Fall 2019 OLLI Catalog (Interactive)

PEER-LED CLASSES (Omnilore)
Common Reading:
Nature’s Mutiny: How the Little Ice
Age of the Long Seventeenth
Century Transformed the West
and Shaped the Present,
by Philipp Blom (February 2019)
(ICE) How The Little Ice Age Changed History
Starting in the fourteenth century and lasting several hundred
years, cooling temperatures disrupted the world’s economic and
social structures—contributing to the rise of the modern world.
This epoch is known as the Little Ice Age, during which average
earth surface temperatures dropped by as much as two degrees
Celsius, or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit. (This is the same amount of
temperature change as the goal to limit global warming now.)
These cooling temperatures and accompanying major storms
reduced crop yields which disrupted the feudal and guild economic
and social structures of the time, giving rise to the modern world.
People migrated, cities grew, food was transported long distances,
banking emerged and money became more important. These social
and economic changes were coincident to the beginnings of modern
science, the Enlightenment, and the innovation of capitalism.
Common Reading:
The Library Book, by Susan Orlean
(October 2018)
(LIB) Libraries
The S/DG will examine the role of libraries in society and in our
lives, as well as reading about the 1986 fire at the Los Angeles
Central Library where we trace the early history of this local library
and its colorful head librarians; we read about the issues that
face libraries today (homeless users) as well as the puzzling selfcontradictory
man who was accused of but probably did not start
the library fire. We’ll study the changes libraries face as interest in
books is being replaced by digital media, the rise of internet use in
libraries, the history of libraries in America, the history of famous
libraries in ancient and medieval history, and the role of the
Library of Congress.
36 OSHER LIFELONG LEARNING INSTITUTE @ CSU DOMINGUEZ HILLS