Upcoming Events
“The Death of the American Dream?”
Tuesday, May, 10 2022| 4:30 PM (ET)
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center)
Open to the Public
AEI Scholar Michael Strain will argue that populism has infused an unwarranted and debilitating pessimism into national economic discourse.
Michael R. Strain is the director of Economic Policy Studies, and the Arthur F. Burns Scholar in Political Economy at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). Dr. Strain is the author of “The American Dream Is Not Dead: (But Populism Could Kill It)” (Templeton Press, 2020). He is the editor or coeditor of three books: “What Has Happened to the American Working Class Since the Great Recession?” (American Academy of Political and Social Science, 2021); “The US Labor Market: Questions and Challenges for Public Policy” (AEI Press, 2016); and “Economic Freedom and Human Flourishing: Perspectives from Political Philosophy” (AEI Press, 2016). He also writes frequently for popular audiences, and his essays and op-eds have been published by The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, The National Review, and The Weekly Standard, among others. He is a columnist for Bloomberg Opinion.
Sponsors: The Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Political Science Department
Past events
“The Niceties”
April 28-30, 2022| 7:30PM (ET) and May 1, 2022| 2:00PM (ET)
Town Hall Theater, Middlebury, VT
The Middlebury Acting Company presents Eleanor Burgess’ play, “The Niceties,” directed by Margo Whitcomb.
At an elite East Coast university, an ambitious young black student and her esteemed white professor meet to discuss a paper the college junior is writing about the American Revolution. They’re both liberal. They’re both women. They’re both brilliant. But very quickly, discussions of grammar and Google turn to race and reputation, and before they know it, they’re in dangerous territory neither of them had foreseen – and facing stunning implications that can’t be undone.
The Niceties is a complex and compelling depiction of racial and generational divides as it asks who gets to tell the story of America, and how. An explosive thriller … nothing short of seismic.
For tickets, https://townhalltheater.org/event/the-niceties/
Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar Lecture–“Rivers of Power: How an Ancient Force Rules Us Still”
Monday, April 25, 2022| 4:30PM (ET)
McCardell Bicentennial Hall 216
Closed to the Public
Please join us for Professor Laurence C. Smith’s lecture entitled ”Rivers of Power: How an Ancient Force Rules Us Still.”
Laurence C. Smith is the John Atwater and Diana Nelson University Professor of Environmental Studies in the Institute at Brown for Environment & Society and the Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences at Brown University. His research interests include the Arctic, water resources, and satellite remote sensing technologies.
The War in Ukraine: A Conversation with Admiral James Stavridis
Monday, April 25, 2022| 12:00PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
Please join Amy Yuen, Associate Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Political Science Department, for a conversation with Admiral James Stavridis about the war in Ukraine.
Admiral James Stavridis is Vice Chair, Global Affairs of The Carlyle Group and Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Rockefeller Foundation, following five years as the 12th Dean of The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. A retired 4-star officer in the U.S. Navy, he led the NATO Alliance in global operations from 2009 to 2013 as Supreme Allied Commander with responsibility for Afghanistan, Libya, the Balkans, Syria, counter piracy, and cyber security. He also served as Commander of U.S. Southern Command, with responsibility for all military operations in Latin America from 2006-2009. He earned more than 50 medals, including 28 from foreign nations in his 37-year military career.
Admiral Stavridis earned a PhD in international relations and has published eleven books and hundreds of articles in leading journals around the world, including the recent novel “2034: A Novel of the Next World War,” which was a New York Times bestseller and “The Sailor’s Bookshelf: Fifty Books to Know the Sea”.
In this webinar, Admiral Stavridis and Professor Yuen will discuss key questions related to Ukraine, Russia, and NATO. We hope you will join us for this important conversation.
Please register for this webinar right here.
Gensler Symposium 2022: Reproductive Justice Now!–Keynote Address
Thursday, April 21, 2022| 5:30PM (ET)
Robert A. Jones House Conference Room or virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
Virtual Keynote Conversation between Loretta J. Ross and Carrie N. Baker facilitated by Dr. Carly Thomsen (GSFS).
“Abortion and Childbirth in a Post-Roe World:” by Carrie N. Baker.
“Beyond Abortion: Reproductive Futurism:” by Loretta J. Ross.
Loretta J. Ross is an Associate Professor at Smith College. An activist, public intellectual, and scholar, she started her career in activism and social change in the 1970s. She worked for organizations such as the National Football League Players’ Association, the D.C. Rape Crisis Center, the National Organization for Women (NOW), the National Black Women’s Health Project, the Center for Democratic Renewal (National Anti-Klan Network), the National Center for Human Rights Education, and SisterSong Women of Color Reproductive Justice Collective until retiring as an organizer in 2012 to teach about activism.
Carrie N. Baker, J.D., Ph.D. is the Sylvia Dlugasch Bauman Chair of American Studies and a professor in the Program for the Study of Women and Gender at Smith College. Her scholarly research centers on the intersections of gender and race in law and policy, focusing in particular on sexual harassment, sex trafficking, and reproductive health, rights and justice. She is a regular writer and contributing editor at Ms. magazine, where she serves as co-chair of the Ms. Committee of Scholars, and she has a monthly column in the Daily Hampshire Gazette (Northampton, Massachusetts). She is co-editing a forthcoming book, Public Feminisms: From Academy to Community (Lever Press, 2022), with Aviva Dove-Viebahn.
https://middlebury.zoom.us/j/99463016696?pwd=Z2lCb3I3ODR6L0c0cTFHRis4bUhxQT09, Password: 536738
Sponsors: The Gensler Family Fund, the Program in Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies, and the Feminist Resource Center at Chellis House
“How Stateless Nations Claim Their Homelands: A case study in attachment, memory, and resilience”–Timi Mayer, Inaugural Lecture
Wednesday, April 13, 2022| 4:30 PM (ET)
The Orchard, Hillcrest 103
Open to the Public
Timi Mayer, Robert R. Churchill Professor of Geosciences, will deliver an inaugural lecture entitled, “How Stateless Nations Claim Their Homelands: A case study in attachment, memory, and resilience.”
