Academics
Admissions & Aid
Student Life
About
Info For
We will discuss My Father’s House (The Rome Escape Line Trilogy Book 1) by Joseph O’Connor
In-person class June 4 10:30–11:45 a.m. Instructors: Rotating Facilitators
We will discuss The Hound of the Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It is one of the most famous stories ever written and was the third Sherlock Holmes novel by Conan Doyle. It is considered by some to be the best of them.
In-person class June 11 10:30–11:45 a.m. Instructor: Richard Redmond
The classic book group will discuss Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann, Part 9 to the end. It is a saga chronicling the decline of a wealthy north German merchant family over the course of four generations.
In-person class June 25 10:30–11:45 a.m. Instructor: Richard Redmond is retired from the IT department of a major investment bank. Prior to that he worked as a librarian for many years.
The course will include video clips covering physical comedy, sketches, and the notable stand-up comedians of our lifetime. We’ll try to understand the elements that make for successful comedy and get plenty of laughs along the way.
In-person class June 4–18 1–2:15 p.m. Instructor: Robert Mishaan is a member of BLL and has taught a number of classes on varied subjects that he believes would be of interest to fellow members.
This class will present students with a bold new interpretation of the First World War. It will argue that the welter of colonial wars that encircled the world from the mid-19th century to the early 20th constituted a world war. The general European war that broke out in the summer of 1914 was peripheral to this ongoing war, though it altered its longer-term trajectory.
In-person class June 18 10:30–11:45 a.m. Instructor: Professor Steven Remy has taught modern European and world history at Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center since 2002. He is the author of four books dealing with Nazi Germany and the occupation of post-World War II Germany, war crimes trials, the life of Adolf Hitler, and the history of war crimes and war crimes law since the 19th century.
We will watch and discuss some fascinating TED Talks together in which outstanding thinkers tell about their cutting-edge work, understanding our past, make their predictions for the future and generally amaze their audiences.
In-person class June 25–August 20, except July 30 1–2:15 p.m. Instructor: Maura McGovern served as a teacher (from AP Biology through General Science) and guidance counselor for 40 years at a local public high school. She still found time to read history and classics of English literature. It gives her great pleasure to work with other lifelong learners.
This PBS series highlights the progress of Black Americans living in the North during the late 19th century and early 20th century, In the long years from slavery to desegregation African Americans constructed their own society and, in doing so, established networks that resisted, and eventually toppled, Jim Crow, while giving birth to new cultural forms that transformed world culture, from literature to jazz. Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. inverts the standard narrative of history as a battleground over the repressive, violent forces of white supremacy and instead centers the arc on the private and communal lives of those who, trapped by Jim Crow rule, nevertheless created a diverse, and vibrant, world of their own.
In-person class July 9–30 10:30–11:45 a.m. Instructor: Annette Libert has been a registered nurse/administrator and educator for 45 years. She has facilitated many training sessions and classes for BLL.
This class is intended as a mixed age group, with both young students and BLL-er’s. Professor Aronin will provide the members of the younger generation. We will have open freeform discussions between the generations on large general topics. Some topics could be: responsibility, equality, freedom, life goals, morality, and ethics.
Online class July 23–August 6 2:30–4:30 p.m. Instructor: Professor Richard Aronin has many years of experience negotiating at all levels of business. He enjoys teaching as and is/was an adjunct professor of CUNY, NYU and Touro. He is currently on the board of directors at the Institute of Supply Management-New York (ISMNY), a progressive, nonprofit association.
Professor Ranjitsingh continues the exploration of Caribbean migration to the United States she began last summer. She will discuss the history of the Caribbeanization of New York City, that is the increasing impact of Caribbean immigrants and citizens on the city, and the creation of Caribbean diasporic spaces such as Flatbush, Brooklyn.
