Upcoming

Thursday, April 2, 2026, 12:00 – 1:00pm PST

Join us for a webinar featuring University of Oregon’s James Buckley in conversation with ICW Co-Director Bill Deverell. Centered on Buckley’s book In City of Wood, the discussion explores how capitalists and workers logged California’s redwood forests to generate the materials and financial capital that built San Francisco. Blending labor, urban, industrial, and social history, Buckley reveals how the remote woods and the urban core functioned as interconnected poles in a dynamic regional system. Discover how capitalist resource extraction linked distant landscapes to the making of a modern metropolis.

Register Now: bit.ly/icwbuckley

James Michael Buckley is an urban planner and historian in San Francisco, CA. He holds a Master’s degree in urban planning and a PhD in Architecture from UC Berkeley and has taught at UC Berkeley, MIT, and the University of Oregon. His book, City of Wood: San Francisco and the Architecture of the Redwood Lumber Industry  has been awarded the Abbott Lowell Cummings Award (Vernacular Architecture Forum, 2025), the J.B. Jackson Award (American Association of Geographers, 2025), and the John Brinckerhoff Jackson Book Prize (UVA Center for Cultural Landscapes, 2025).

To purchase City of Wood: San Francisco and the Architecture of the Redwood Lumber Industry,  please click here.

Friday, April 17, 2026, 12:00 – 1:00pm PST

Join ICW and Third LA for a lively conversation with USC Professor of English David Ulin, ICW Co-Director Bill Deverell, and author Chiara Barzini as they discuss California’s complicated history with water. Barzini will draw on her research for her new book, Aqua, in which she explores how the LA Aqueduct shaped LA’s landscape and film history, both in culture, myth, and economic reality.

Register Now: bit.ly/icw-april17th

Chiara Barzini is an Italian author and screenwriter, nominated among the 100 most influential Women of 2020 by Forbes Italy. She is the author of the story collection Sister Stop Breathing (Calamari Press), the novel Things That Happened Before The Earthquake (Doubleday), and an upcoming non-fiction book about the Los Angeles aqueduct and the reckless dreams called Aqua (Canongate), published in Italy in April 2025 with the title L’Ultima Acqua (Einaudi).

David Ulin is Professor of the Practice of English, and editor of the journal Air/Light. He is the author or editor of 20 books, including the novel Thirteen Question Method; Sidewalking: Coming to Terms with Los Angeles, shortlisted for the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay; and Writing Los Angeles: A Literary Anthology, which won a California Book Award. The former book editor and book critic of the Los Angeles Times, he has written for The Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, Virginia Quarterly Review, The Paris Review, and The New York Times; his essay “Bed” was selected for The Best American Essays 2020. He has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, and Ucross Foundation, as well as a COLA-IMAP Master Artist Grant from the City of Los Angeles. He has also edited The Didion Collection, including Didion: The 1960s and 70s, Didion: The 1980s and 90s, and Didion: Memoirs and Later Writings, for Library of America.

Thursday, April 30, 2026, 12:00 – 1:00pm PST

Join editors Jared Aldern and Theresa Gregor for a dynamic conversation celebrating the release of Landkeeping: Restoring Indigenous Fire Stewardship and Ecological Partnerships, forthcoming in April 2026 from Oregon State University Press. Landkeeping offers powerful and engaging perspectives on Indigenous fire stewardship and its vital role in ecological health, cultural continuity, and land-based kinship. In this webinar, the authors will discuss the book’s collaborative vision, the resurgence of Indigenous fire practices, and how renewed ecological partnerships can guide more just and resilient futures. Don’t miss this opportunity to hear directly from the contributors about the ideas, relationships, and on-the-ground work that shaped this important new volume.

Register Now: bit.ly/landkeeping

Jared Aldern is a grant writer, historian, fire practitioner, and a cofounder of the Sierra-Sequoia Burn Cooperative; he has over thirty years of experience partnering and collaborating with Tribal Nations in California.

Theresa Lynn Gregor, a Kumeyaay and Yoéme scholar, researches California American Indian women, Tribal sovereignty, cultural revitalization, and environmental resilience. She leads Mataguay Consulting Services LLC to support Indigenous sovereignty, nonprofit leadership, community service, and survivance.