All ethnic nations mark attachment to their homelands by erecting markers in the landscape that denote important events in the life of the nation. These markers serve not only as material proof of the nation’s past in the homeland but also as sites for the ongoing ritual affirmation of national identity. But when the ethnic nation is stateless and has become a marginalized minority in its own homeland, members of the nation must devise new ways to maintain their identity. This is especially difficult if the homeland is governed by an authoritarian regime that wishes to erase the nation along with its attachment to its homeland. In those cases, resilience is not enough and maintaining national identity becomes the work of the diaspora.
Vaccinations and masks required.
“Reporting on an Unprecedented Pandemic”–Robert W. van de Velde, Jr. ’75 Memorial Lecture
Monday, March 14, 2022| 7:00 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
Apoorva Mandavilli, New York Times reporter, will deliver the 2022 Robert W. van de Velde, Jr. ’75 Memorial lecture, “Reporting on an unprecedented pandemic.”
Since the early days of 2020, when the world slowly woke to the coronavirus pandemic, reporting on the virus has been relentless, fast-paced and immeasurably complicated. It has also been exhilarating. This event will offer a brief glimpse into the experience of a journalist who has written almost exclusively only about the pandemic for nearly two years.
To join by Zoom, please go to https://www.middlebury.edu/events/event/robert-w-van-de-velde-jr-75-memorial-lecture
“Russia’s War on Ukraine”–A Round Table Discussion
Tuesday, March 8, 2022| 6:30 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
Please join Timothy Frye ’86 and William Pyle for a discussion on Russia’s war on Ukraine. The discussion will take via Zoom webinar and will be followed by an audience Q & A.
Register Now: https://middlebury.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_27Q-4pFxSZ2XRUd5j908EA
Timothy Frye ’86 is the Marshall D. Shulman Professor of Post-Soviet Foreign Policy at Columbia University. Professor Frye received a BA in Russian language and literature from Middlebury College, an MIA from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, and a PhD in political science from Columbia. His research and teaching interests are in comparative politics and political economy with a focus on the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. He is the author of Brokers and Bureaucrats: Building Markets in Russia, which won the 2001 Hewett Prize from the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies; Building States and Markets after Communism: The Perils of Polarized Democracy, which won a Best Book Prize from the APSA Comparative Democratization section in 2010; and Property Rights and Property Wrongs: How Power, Institutions, and Norms Shape Economic Conflict in Russia, which was published in 2017. His most recent book is Weak Strongman: The Limits of Power in Putin’s Russia. He co-directs the International Center for the Study of Institutions and Development at the Higher Economics School in Moscow and edits Post-Soviet Affairs.
William Pyle is the Frederick C. Dirks Professor of International Economics at Middlebury College and an affiliate of the programs in International Politics and Economics and Russian and East European Studies. He is Associate Fellow of the International Center for the Study of Institutions and Development at the HSE University in Moscow, and he has recently held visiting research positions at CESifo in Munich and the Bank of Finland Institute for Emerging Economies.
Sponsor: Alumni and Parents Program Office
“The Impact of the Fall of Afghanistan on the US in Asia”
Tuesday, March 8, 2022| 4:30 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs program on Security and Global Affairs presents Lisa Curtis speaking on “The Impact of the Fall of Afghanistan on the US in Asia” via Zoom.
Lisa Curtis is a Senior Fellow and Director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). She is a foreign policy and national security expert with over 20 years of service in the U.S. government, including at the NSC, CIA, State Department, and Capitol Hill. Her work has centered on U.S. policy toward the Indo-Pacific and South Asia, with a particular focus on U.S.- India strategic relations; Quad (U.S., Australia, India, and Japan) cooperation; counterterrorism strategy in South and Central Asia; and China’s role in the region.
Ms. Curtis served as Deputy Assistant to the President and NSC Senior Director for South and Central Asia from 2017-2021 under three successive National Security Advisors. During her tenure at the NSC, she coordinated U.S. policy development and implementation of the South Asia Strategy approved by the
President in 2017 and was a key contributor to the Indo-Pacific Strategic Framework, which included expanding Quad security cooperation. She coordinated policies designed to strengthen the U.S.-India defense, diplomatic, and trade partnership, resulting in a widely recognized elevation of the relationship.
To join this webinar, please use this Zoom link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
“The War in Ukraine”–A Roundtable Discussion
Friday, March 4, 2022| 12:30 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
The RCGA International and Global Colloquium series presents William Pyle, Frederick C. Dirks Professor of International Economics, and the lecture, “ Exiting Communism’s Enduring Effect on Russian Public Opinion.”
One cannot fully understand the country that Russia is today without appreciating the enduring effect of its dramatic exit from communism thirty years ago. The shocks of transitioning from one economic system to another and witnessing the Soviet empire’s collapse left a deep and enduring impression on Russians’ worldview. Public opinion surveys and election data highlight how this history has had lasting and often differential effects on individuals and entire regions.
