Are you ready to get nerdy!?
Think TED talks with beer. Discovery Channel meets Drunk History.

Be there AND be square!

Speakers

"Fire Spinning 101: How to Be Hot, but Not Get Crispy"
by Jor Dansaren

Ever seen those cool hippies playing with fire at a festival and wondered how one gets into that stuff? Well, it's lucky Jor is here - she'll tell you a bit about fire spinning as a whole, then take you through some basic best practice!

Jor has been engaging in intentional, controlled pyromania for over a decade, amongst other artistic pursuits. She has previously helped organise and run fire spinning communities in Ōtautahi and Pōneke. While she picks up her fire props less often nowadays, she still loves to educate on how to have fun fire spinning, whilst keeping yourself, your environment, and your friends safe!

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"Let’s Talk About Sex Baby"
by Dr Jessica Tappin

We might think words simply describe reality. But what if they help create it? Jessica will explore how the way we use language shapes our understanding of the world and why this matters when it comes to talking about sex.

Jessica works at Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa Massey University teaching and researching in critical health psychology. Her PhD was about mediated depictions of sexual desire and implications for wellbeing. She is interested in how language and culture influence what we see as normal, natural or common sense, and what becomes possible when we start questioning those ideas.

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“Minority Language Dictionary-Making”
by Lee Fraser

Making a dictionary for a language that hasn’t had one before: Why would you, where do you start, and when are you finished? A dictionary can’t be political, can it? Who decides what’s too taboo to include?

Poet and former field linguist Lee Fraser will flip us through some complexities of this ‘ordinary’ thing. She’s contributed in dictionary-making in Papua New Guinea and Kenya, and wrote a slam-winning poem out of a research project on the Oxford Dictionary of New Zealandisms.

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Contact the host of Nerd Nite ChCh #42: Setting Fire to the Dictionary

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