Events

On the week of October 22nd, Pittsburgh museums and cultural institutions will host Power Beyond Extraction, an event series curated by The Natural History Museum that looks at power in terms of both energy and the people power needed to bring about the just transition to a clean energy economy. Timed to coincide with the Shale Insight Conference, an annual convening and conversation about the future of energy hosted by industry, Power Beyond Extraction invites community leaders, activists, artists, and scholars to contribute to this city-wide conversation of regional, international, and inter-generational importance.

Three leaders of traditional Bay Area territories will speak from the heart about historical and contemporary events that have left them landless and without federal recognition, the impact of this situation on their people, the work they are doing to reclaim culture and re-assert their claim to these lands, and why Indigenous presence matters as San Francisco emerges as one of the wealthiest cities on the planet and a hub for tech corporations and real estate speculation.

On Indigenous Peoples’ Day, canoes representing tribes from up and down the West Coast and beyond will take to the waters of San Francisco Bay and circle Alcatraz Island to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the 1969 Occupation of Alcatraz by the Red Power movement.

How can scientists better amplify their voices in today’s fractured public sphere? This discussion panel will convene a group of eminent scientific researchers who have also stepped into the public limelight around issues of critical contemporary importance.

This discussion panel will feature a group of museum professionals and activists who have helped move the sector in significant new directions by stressing the responsibility of museums to their publics in the broadest possible sense.