Sponsored by the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs, the International and Global Colloquium offers students, faculty, and staff the opportunity to learn about global and international research activities. Speakers include Middlebury College faculty and alumni, as well as other scholars and professionals in the global arena.
To join this webinar, please use this Zoom link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
“The War in Ukraine”–A Roundtable Discussion
Tuesday, March 1, 2022| 4:30 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs presents a group of experts, students and faculty in a roundtable discussion regarding “The War in Ukraine.” Participants include Vitaly Charnetsky (University of Kansas), Jeff Buettner (Middlebury), Sarah Bidgood (MIIS), Kevin Moss (Middlebury), Tatiana Smorodinska (Middlebury), Michael Kraus (Middlebury) Marila Dzholos (Class of ‘24) with Rebecca Mitchell (Middlebury) moderating.
A timely, educational and informative discussion. To join this webinar, please use this Zoom link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
Sponsor: Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs
“The War over History: Russia and Ukraine on the Brink of Defining Their Identities”
Thursday, February 23, 2022| 4:30 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs program on Global History presents Dr. Serhy Yekelchyk and “The War over History: Russia and Ukraine on the Brink of Defining Their Identities.”
While the world media and military strategists focus on the next move of the Russian armada massing near the Ukrainian border, only history can tell us why the Russian troops are there. This talk will trace the historical origins of the Russians’ unwillingness to accept an independent Ukrainian state and explain how Ukraine became the battleground in the centuries-long Russian crusade against Western influences, including the very concept of democracy. Whether or not a major war begins soon, the ongoing conflict has only strengthened the Ukrainian national identity. In order for peace to become possible, Russia would also need to reimagine itself as a nation rather than an empire.
Serhy Yekelchyk is professor of Slavic Studies and History at the University of Victoria and the author of Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know, 2nd edition (Oxford University Press, 2020).
To join this webinar, please use this Zoom link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
“Understanding 9/11: Causes, Legacies, Lessons”
Friday, January 28, 2022| 9:00 am (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs will host the conference “Understanding 9/11: Causes, Legacies and Lessons. This conference will bring together academic, economic, legal, security, and strategic specialists to examine 9/11’s impact—domestically and abroad—to better understand its transformative effects and the lessons it offers in the areas of foreign policy, security, and domestic politics.
Panelists for this conference include: Spencer Ackerman (The Daily Beast, Substack newsletter “Forever Wars”), Andrew Bacevich (Quincy Institute), Linda Bilmes (Harvard Kennedy School), Juliette Kayyem (Harvard Kennedy School), James Marone ‘75 (Brown University), Faiza Patel (Brennan Center for Justice), Stan Sloan (Atlantic Council), and Shibley Telhami (University of Maryland).
For more information on this conference, please visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs website. You can join the webinar right here.
“Does Capitalism Run On Greed?: Adam Smith on Living a Better Life”
Thursday, December 2, 2021| 4:30 pm (ET)
Axinn 229
Open to the Public
Adam Smith is best known today as the defender of capitalism, but he was also an uncommonly brilliant philosopher who was especially interested in the perennial question of how to live a good life. In Our Great Purpose (2021), Professor Hanley, one of today’s leading Smith scholars, shows us Smith in an entirely new light—and along the way, teaches us what it truly means to possess an excellent character and lead a worthy life.
Ryan Patrick Hanley is Professor of Political Science at Boston College. Prior to joining the faculty at Boston College, he was the Mellon Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Marquette University, and held visiting appointments or fellowships at Yale, Harvard, and the University of Chicago. A specialist on the political philosophy of the Enlightenment period, he is the author of Adam Smith and the Character of Virtue (Cambridge, 2009) and Love’s Enlightenment: Rethinking Charity in Modernity (Cambridge, 2017), and Our Great Purpose: Adam Smith on Living a Better Life (Princeton, 2019). His most recent projects include The Political Philosophy of Fénelon, and a companion translation volume, Fénelon: Moral and Political Writings, both of which will be published by Oxford in 2020.
“Liberal Arts for an Information Age”
Tuesday, November 30, 2021| 7:00 pm (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public–registration required
The Middlebury Initiative for Data and Digital Methods (midd.data) is pleased to present “Liberal Arts for an Information Age”, a fireside chat with Eric Schmidt, Co-founder, Schmidt Futures, who served as Google’s Chief Executive Officer and Chairman from 2001 to 2011, Executive Chairman from 2011 to 2018, and most recently as Technical Advisor.
In this webinar, moderated by Professor Caitlin Myers, John G. McCullough Professor of Economics and co-Director of midd.data, Mr. Schmidt and Professor Myers will discuss key questions related to how liberal arts colleges and similar institutions might adapt to a rapidly changing world marked by the rise of big data, big computing, and big tech.
Guests are encouraged to submit their questions for the conversation ahead of time via this form.
This event is open to all members of the Middlebury Community and to the public. Register in advance here.
“Artists in Dialogue: Jon Henry & Mikael Owunna, Moderated by Andrew Plumley ‘ 11”
Wednesday, November 17, 2021| 7:00 pm (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public–registration required
Photographers Jon Henry and Mikael Owunna discuss their artistic responses to police murder of Black men. Andrew Plumley ’11 (Senior Director, Equity & Culture, American Alliance of Museums) moderates this online conversation, which will include audience Q&A. Free.
Advance registration required. Learn more and register: https://bit.ly/OwunnaHenry.
American Sign Language interpretation and live closed captioning provided. Accessibility questions? Contact Mikki Lane, 802.443.2309 or mlane@middlebury.edu.
