All things Taylor Swift to viewed through an academic lens at North Central College’s ‘TayTalks’ – Chicago Tribune

What do Plato and J. Robert Oppenheimer have to do with Taylor Swift?

North Central College faculty members are going to tell you.

Wednesday night, the Naperville college is hosting a series of “TayTalks.” That’s right, a whole evening of faculty presentations about the superstar herself. Call yourself a Swiftie? Buckle up. Speakers are set to celebrate and discuss Swift through the context of everything from physical therapy to physics.

Her reputation precedes her — in more ways than one, and in more subjects than you’d think would be apropos in the singer-songwriter’s prolific career.

The series, free and open to the public, is surely seeped in a little Swift-mania. Really, what better way to entice a night of discussion than tapping into the global phenomenon. But it’s also a creative means of showing how one figure — albeit, one of the world’s best-selling artists with an NFL tight end beau to boot — can be examined through a liberal arts lens.

Eight TayTalks led by 10 North Central professors and lecturers will command the college’s Wentz Concert Hall. Presentations start at 7 p.m. but true to Swiftie form, there will be a reception an hour before the event starts at which attendees can make and trade friendship bracelets à la the tradition at Swift’s Eras Tour.

North Central students and alumni also will be presenting their own creative works inspired by Swift.

Though it’s no worldwide concert, don’t be afraid to dress up for the occasion, organizers say. It’s hard to ignore the sequins-draped allure of dolling up for an event with lecture titles like, “‘If I was a man, I’d be the man’: Catchy Song Lyrics or Ethical Corporate Conundrum?” and “Super Bowl Pie.”

Jennifer Smith, for one, will be wearing an outfit inspired by Swift’s latest album, “The Tortured Poets Department.”

Smith, professor and chair of English at North Central as well as the brain behind TayTalks, kept the details of her planned look close to the vest she promised something well-worthy of Wednesday’s glittering affair.

She even has a daytime outfit to wear as she teaches in the hours ahead of the big event.

“I teach starting at 8 a.m. on Wednesdays,” Smith said. “So I’ve got an outfit for my daytime, and that includes sequins. It’s a bit more ‘Lover’ era.”

As an English professor, Smith said she has long revered Swift’s storytelling but that interest was casual until 2018, when she saw the singer during her “Reputation” stadium tour.

“I found myself … waiting for all the new music to drop, reading the theories, listening to the albums on repeat,” Smith said.

Her scholarly interest swiftly followed suit. The 2020 releases of the “Folklore” and “Evermore,” albums stirred the academic in her for their “sustained engagement with literary texts.”

Smith’s fascination, both as a listener and an educator, has held firm since. It’s even taken her across the world.

In February, Smith attended the “Swiftposium” in Melbourne, Australia, a two-day academic conference studying all things Swift. She was one of 130 presenters at the international event, which strung together talks on topics ranging from translating Swift’s music to different languages to her influence on the field of marketing.

Her experience at the event is what inspired TayTalks. Coming off of the conference, Smith remembered sitting down for a meeting with other faculty at which they were talking about how students were struggling to define the liberal arts and how they as educators could help facilitate better understanding.

Mid-meeting, Smith had an idea: employ Swift. She messaged the dean of her college and pitched the beginnings of what would become TayTalks. He was immediately on board.

“What’s great about the liberal arts is that you could take a subject like Swift and you can find meaning in it differently based on what disciplinary lens you use. …You can use the liberal arts to understand something more deeply and broadly,” Smith said. “And it shows students that the questions with which you approach a subject determines the answers you find.”

Take assistant professor of physical therapy Leanna Blanchard. She and two of her colleagues in North Central’s Doctor of Physical Therapy Program — Jamie LaPenna and Sarah Tylkowski — will be speaking to Swift’s Eras Tour as a testament to human movement.

They will examine the way Swift moves throughout her three-plus-hour shows as well as how she reportedly takes care of herself to keep up the months-long tour, Blanchard said.

“We want attendees to walk away with a new appreciation for what Taylor is putting her body through” whether they’re watching her performance in person or when tour moments show up on their TikTok feeds, she said.

Blanchard herself has seen the test in endurance live on several occasions.

“I’ve been to the Eras Tour three different times. Don’t judge me,” she quipped.

Asked about the experience, Blanchard couldn’t help but gush. “It was amazing,” she said.

It’s been fun to blend a personal passion with her professional work, Blanchard said. She hopes the feeling is reflected to students and attendees in general Wednesday.

Fellow self-proclaimed Swiftie and math professor Katherine Heller echoed her colleague.

“I want to see (attendees) leave having had a fun evening and also feeling inspired,” she said. “Even if Taylor Swift isn’t their favorite — I mean, that’s hard for me to imagine — that they walk away and start to think about their favorite artist and how they can take it beyond just enjoying their music.”

Heller’s talk will focus on the mathematical constant known as the “golden ratio” and how it applies to Swift’s music. She says she hopes to convey that the theories and concepts studied in the classroom, even in math, can be applied to real-world settings.

That goes for the other TayTalks on tap.

Assistant professor of physics Susan Kempinger’s presentation — “‘I did something bad’: Scientific Ethics and J. Robert Oppenheimer” — will look at questions of autonomy, public opinion and regret by comparing Swift to the case of Oppenheimer and the atomic bomb.

Associate professor of philosophy Shaheen Moosa will draw parallels between Swift’s music and Plato’s philosophical work, while academic services librarian Laura Cameron will discuss concepts of mis- and disinformation through rumors that have circulated about Swift.

A full preview can be found at https://www.northcentralcollege.edu/tay-talks. Though free, tickets are required.

tkenny@chicagotribune.com