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Lectures, March 16, 2007
“A New Medical Specialty”
Dr. Hernán Drobny
Fri, Mar 16, 3pm
Teatro Santa Ana
Insurgentes 25
50 pesos
“Oh, great!” you must be thinking. Another specialist in medical care. The irony is that medicine has become so specialized and fragmented that a specialty that provides a broader and more comprehensive perspective on the whole person and their personal values and preferences has become necessary. Patient advocacy is a new specialty that can coordinate between the different specialties and can advocate for both the patient and family. Although this could be done by the primary care provider or family doctor, they are often too busy to do this effectively. Also, many people do not have primary care providers.
Medical decisions can be so complicated. Choices must be made under duress, perhaps when we are feeling sick and afraid. At these times it is difficult to think clearly and critically. Often, there are no easy answers. A guiding principle of medical ethics is respect for patient autonomy-your right to make personal decisions about matters affecting your health. To exercise this right, you must truly understand your treatment options. This is also a part of the new medical specialty being developed that centers on the patient, rather than the health care establishment.
After 32 years in primary care practice in internal medicine at the University of Michigan, I established one of the first consulting practices as a patient advocate. In this new area of work, I have consulted with individuals who want help in navigating the medical establishment and deciding among treatment options, and with individuals who want someone without conflicts of interest to help them critically consider what to do.
The lecture, which presents examples from my patient advocacy practice, is followed by an interactive discussion of issues to which audience members may want to contribute and consider. Proceeds will support the Biblioteca Pública and CASA.
“Just Plain Folk Music”
By Elsmarie Norby
Tues, Mar 20, 3pm
Sala Quetzal, Biblioteca Pública
Insurgentes 25
Elsmarie Norby will combine listening and discussion in her delightful lecture: “Just Plain Folk Music.” She will discuss the limitless world of music that has come from ordinary people in their ordinary lives throughout human history. Why does music matter? Why is music an integral part of every time and place? What makes someone a musician? Come to listen, share, and leave with lots of new ideas.
Cross-cultural lectures
by Beldon Butterfield
Tues, Mar 20; Thurs, Mar 22;
Tues, Mar 27; Thurs Mar 29, 5–6pm
Warren Hardy Spanish School
San Rafael 6
Once again, Beldon Butterfield hosts a series of lectures regarding cross-cultural issues. In the first, “Face Behind the Mask” on March 20 and 22, he discusses the Mexican instinct to regard the world as dangerous, which one can understand through an awareness of Mexican history. On March 27, Butterfield discusses “Cross-culture,” including the Mexican penchant for American lifestyles and products despite a traditional suspicion and hostility towards the US.
Finally, on March 29, he discusses San Miguel in “The Bubble Effect,” which primarily focuses on the issue of whether or not San Miguel is the real Mexico.
These lectures are sponsored by the Warren Hardy Spanish School,located at San Rafael 6 in front of the San Juan de Dios Church. Seating capacity is limited to approximately 60 people and the last series was completely filled.
Mr. Butterfield came to Mexico with TIME INC.. in 1962. For more information, call Beldon or Kate Butterfield at 152-2796 or Tuli Hardy at 154-4017.
“Why Is the US in Iraq?”
With John Barham, Cliff DuRand and Gregory Diamant
Wed, Mar 21, 10:30am
Sala Quetzal, Biblioteca Pública
Insurgentes 25
50 pesos
So, we all know there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. And Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. We also know that the US has supported many brutal dictators around the world, Saddam Hussein among them. Some say this is part of a larger clash of civilizations called the war on terror. But Iraq was not a source of Islamic terrorism until the US military invaded. All the familiar excuses for the 2003 invasion of Iraq just don’t hold water. Why, then, is the US in Iraq?
Oil is the usual answer. But just how black gold figured into the administration’s calculations needs to be understood more clearly. How does this fit into the US’s role in the world as well as its geo-political strategy? And, is this view limited just to the neo-conservatives who now control the White House?
These are some of the deeper questions that will be explored by a panel discussion on Wednesday, March 21. Panelists include historian John Barham, social philosopher Cliff DuRand and Gregory Diamant.
The Magnificent Maya: Part II
By Professor Guillermo Méndez
Wed, Mar 21, 3pm
Teatro Santa Ana
Insurgentes 25
50 pesos
The Maya were the most advanced of all the ancient civilizations of Mesoamerica. They inhabited southern Mexico, Belize, Guatemala and the western boundary of Honduras and El Salvador. Although they used no wheeled vehicles of any kind, they built cities and paved roadways; their astronomers plotted the movements of the visible planets and stars using a mathematics that included zero, a rare accomplishment in world history. They were the only people in the New World to develop a complete language that could express anything spoken in writing.
The Magnificent Maya: Part II is the follow-up lecture to Part I, given last week by Professor Guillermo Méndez. The focus of Part II is Mayan religion, politics and sex.