This event is organized in conjunction with the exhibition “Art & Protest: Artists as Agents of Social Change,” on view at the Middlebury College Museum of Art through December 12. Museum hours & visitation policies in flux due to COVID-19: visit http://museum.middlebury.edu/visit for up-to-date information.
Co-Sponsors: American Studies Department; Anderson Freeman Resource Center; Anti-Racist Task Force; Axinn Center for the Humanities; Black Studies Program; Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity; Critical Conversations Series; Faculty Director of Equity, Justice, and Inclusion; First Year Seminar Program; History of Art & Architecture Department; Justice Projects; Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity and Inclusion; The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs Program on Global Anti-Racism; and Studio Art Department
“Afghan Women’s Songs: Lament and Resistance”
Tuesday, November 16, 2021| 4:30 pm (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public–registration required
Folk songs are a means of communication, a tool of expression, and a way to both resist and nurture patriarchy for some Afghan women. Through songs, women tell a story or express feelings that amplify other women’s voices, and women, usually present in the audience, resonate with them. The song themes are often centered around the stories of womanhood, marriage, migration, war, and poverty. Through various interviews in Northeastern Afghanistan, Tabasum Wolayat ’12 established that these songs help women both express their feelings and imagine alternatives.
To register, for this event, click here.
Co-Sponsors: Feminist Resource Center at Chellis House; the Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies Program; the Anthropology Department; and the Critical Conversations Series.
“Honorée Fanonne Jeffers, An Issue of Mercy: Exploring the Life of Phillis Wheatley Peters Through Documents & Poetry”
Thursday, November 4, 2021| 7:00 pm (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
In this online lecture, poet, essayist, and novelist Honorée Fanonne Jeffers will discuss the research and practice that led to her latest book of poetry, The Age of Phillis (2020), a collection based upon fifteen years of research on the life and times of Phillis Wheatley Peters (1753-1784), a formerly enslaved person who was the first African American woman to publish a book. The Age of Phillis won the 2021 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work in Poetry, was long-listed for the 2020 National Book Award in Poetry, was a finalist for both the 2021 PEN/Volcker Award and the 2021 Los Angeles Times Book Prize in Poetry, and The Age of Phillis was chosen as the “common read” for the scholarly conference, Society of Early Americanists for the academic year of 2020-2021.
For over twenty years, Honorée Fanonne Jeffers has been lifting her voice on issues of Black culture, racism, American history, and gender through the medium of writing. She is also the author of The Gospel of Barbecue (2000); Outlandish Blues (2003); Red Clay Suite (2007); and The Glory Gets (2015). Jeffers is also a prose writer and author of the forthcoming novel The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois (2021). She is the recipient of fellowships from the American Antiquarian Society, the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Vermont Studio Center, the Witter Bynner Foundation through the Library of Congress, and the Tennessee Williams’ Scholarship in Fiction from the Sewanee Writers Conference. She was also the winner of the Emerging Fiction Fellowship from the Aspen Summer Words Conference and recently was honored with the 2018 Harper Lee Award for Literary Distinction, a lifetime achievement award. She is a Professor of English at the University of Oklahoma.
To join the webinar, please use
https://middlebury.zoom.us/j/92017154874?pwd=Yks1ZVp4SFNOZlByNS9CZjRoWHdoQT09
Passcode: 347204
“Montpelier Comes to Vermont”
Tuesday, November 2, 2021| 12:30-1:30 pm (ET)
Axinn 229
Join Visiting Lecturer and Senator Ruth Hardy and students in her Women in U.S. Electoral Politics class for a panel discussion with women in Vermont politics, including Speaker Jill Krowinski, Senate Pro Tempore Becca Balint, Lieutenant Governor Molly Gray, and several more women in state and local elected office. Panelists will discuss the barriers and opportunities they have faced as women in politics, how they approach campaigning and public service, and their priorities as we move into a new legislative session and election year.
Sponsors: Feminist Resource Center at Chellis House and the Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies
“What happens if Roe v. Wade is overturned?”
Wednesday, October 20, 2021| 4:30 pm (ET)
Hillcrest 103 (The Orchard)
Open to the Public (as long as Middlebury COVID protocols are observed)
The U.S. Supreme Court will soon hear oral arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, a case that is widely expected to determine the fate of Roe v. Wade and the constitutional right to abortion. Caitlin Myers of the Middlebury College Economics Department will explore how might the Court’s decision reshape the landscape of abortion access and impact women’s pursuit of economic security and family? Professor Myers will describe what we know about the causal effects of abortion access and what this implies for a possible post-Roe America. Along the way she will discuss spearheading and writing an economists’ amicus brief to the Supreme Court in this landmark case.
Sponsor: The Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
“Should the United States Increase Immigration”
Thursday, October 14, 2021| 5:00 pm (ET)
McCardell Bicentennial Hall 216
Open to the Public (as long as Middlebury COVID protocols are observed)
Should the United States increase immigration? At this event, Peter Skerry, Professor of Political Science at Boston College, and Alex Nowrasteh, Director of Immigration Studies at the Cato Institute, will present different views, converse with each other, and take questions on this timely and important question in American politics.
Sponsors: Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Political Science Department
Afghanistan and the Future of Girls’ and Women’s Education
Saturday, October 2, 2021 | 4:00 PM
Wilson Hall
RSVPs requested (RSVP to PresOffRSVP@middlebury.edu by 4pm Friday, Oct 1)
Shabana Basij-Rasikh ’11, in conversation with President Patton.