In-person class August 6 10:30 am–noon Instructor: Aleah N. Ranjitsingh, Ph.D. is a Caribbean immigrant from Trinidad and Tobago, and first came to the United States to pursue a degree at Brooklyn College. Several years later, she found herself back at her alma mater as an Assistant Professor in the Africana Studies Department and Caribbean Studies Program. Her research focuses on the Caribbean and the Caribbean diaspora, where she interrogates the concepts of gender, race, mixed race, Blackness, identity, and diaspora. She is the co-author of Dougla in the 21st Century: Adding to the Mix, a study of race and the mixed race Dougla identity in the Caribbean and the Caribbean diaspora, which was published by the University of Mississippi Press in June 2021.
Great things are happening in the world of science today. Read and bring the Tuesday, NY Times science section to class for our informative discussions about the latest breakthroughs.
Online class June 5–August 21 10:30–11:30 a.m. Facilitator: David Krupp taught in the NYC schools for 45 years.
Staying abreast of current events allows you to have a better understanding of the world around you. It helps you form informed opinions and make decisions about issues that affect your life. Participants will discuss local, national, and international news. Come tell us what you think.
Online class June 5–August 21 12:30–2 p.m. Facilitator: Robert Mishaan
This class explores the creativeness, inventiveness and achievements of a time period maligned as dark. We will learn about the impact of the Crusades on Western Europe and how Western Europeans of that period spent their free time.
In-person class June 20 10:30–11:45 a.m. Instructor: Marianne Gennari not only has experience in the field of money laundering and fraud, she also minored in medieval studies at SUNY Binghamton.
About 12 million immigrants landed on Ellis Island, the first outpost of the American Federal Immigration Station in the Upper New York Bay, and the ultimate gateway to the United-States of America. However, when they arrived, their fates did not always belong to them. In those decisive hours, when federal immigration inspectors decided who could enter the country and who was sent home, the Melting Pot was born.
In-person class June 20 1–2:15 p.m. Instructor: Annette Libert
We continue our exploration of the religions, this time focusing on the history and philosophy of the 1st and 2nd centuries CE and how they led to the rise of Judaism and Christianity. Professor Shaye Cohen explains why Jews and Christians argue over the interpretation of the Bible.
July 11 and 18 10:30-11:45 a.m. Instructor: Rona Goldwitz is a member of the BLL board of directors. She enjoys finding fascinating topics to present to fellow BLL-er’s and hopes these subjects delight them as much as they do her.
The ideas of intrinsic nature (sex, race), and social nature (gender, ethnicity) and their relationships are examined both in American society and other cultures.
In-person class July 11 and 18 1–2:15 p.m. Instructor: John Beatty, Prof. Emeritus, anthropology has taught in several departments at Brooklyn College and other colleges around the U.S., Germany, and Japan. His major areas academically are cultural anthropology, and linguistics and has a strong interest in astronomy and dinosaurs! He has an interest in performance and has performed in films and on stage both as a person and as a puppeteer.
Who was Eunice Hunton Carter? How did she take down New York City Mafioso Charles “Lucky” Luciano?
Online class August 1 10:30 a.m.–noon Instructor: Phyllis Harris strives to increase her sense of wonder now that she has the time after becoming rewired (retired) in 2021. She enjoys exploring multiple topics with others that are educational, often unexpected, and sometimes quirky.
As we age, we start to lose friends, family, and acquaintances to death at an increasing rate. We also know that our own end will be coming. What are the physical and emotional changes experienced by a dying person? Understanding these can help us help our loved ones and can also calm our fears about what is to come for ourselves.
In-person class August 8 and 15 10:30–11:45 a.m. Instructors: Rona Goldwitz and Annette Libert
Cultural understandings of the world and universe we live in vary dramatically across cultures. Of interest here are the concepts of life, death, and the ways in which different cultures conceive of and respond to them.
In-person class August 8 and 15 1–2:15 p.m. Instructor: John Beatty, Professor Emeritus
Be a part of the Brooklyn Lifelong Learning community.
