On 27 November, 2007, Ms. Gisela Erbsloeh, Freelance Radio Journalist, Baden-Baden, gives her assessment of the Kadyrov government in Chechnya and details some of travels to the capital city Grozny in Chechnya (Russia) in the spring and late summer 2006 in a brownbag titled: “The Fracturing of Chechen Society.”

During a public lecture at the Kansas Union on 27 November, Ms. Gisela Erbsloeh, Freelance Radio Journalist, Baden-Baden, explains the role that the Prometheus legend plays among the Chechen and Ingush peoples in a lecture titled: “Prometheus' Daughter: Women among the Ruins of the North Caucasus.”

On 6 November 2007, Dr. Shana Penn, Visiting Scholar, Center for Jewish Studies, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, CA gave the CREES Brownbag lecture titled: “The Revitalization of Jewish culture in Post-Communist Poland.”

Dr. Shana Penn, who is a visiting scholar at the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California, was invited on 5 November 2007 to give the annual Oswald Backus Lecture in Russian and East European Studies. The title of her lecture was “Solidarity's Secret: The Women Who Defeated Communism in Poland.” Here Dr. Penn describes some of the research that became part of her award-winning book under the same title.

Major Kevin Thompson, Mr. Rob Kurz and 1LT Chuck Bartles, FMSO, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas present how they perform open-source research and analysis in a brownbag titled: “Foreign Military Studies Office, Ft Leavenworth - Background, Mission, and Way Ahead,” 30 October 2007.

Jerry Mikkelson, CREES, KU provides interesting biographical background to his brownbag titled: “Boris Pasternak and Doctor Zhivago: Fifty Years Since the Nobel Award,” 23 October 2007.

In her brownbag titled, “Spatial Patterns of Public Concerns and Political Opinion in Azerbaijan,” Dr. Shannon O’Lear, Geography, KU, explains the background to her research and the methodology she used in gathering data in this country. 2 October 2007.

In a public lecture titled, “Escaping Communist Czechoslovakia: Five Friends, 20,000 Enemy Troops, and the Secret That Could Have Changed the Course of the Cold War,” Author, Barbara Masin, explains the genesis of her book “Gauntlet.” 24 September 2007.

Dr. Margaret Paxson, Senior Associate, Kennan Institute, reads excerpts from her book, Solovyovo: The Story of Memory in a Russian Village, and then discusses her research methodology in a brownbag titled: "What's in a Story?: Memory, History, and Research Methodologies," given on 18 September 2007.

Margarita Karnysheva, KU PhD Candidate, History, discusses some of the complex border issues between and among the various ethnic groups in central Siberia in a brownbag labeled: "Aga, Ust-Orda and the Republic of Buriatia: the Buriats across the Borders," given on 11 September 2007.

Dr. Norman Saul, History, KU, explains some of the biographical intricacies of Charles Crane during a brownbag titled: "Charles Crane, American Globalist and Foremost Russophile," presented on 4 September 2007.

Dr. Alex Tsiovkh, CREES, KU, discusses some of the political perplexities in the current Ukrainian government in a brownbag titled: "The Orange, post-Orange, and post-post-Orange battle goes on: Ukraine - Summer '07," given on 28 August 2007.