Shabana Basij-Rasikh is Middlebury Class of 2011, and is president and cofounder of SOLA, the first girls’ boarding school in Kabul, Afghanistan. She and hundreds of her faculty, staff, and students narrowly escaped the city in August as the Taliban took over. SOLA has relocated in Kigali, Rwanda, in order to provide continuity of education. Shabana has written about her recent experiences, and the importance of women’s education, in the Washington Post and other venues. She is now a regular contributor to their opinion section. We are delighted to welcome her back home to Middlebury.
Sponsor: The CTLR and the Office of the President
“Madison’s Hand: Revising the Constitutional Convention”
Tuesday, September 28, 2021| 5:00 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
Mary Sarah Bilder, winner of the 2018 Bancroft Prize, will explore James Madison’s revisions of his famous notes from the Constitutional Convention and what those revisions tell us about the Constitutional Convention and how we regard the Constitution itself.
To join the lecture, please join via Zoom at go.middlebury.edu/AHF.
Sponsors: Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Political Science Department (at the request of Professor Gary Winslett)
Clifford Symposium–“Radical Implications: Facing a Planetary Emergency”
Thursday-Saturday, September 23-25, 2021
In-person for College Community/Zoom for the Public
Join us for this year’s Clifford Symposium, packed with top-flight speakers, discussions, and more. For a full description and for the program, please see
Sponsor: Clifford Symposium Organizing Committee
Charles S. Grant Memorial Lecture–Timothy Snyder, “Does American Politics have a Future? A Reflection on Time and Democracy”
Thursday, May 6, 2021| 3:00-4:15 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
Timothy Snyder, the Richard C. Levin Professor of History at Yale University and a permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna and one of the most influential historians of our times, will deliver this year’s Charles S. Grant Memorial Lecture.
The Grant lectureship is named in honor of Charles S. Grant, who was a gifted teacher and leading scholar of early American history in Middlebury’s History Department prior to his untimely death in 1961. Shortly thereafter, his college colleagues and friends in the community raised funds to establish a lectureship in his honor. Over the past fifty years, the Grant Fund has brought many distinguished historians to Middlebury.
To join the lecture, please go to
Sponsors: Charles S. Grant Memorial Lectureship and the History Department
How Can We Achieve Educational Equity?
Wednesday, May 5, 2021| 4:45-6:00 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
Gensler Family Symposium on Feminism in the Global Arena–“Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals”
Friday, April 30, 2021| 4:30 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
Join us for a discussion with Alexis Pauline Gumbs about her book entitled Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals.
Register in advance for this webinar here. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.
Van de Velde Lecture–Connie Schultz, “Next: Journalism in an Age of Reckoning”
Tuesday, April 27, 2021| 4:30-6:00 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
Connie Schultz is a nationally syndicated columnist for Creators Syndicate and Professional-in-Residence at Kent State University School of Journalism. She won the Pulitzer Prize in 2005 for Commentary for columns that judges praised for providing “a voice for the underdog and the underprivileged.” She also won the Robert F. Kennedy Award for Social Justice Reporting and the Batten Medal, which honors “a body of journalistic work that reflects compassion, courage, humanity and a deep concern for the underdog.”
Schultz is the author of two memoirs, Life Happens – And Other Unavoidable Truths, and . . . His Lovely Wife, a memoir about her husband Sherrod Brown’s successful 2006 race for the U.S. Senate. Her first novel, The Daughters of Erietown, was recently published and became a New York Times bestseller.
Robert van de Velde Jr. attended Middlebury College where he majored in Sociology and was an active member of the staff of WRMC-FM, the college radio station. Not long after his graduation, he died suddenly. Shortly after his death, family members and friends established the Robert W. van de Velde, Jr. ’75 Memorial Lecture. This lecture provides an annual opportunity for a searching examination of the confluence of public affairs and journalism.
The link to join this webinar can be found on the Middlebury Events Calendar.
Sponsor: Robert W. van de Velde ’75 Memorial Lectureship
Hannah A. Quint Lecture in Jewish Studies–David Nirenberg, “What Does the History of Anti-Semitism Tell Us About its Future?”
Thursday, April 22, 2021| 5:00-6:30 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
David Nirenberg is Dean of the Divinity School at the University of Chicago and the Deborah R. and Edgar D. Jannotta Distinguished Service Professor of Medieval History and Social Thought. This is the 32nd Annual Hannah A. Quint Lecture in Jewish Studies, established by the late Eliot Levinson, Class of 1964, in honor of his late mother, Mrs. Quint. For a history of the lectureship, go to http://www.middlebury.edu/academics/jewish/events/quint
Sponsor: Jewish Studies
What are the Limits of Religious Liberty?
Thursday, April 15, 2021| 4:45-6:00 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
A Counterpoint Webinar
DAVID FRENCH, fellow at the National Review Institute and editor of The Dispatch. Previously, he was the President of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE); a senior attorney for the American Center for Law and Justice and the Alliance Defending Freedom, where he specialized in religious liberty cases; and a staff writer for Time and National Review. During the Trump era, Mr. French became nationally known as a leading conservative voice in the “Never Trump” movement. He is author of four books including, Divided We Fall: America’s Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation (2020). A veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, French was deployed to Iraq in 2007 during the Iraq War and was awarded a Bronze Star. He is a graduate of Harvard Law School.
