Wayne G. Basler Chair of Excellence

In 1994, the Wayne G. Basler Chair of Excellence for the Integration of the Arts, Rhetoric, and Science was named in honor of an individual who has continuously supported the university over many years. This chair helps to bridge the gap in academia between the sciences, the arts, and the humanities disciplines. Chairholders serve for one semester, or the equivalent, allowing a number of individuals from a variety of fields to participate over time. The primary duties of the chairholder are to teach two courses, typically one undergraduate and one graduate, and to present four public lectures/performances.

Jason Davis, Basler Chair of Excellence for Fall 2022

Events

• Environmental Music Performance

  Friday, October 14, 7:30 PM Martin Recital Hall, ETSU. Free and open to the public

  2022 ETSU College of Arts and Sciences Basler Chair Jason Davis will present a performance of "environmental music" for solo double bass and an ETSU faculty jazz combo. Jason is a composer, bassist, and the director of Climate Stories Project, an educational and artistic forum for sharing personal stories about climate change. The musicians will improvise to recorded sounds of the natural world, and also perform music that features recorded voices of interviewees speaking about their personal responses to the climate crisis. A short presentation at 7:30 will precede the music performance. Jason has a Doctorate in Music Performance from McGill University and teaches at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts. To learn more about Jason's musical work, please visit this link.

• What's your Climate Story?

  Basler Chair Event by Jason Davis
  Wednesday, October 26th from 5:00 - 7:00 PM EST.

  East Tennessee Room, Culp Center, ETSU Main Campus (Johnson City, TN)

  This is an event open to the community in partnership with the ETSU Department of Sustainability and the College of Arts and Sciences. Dr. Susan McCracken, the newly appointed vice provost for Community Engagement and director of the Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP) will serve as a dignitary for the event. 
  
  
  

• Appalachian Environmental Oral Histories 

  Tuesday, November 29th, 4:30 - 6:30 PM in the Reece Museum

  Students from the College of Arts and Sciences and ETSU Basler Chair, Dr. Jason Davis, will host an opening reception for Appalachian Environmental Oral Histories on Tuesday, November 29 from 4:30-6:30 p.m. at the Reece Museum.  

  Appalachian Environmental Oral Histories will be on display in the Reece Museum as part of the Tennessee Music Pathways exhibition from November 29 until December 9, sharing the space with Tune in on My Memories: The Work & Play of Richard Blaustein. The installation will move to the Tipton Gallery in Downtown Johnson City in the spring. The exhibition will feature oral histories of community members in the Southern Appalachian region speaking about their relationships to the local environment, recorded by ETSU students in the Documenting Environmental Oral History course Davis taught in the Department of Media and Communication. 

   

  The event and exhibition are free and open to the public. For more information contact Dr. Mimi Perreault – perreault@etsu.edu 

Biography

Jason Davis is a musician, educator, and the director of Climate Stories Project, an educational and artistic forum for sharing personal stories about the changing climate. Since 2014, he has been collecting and sharing stories from around the world of people speaking about their personal responses to climate change in their home places. He leads climate storytelling workshops in which participants craft their own climate stories and learn to speak confidently about personal and community connections to the climate crisis. Jason also writes and performs music pieces which integrate elements of recorded climate stories, creating a vivid portrait of the changing climate as expressed through sound and personal testimony. Jason has a doctorate in music from McGill University and teaches at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts. Please visit www.climatestoriesproject.org  to learn more.

Davis is an accomplished bassist, composer, and teacher. His project is an educational and artistic forum for sharing personal and community stories about climate change. Davis leads educational workshops for students and community members who learn to share their own stories of the changing climate he will be leading several during his Basler fellowship. Davis was the featured speaker/performer at the ETSU Blue + Gold = Green Climate Stories Event hosted by online Overlooked in Appalachia in April 2021 (https://www.overlookedinappalachia.org/).

Davis will be teaching a course in Fall 2022 in Media and Communication, which is open to undergraduate and graduate students for students from across the university. 

The course is MCOM 4957/5957: Documenting Environmental Oral History, CRN 85284/85285, WPH 419, Tuesday and Thursday from 4:30 pm – 5:50pm.