Humanities Mixtape

Rewinding the 1980s

Bismarck State College is going back to the 80s with the multidisciplinary Humanities Symposium, presented by Bringing Humanities to Life at BSC. This event explores how people remember and interpret an iconic decade in recent history from the perspective of 2025. The event takes place from Oct. 22 to 24 at the Advanced Technology Center.

This symposium takes a humanities-based lens and explores a variety of topics, including how pop culture and trends laud and celebrate the era, particularly when it comes to popular culture itself. It also considers what the 1980s imagined about today as well as local, national, and international topics and trends rooted in the 1980s.

The events included at the symposium range from a music performance by local group Rift and a screening of “Beetlejuice” (1988). Speakers include local author Sarah Vogel, Prairie Public News Director Dave Thompson, and author and essayist Chuck Klosterman.

Bringing Humanities to Life has had a key role in organizing this symposium. This group was originally funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities. Associate Professor of English Michael Tomanek is part of Bringing Humanities to Life and has experience with organizing symposiums in the past.

“We have a committee of about 15 people or so that combines faculty from the humanities, some faculty that are technically outside of the humanities, but also a couple community members,” Tomanek said. “We get what we have because we're working off of these proceeds [the grants] every year.”

Tomanek added that BSC has a history of symposiums. Symposiums in the past have included a 10 year anniversary of 9/11, a symposium on John F. Kennedy in 2013, and another symposium on the 1960s. The symposiums came to a halt in 2020, when COVID struck and delayed a symposium on American bison until 2022. That was the last symposium. Until now.

“As we've been trying to find and identify different ways that we can leverage this fund, we thought ‘well why not pick up this tradition [of having symposiums], and we're 40 to 45 years out from the 1980s,” Tomanek said. “We said ‘let's do [the symposium] on the 1980s and get all sorts of speakers and activities that … celebrate as well as try to understand why we are so fascinated with [the 1980s] right now.’”

Tomanek mentioned that, with the re-release of 80s movies and 80s pop culture trends returning, Bringing Humanities to Life settled on the theme and sought to bring the event to the Advanced Technology Center to showcase the new building.

Anyone is welcome to attend the symposium. Here, attendees can reflect on the past, examine the present, and imagine the future. Registration is free for students, and students are asked to register for the event before attending. Check your BSC email for the full schedule of events.