LINDA C. MCCLAIN, Robert B. Kent Professor of Law at Boston University School of Law. She is known for her work in family law, gender and law, and feminist legal theory. Her scholarship addresses the respective roles of families, other institutions of civil society, and government in fostering citizens’ capacities for democratic and personal self-government. Prof. McClain coordinates the law school’s participation in the Women’s Gender & Sexuality Studies (WGS) Certificate Program and has served as a faculty fellow at the Boston University School of Theology. Her seven books include Who’s the Bigot? Learning from Conflicts Over Marriage and Civil Rights; Gay Rights and the Constitution; and Ordered Liberty: Rights, Responsibilities and Virtues. Prof. McClain has held visiting fellowships at Harvard, Princeton, Virginia, and Penn. A graduate of Georgetown and NYU law schools, she also earned a degree in Religious Studies from University of Chicago Divinity School.
Via Zoom at go.middlebury.edu/ahf
Sponsors: The Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Department of Political Science (upon request of K. Callanan)
Architectures of the Flesh
Wednesday, March 31, 2021| 4:30-6:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Zakiyyah Iman Jackson is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Southern California. She is the author of Becoming Human: Matter and Meaning in an Antiblack World, published by NYU Press in 2020 as part of their Sexual Cultures series. She is at work on a second book, tentatively entitled “Obscure Light: Blackness and the Derangement of Sex-Gender.” She has published numerous articles in Gay and Lesbian Quarterly, Feminist Studies, South Atlantic Quarterly, and others.
Sponsor: Axinn Center for the Humanities
Co-Sponsors: Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies, The Feminist Resource Center at Chellis House, Black Studies, Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity
Are Social Justice and Capitalism Compatible?
Wednesday, March 10, 2021| 4:45 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The Alexander Hamilton Forum is hosting this counterpoint webinar featuring Professor John Tomasi of Brown University and author of Free Market Fairness (Princeton) and Professor Pablo Gilabert of Concordia University (Montreal) and author of From Global Poverty to Global Equality: A Philosophical Exploration (Oxford).
To join this forum, please click go.middlebury.edu/ahf
International Communication during COVID-19
Tuesday, March 9, 2021| 7:00-8:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs program on Global Health Challenges presents Professor Jean Claude Kwitonda who will share his perspective on international communications during the COVID-19 pandemic and how discourse about aid and development has shifted as countries are competing for resources to fight the pandemic. He will also discuss the role of positive deviance during the pandemic.
Jean Claude Kwitonda has diverse experiences working as copywriter, researcher, translator and a college teacher. Prior to joining Howard University, he taught in different universities in Rwanda and Ohio. His teaching and research interests include Health Communication, Communication for Development and instructional communication.
To join this webinar, use this Zoom Link (Passcode = 141150) or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
Broadening the Conversation: Communicating to Non-Experts About Your Work
Friday, February 5, 2021| 12:15-1:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Guest speaker Joshua Tucker from New York University and co-author of The Washington Post’s Monkey Cage will lead us in a discussion on how we speak to a general audience about our research. Whether the topic is data science, climate change, policy, history, or art, it can seem difficult for those of us steeped in the details of a subject to present our work in ways that are accessible to non-experts. In this workshop we will hear from an expert on bridging the expert-non-expert gap and will be reminded of resources at Middlebury that can assist us in broadening the audience for our work. Register for this session HERE.
Co-Sponsors: Center for Teaching, Learning & Research, Department of Political Science, and MiddData
Profound Learning and Full Participation: Utilizing High Impact Practices for Student Success
Monday, February 1, 2021| 12:15-1:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Pivoting on a full participation framework, Timothy Eatman, Dean of the Honors Living-Learning Community and Associate Professor of Urban Education in the College of Arts & Sciences at Rutgers University, will share the evidence-based research demonstrating a positive relationship between student participation in high-impact practices (HIPs) and improved student outcomes. These curricular and co-curricular practices support student engagement, advance curricular coherence, and generate equitable outcomes. Register for this session HERE.
Co-Sponsors: Center for Community Engagement and Center for Teaching, Learning & Research
Spirituality and Social Justice: A Multifaith Panel Discussion Honoring the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Tuesday, January 26, 2021| 8:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Please join us for a discussion with a multi-faith group of panelists to reflect on the question “what do wisdom traditions offer us in navigating the challenges of oppression and injustice in these challenging times.” We’ll discuss the religious, secular, and spiritual foundations of civic actions for social justice.
Panelists:
Rev. Barnaby Feder (Unitarian Universalist)
Fr. Luke Austin (Christian)
Sensei Joshin Byrnes (Buddhist)
Rabbi Danielle Stillman (Jewish)
Chaplain Saifa Hussain(Muslim)
Vijaya Wunnava (Hindu)
Rajnii Eddins (spiritual artist/activist)
Moderated by the Rev. Mark R. Orten, Dean of Spiritual and Religious Life
Zoom link here: https://middlebury.zoom.us/j/97399624075?pwd=WGRQUGphRWMwblI4bEo4MTFmekMzZz09
Sponsor: Charles P. Scott Center for Religious and Spiritual Life
The Post Pandemic College: Trends, Opportunities, and Threats
Tuesday, January 19, 2021| 12:15-1:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
In this opening presentation to the 2020 Contemporary Teaching in the Liberal Arts Series, noted futurist and educational commentator Bryan Alexander will analyze how the COVID-19 pandemic is transforming American higher education and will outline the key dynamics that will shape the post-pandemic college. Bryan’s presentation will set a broad and deep context for the rest of the sessions in this year’s series. Bryan will also respond to questions and comments from attendees.