Religion permeated every aspect of ancient Mayan life. Everything in nature was sacred and possessed spiritual energy. Maya cosmology was complex but intimately connected with daily life. Mayan politics in the Classic Period (AD 250–900) centered on semi-divine kings who ruled and expanded their influence through warfare, marital unions, they could have “secondary” wives, and diplomacy. A beautiful (sexy) Mayan, male or female, would have had an intentionally-deformed skull, filed and inlaid teeth, decorative facial scars and, if lucky, slightly crossed eyes.
“Latin America Tilts Left”
By Henry Veltmeyer
Fri, Mar 23, 1pm
Sala Quetzal, Biblioteca Pública
Insurgentes 25
50 pesos
Neoliberalism is dead, or at least dying. It is evident that the economic model that has been in force all over Latin America (and the world, actually) over the past two decades is economically dysfunctional and totally unsustainable both socially and politically. One reason for this is that the type of capitalism that it promotes is extraordinarily socially exclusive, benefiting few and hurting and damaging many. For one thing, neoliberalism is associated with a dramatic increase—to a criminal degree—in social inequalities in the distribution of wealth and income.
But people are not laying down and simply accepting this situation. In Latin America, for example, neoliberal macroeconomic policies have generated widespread resistance that has surfaced in powerful social movements in the popular sector of Latin American society. Another response to neoliberalism has been at the level of national politics with the emergence of new center-left regimes dedicated to providing an alternative to neoliberalism. Latin America’s political landscape today is littered with variations of this political development. The apparent leftist tilts in national politics can be seen in the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela; in the historic coming to state power of the indigenous movement in Bolivia and Ecuador; in the formation of a Workers’ Party government in Brazil; in a socialist government in Chile; in a government in Argentina that has challenged the US and the international financial institutions that do its bidding.
These developments will be analyzed by Henry Veltmeyer, author of numerous books on Latin America, among them his most recent Social Movements and State Power: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador, which he co-authored with James Petras. He is Professor of International Development Studies at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and at Universidad Autónoma de Zacatecas in Zacatecas, Mexico.
Professor Veltmeyer examines the meaning of the apparent leftist tilt in Latin American politics and assesses the challenges faced and the prospects for an alternative to neoliberalism—prospects for the creation of another world.
Bioenergy III: “The Cosmic Music”
Thurs, Mar 23, 5pm
Sala Quetzal, Biblioteca Pública
Insurgentes 25
By donation
Guillermo Galindo Endo continues his series of lectures on bioenergy, in a talk titled, “The Cosmic Music.”
In Bioenergy I and II it was proposed that material, energy and electromagnetism are three individual and equal forces, which are in balance in this universe. Without those three forces, nothing in our whole universe could exist.
We understand that everything that exists, even us, is based on relationships between those three forces. Energy is everything that can perform a job or change a status. Materia is everything that occupies space. And, according to Dr. Aureliano Horta, magnetism is the rotational alignment of the smallest particles, which are part of everything.
This, of course, applies also to the human body, but it is not all that makes us human beings. Dra. Esther del Río, a Mexican biologist, discovered that within the human body, our cells and systems are connected in continuous communication processes in the form of electrical signals, magnetic frequencies and light hologram systems. This means that we are not only three-dimensional but that we communicate in multi-dimensional ways within our physical body. Current theories consider that our universe is made of at least 11 dimensions. How do we access these other dimensions?
In his third lecture about bioenergy, Guillermo Galindo Endo expounds on the idea that the universe is vibration—just like music or a cosmic song—that never stops but plays forever. If we are sensitive to this cosmic music, we will be able to open our minds to the other dimensions.
“Anti-aging Therapies”
with Dr. Hugo Montppellier
Sat, Mar 24, 11am
Villa Jacaranda Hotel Theater
Aldama 53
There are many benefits to be gained from anti-aging therapies, according to Dr. Hugo Montppellier, a certified member of the National College of Anti-Aging Medicine and Master of Medicine, Anti-Aging, of Las Lomas Hospital in Mexico City. “From increased energy and libido to muscle mass, we’ll discuss the benefits of hormone regulation therapies for people over 50 years old,” he said. “And it’s not just women who should be concerned with hormone regulation therapy.”
Montppellier notes that growth hormone and testosterone replacement therapies, as reported in medical journals such as The Clinical Journal of Endocrinology, are being cited for improving the cardiovascular system. He also discusses stress control and its relation to insulin and cortisol regulation for defending against dementia and possibly Alzheimer’s disease. Because the change in hormone levels after age 50 can also cause weight gain in many people, he will talk about the use of FDA-approved medical weight loss programs and supplements that one cannot just assemble off-the-shelf. Dr. Montppellier wants to make us “better from the inside out.” Since aging is seen on our faces, too, he has invited Dr. Olhovich to participate and offer consultations on the use of botox and restylane for wrinkle and frown-line reduction.
Dr. Montppellier, also a member of the American Academy and Latin Society of Anti-Aging Medicine, will have clinical assistants present to take blood samples for a work-up on persons interested in learning more about how anti-aging and longevity therapies apply to them. Following this first off-site clinic and information session Dr. Montppellier will continue this program in San Miguel every two weeks. There is no cost to attend, but please call the hotel at 152-1015 for a reservation.
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