The Salvation Army’s New Jersey’s Third Annual Kettle Kick-Off began on Tuesday, November 28. It is known as Giving Tuesday, with Red Kettle stands at New Jersey train stations including the Trenton Transit Center and Hamilton.

Trenton City Mayor Eric E. Jackson and Trenton Thunder mascot Boomer were on hand at the Trenton station. Morning commuters at Newark Penn Station and Secaucus Junction also saw the Red Kettle stands. The goal is to raise $1.9 million. Funds collected during the campaign will provide for families and individuals across the state during the holiday season and year-round, sustaining the programs and services from The Salvation Army that help people in need manage their daily lives. more

Womanspace recently announced the appointment of new board of directors members Charles Walker, Joanne Barlow, Salim Manzar, and Michelle Bajwa.

Walker has over 30 years of leadership and business experience, having served as a U.S. Army Infantry Officer, a marketer at Johnson & Johnson, and an executive at several software companies and advertising agencies. He is currently co-president and chief operating officer of Cadient Group, a global advertising agency acquired by Cognizant.  more

Rhodri Lewis and Leonard Barkan will be talking about Lewis’s book Hamlet and the Vision of Darkness (Princeton Univ. Press) at Labyrinth Books on Wednesday, December 6 at 6 p.m.

Rhodri Lewis and Leonard Barkan will discuss Lewis’s radical new interpretation of the most famous play in the English language. By exploring Shakespeare’s engagements with the humanist traditions of early modern England and Europe, Lewis reveals a Hamlet unseen for centuries: an innovative, coherent, and exhilaratingly bleak tragedy in which the governing ideologies of Shakespeare’s age are scrupulously upended. more

Alvin Felzenberg and Charles Stile will be discussing Felzenberg’s new book, The Man and His Presidents: The Political Odyssey of William Buckley Jr. (Yale University Press) at Labyrinth Books on Thursday, November 30 at 6 p.m.

William F. Buckley Jr. is widely regarded as the most influential American conservative writer, activist, and organizer in the postwar era.  more

Vox Blue and Vox Blue Too will present a concert titled “What is Old is New Again” on Sunday, December 3 at 4 p.m. in the Bart Luedeke Center Theater on the campus of Rider University in Lawrenceville. Led by the ensemble’s conductor, Tim Brent, the program will feature timeless works from the Great American Songbook by George Gershwin, Richard Rodgers, and Lorenz Hart, as well as popular music by artists Stevie Wonder, Paul Simon, and others. more

The Lewis Center for the Arts’ Program in Dance at Princeton University presents the annual Princeton Dance Festival, in which 51 Princeton dance students will perform repertory works by Bill T. Jones and Ohad Naharin and premiere new works by Alexandra Beller, Rebecca Lazier, Brian Reeder, Olivier Tarpaga, and Raphael Xavier. Four performances will take place: December 1 at 8 p.m., December 2 at 2 p.m. and 8 p.m., and December 3 at 1 p.m. at the Berlind Theatre at McCarter Theatre Center. Reserved seating tickets for the Princeton Dance Festival are $12 in advance of show dates, $8 for students, $12 for seniors, and $17 purchased the day of performances at the box office.

Tickets are available online through arts.princeton.edu/dancefestival, by calling the McCarter box office at (609) 258-2787, at the Frist Campus Center or Lewis Arts complex ticket offices, and at the door on the night of performances.

Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison, Robert F. Goheen Professor in the Humanities, Emeritus, delivered the keynote address last week at Princeton University’s Princeton & Slavery Project Symposium investigating the University’s historical engagement with the institution of slavery. Morrison, left, was introduced by U.S. Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith, the Roger S. Berlind ’52 Professor of the Humanities Director and Professor of Creative Writing. Following the speech, the University renamed West College Morrison Hall, in Morrison’s honor. (Photo Courtesy of Princeton University, Office of Communications, Denise Applewhite)

Rago Arts and Auction Center in Lambertville is presenting a talk by author and historian Joseph A. Williams on his latest book, The Sunken Gold: A Story of World War I, Espionage, and the Greatest Treasure Salvage in History. The event will be held on Tuesday, November 28 at 333 North Main. The auction house opens at noon. A wine and cheese reception begins at 5 p.m. The presentation will begin at 6 p.m.

In 1917, HMS Laurentic, laden with 44 tons of Allied gold bound for the United States, is sunk off the coast of Ireland by Germany. The ensuing struggle to recover the treasure by Royal Navy divers and their subsequent spywork of breaking into sunken U-boats for secret documents helped win the war. Today, there is still gold in the wreck waiting to be discovered.  more

Professor Richard Buckley will discuss tree diseases that have been devastating native trees on Wednesday, December 13, at Mercer County Community College in West Windsor.

The program begins at 6:30 p.m. following pizza at 6 p.m. and is held in the Student Center/Welcome Center Room SC 104. more

Each December, thousands of people gather on the banks of the Delaware River to watch the re-enactment of George Washington’s daring 1776 Christmas day river crossing. During the event, several hundred reenactors in Continental military dress listen to an inspiring speech by General Washington and then row across the river in replica Durham boats.  The public has two opportunities to view the reenactment at Washington Crossing Historic Park (Pa.) this year. The first is on Sunday, December 10, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. (actual crossing at 1 p.m.). The 65th annual Christmas Day crossing will take place from noon to 3 p.m. on December 25 (actual crossing at 1 p.m.). Washington Crossing Historic Park is located at the intersection of Routes 532 and 32 (River Road) in Bucks County, Pa. To stay up-to-date on what is happening in the park, visit WashingtonCrossingPark.org. 

As a part of its mission, eliminating racism and empowering women, the YWCA Princeton has partnered with Cornerhouse to host inter-generational discussions on racism. The first event took place on October 17 at the YWCA Bramwell House. The topic was feminism and race.

Part of the YWCA’s Stand Against Racism campaign, the next event will be held December 5 at 7:30 p.m. Paris McClean, head of Sacred Heart School’s Lower School, will speak about Code Switching, which is the switching from the linguistic system of one language or dialect to that of another. According to McClean, “As identities of individuals become increasingly diverse, code-switching has evolved from a language base into styles of dress, social mannerisms, and other forms of self-expression.”  more