Bryan Alexander is an internationally known futurist, researcher, writer, speaker, consultant, and teacher, working in the field of higher education’s future. From 2002 to 2014 Bryan worked with the National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education (NITLE), a non-profit working to help small colleges and universities best integrate digital technologies. In 2013 he launched a business, Bryan Alexander Consulting, LLC. Through BAC he consults throughout higher education in the United States and abroad. Recently, he moved to the Washington, D.C., area from Ripton, Vermont. He is currently a senior scholar at Georgetown University and teaches graduate seminars in their Learning, Design, and Technology program.
Bryan speaks widely and publishes frequently, with articles appearing in venues including The Atlantic Monthly and Inside Higher Ed. He has been interviewed by and featured in the Washington Post, MSNBC, The Wall Street Journal, US News and World Report, National Public Radio (2017, 2020, 2020, 2020, 2020), the Chronicle of Higher Education (2016, 2020), the Atlantic Monthly, Reuters, the National Association of College and University Business Officers, Pew Research, Campus Technology, The Hustle, and the Connected Learning Alliance.
Bryan recently published Academia Next: The Futures of Higher Education for Johns Hopkins University Press (January 2020), which won an Association of Professional Futurists award. He is currently working on Universities on Fire: Higher Education in the Age of Climate Crisis (2022). His two other recent books are Gearing Up For Learning Beyond K-12 and The New Digital Storytelling (second edition).
On several occasions, Bryan has contributed to the Center for Teaching, Learning & Research’s Contemporary Teaching in the Liberal Arts Series, which has been held during winter terms since 2015.
For more on Bryan, see https://bryanalexander.org/
Register HERE
Sponsor: Center for Teaching, Learning & Research
The U.S. Gender Gap: Past, Present, and Future
Thursday, December 3, 2020| 12:15-1:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
You may have seen gender gap described in the media this way: “Women are only paid 82 cents for every dollar paid to men.” We will talk about where that measure comes from and how it relates to gender discrimination. Professor Byker will discuss how the gender gap has evolved since the 1980s and where it may be going particularly in light of the Covid pandemic.
Tanya Byker (B.A., Swarthmore; PhD, University of Michigan) joined the Middlebury Economics faculty as an assistant professor in the fall of 2014. She teaches courses in regression, and the economics of gender. Her research falls under the categories of labor and development economics and focuses on the interrelated choices individuals make about education, work and parenthood. She has studied how birth-related career interruptions in the US vary by mother’s education, and the ways that parental leave laws impact those labor-supply decisions. In a developing country context, she has studied how access to family planning impacts fertility and longer-term outcomes such as schooling and employment in Peru and South Africa.
Hosted by Sarah Stroup, Associate Professor of Political Science.
See the Faculty at Home website for additional information, including how to register for this free event: www.middlebury.edu…
Sponsor: Faculty at Home series
Conversation at the Crossroads: The Intimacy of Right Relations (Who’s Got Skin the Game?)
Tuesday, November 17, 2020| 7:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Red Nation, Black Nation. Environmentalism. Undoing Racism. Reparations & Decolonization.
In the spirit of embracing 2020 vision, Diné (Navajo) activist, artist and ceremonial leader Woman Stands Shining (Pat McCabe) & African American storyteller, activist, performer-in-the-making and Middlebury Scholar-in-Residence Dr. Carolyn Finney are coming together in an intentional conversation about race, the environment, intimacy and right relations. Bring your questions and your open heart and let’s see what might emerge…
Curated by Divya Gudur ’21 and Gabe Desmond ’20.5
Register to receive Zoom link: https://middlebury.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_Uwet2x8pSCiKQ4Fzy25vuQ
Sponsors: Franklin Environmental Center, Black Studies Program, Program in Environmental Studies, Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity, Sunday Night Environmental Group, Student Government Association, Office of the Provost, The Climate Action Capacity Project, and New Perennials Project
Internet Hate Speech: What Can We Do?
Monday, November 16, 2020| 5:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Online extremism and internet hate speech show no signs of abating, and have been linked with violent atrocities across the country and around the world. In this talk, two experts on internet speech issues address the following questions: What is the best way to deal with hate speech on the internet? What role should governments, social media companies, and others play in curbing internet hate speech? What other options are there for addressing online extremism?
Rebecca MacKinnon is founding director of Ranking Digital Rights, a program that promotes freedom of expression and privacy on the internet.
Becca Lewis researches online political subcultures and grassroots media movements, with a focus on influence-building, media manipulation, and disinformation efforts among these groups.
Click this ZOOM link to join.
Password: 372443
Anxiety to Action: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis
Thursday, November 12, 2020| 6:00 pm
Zoom
Focused on the College Community, but open to the Public
When climate change looms large, election uncertainties have us all on edge, the pandemic has no definitive end in sight, racism and racial injustices continue to compound, and everything feels overwhelming, what do you do? How do you find your way to meaningful intersectional action? Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Katharine Wilkinson will join Middlebury virtually on Thursday, November 12 at 6 p.m. EST for a special conversation about their experiences and draw on insights from their new book, All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis, a collection of essays by women spanning backgrounds, approaches, and generations at the forefront of the climate movement. This talk is an incredible opportunity to dive into topics crucial to our campus and our world. We hope you will weigh in on what you’d like to see covered. A recording of the conversation will be available for those unable to attend the synchronous event.
Follow up conversations to discuss and reflect will be hosted by cosponsors are being planned – stayed tuned.
More details:
- 90-min Discussion and Q&A of pre-submitted and live questions facilitated by Assistant Professor Mez Baker-Medard
- Register HERE! (First 50 registrants will receive a free copy of Johnson and Wilkinson’s All We Can Save)
- Submit your questions HERE by Sunday, Nov 8th
- Find more information and speaker bios at go/anxietytoaction
For more information, contact CACP Project Director Minna Brown at mbbrown@middlebury.edu or MCAB Speakers Committee at MCABspeakers@middlebury.edu.
Sponsors: Climate Action Capacity Project (CACP) in collaboration with Middlebury College Activities Board, Franklin Environmental Center, Sunday Night Environmental Group, among others.
When Should We Trust the Experts?
Tuesday, November 10, 2020| 4:45 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The COVID-19 pandemic has raised fresh perennial questions about the relationship between scientific knowledge and political power. As citizens have been asked to transform their way of life on the basis of scientific guidance, many have expressed alarm at widespread disregard for scientific expertise throughout the crisis, while others have argued that scientific expertise is no substitute for political prudence and ethical judgment, even in the age of pandemic. What role should guidance by technical experts play in a democratic regime? Is scientific expertise a sufficient guide for public policy decisions? How should we understand the problems posed by anti-intellectualism on one hand and technocracy on the other?
For this counterpoint-style webinar, the guest speakers will be:
TOM NICHOLS of the Naval War College. He is author of The Death of Expertise: The Campaign against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters. He was recently named one of POLITICO Magazine’s “POLITICO 50.”
PATRICK J. DENEEN of the University of Notre Dame. He is author most recently of the widely reviewed book, Why Liberalism Failed, which President Obama praised for its “cogent insights into the loss of meaning and community that many in the West feel.”
For the Zoom link, visit go.middlebury.edu/AHF.
Sponsors: Hamilton Forum and the Department of Political Science
Black Spring, White Winter: Reflections on the Long History of the Black Radical Tradition in a Fascist World
Friday, November 6, 2020| 4:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs Program on Anti-Racist Theory and Action around the Globe presents Robin D.G. Kelley, Distinguished Professor of History and African American Studies at UCLA and Gary B. Nash Endowed Chair in U.S. History, speaking about “Black Spring, White Winter: Reflections on the Long History of the Black Radical Tradition in a Fascist World.”
Professor Kelley’s research has explored the history of social movements in the U.S., the African Diaspora, and Africa; Black radical thought; music and visual culture; Black Surrealism; and anti-imperial Marxism. His recent books include, Africa Speaks, America Answers: Modern Jazz in Revolutionary Times (2012); Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original (2009); and Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination (2002). He is also co-editor of numerous books, including: Walter Rodney, The Russian Revolution: A View from the Third World (2018); The Other Special Relationship: Race, Rights and Riots in Britain and the United States (2015); and Black, Brown and Beige: Surrealist Writings from Africa and the African Diaspora (2009).
Use this Zoom webinar link to join or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs event website.
Co-sponsors: The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs, the Feminist Resource Center at Chellis House, the Program in Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies, the Center for Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity, Black Studies and the Twilight Project
Making Sense of the 2020 Election
Thursday, November 5, 2020| 4:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Please join us for a panel discussion featuring commentary and reflections on the 2020 election by professors and students. There will also be an opportunity for those joining the webinar to ask questions.
Please click the link below to join the webinar:
https://middlebury.zoom.us/j/99002198873?pwd =eTMxMkFmbXFYdU11cm5TV2prd2xZZz09
Passcode: 593810
Here’s the link to the vimeo hosting of the post-election webinar.
Sponsor: Critical Conversations
Forecasting the 2020 Presidential Election during in a Global Pandemic
Thursday, October 29, 2020| 7:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Professor of Political Science Matt Dickinson will give a preelection talk examining the state of the race and whether traditional forecast models hold any meaning during a time of crisis.
A Zoom link will be posted to the campus calendar.
Sponsor: Critical Conversations
The Global Pandemic: Lessons for Governments and Citizens of the World
Thursday, October 29, 2020| 4:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs (RCGA) Program on Global Health Challenges presents Olga Jonas, senior fellow, Harvard Global Health Institute. She will be discussing “The Global Pandemic: Lessons for Governments and Citizens of the World.”
To join this webinar, use this Zoom Link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events. Password: 141150
Sponsor: Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs
Will COVID-19 Kill the Liberal International Order?
Thursday, October 22, 2020| 4:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Ambassador Bonnie Jenkins will discuss “Will COVID-19 Kill the Liberal International Order” as part of the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs (RCGA) Program Lecture Series on Security and Global Affairs.
The liberal international order—those institutions, organizations, and arrangements established after WWII to help stabilize global politics, incentivize inter-state collaboration, promote prosperity, and manage challenges multilaterally—has been a hallmark of international relations for decades. In this talk Ambassador Bonnie Jenkins assesses how this global governance infrastructure has fared in light of the corona pandemic. To what extent have components of world order—like the Bretton Woods institutions, EU, WHO, and UN, etc.—worked as their framers’ intended, to facilitate cooperation, collaboration, and effective multilateral action against the pandemic? What security implications arise from her assessment? And will COVID-19 ultimately kill the liberal international order?
To join this webinar, use this Zoom Link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
Sponsor: Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs
Has the Supreme Court Become Too Powerful?
Wednesday, October 21, 2020| 7:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
At this counterpoint-style event, Suzanna Sherry ’76 and Adam J. White will offer contrasting views and field questions from you.
Professor Sherry ’76 is the Herman O. Loewenstein Chair in Law at Vanderbilt University School of Law. Sherry’s work in the area of constitutional law has earned her national recognition as one of the most well-known scholars in the field. The author of more than 100 books and articles, she also writes extensively on federal courts and federal court procedures. After graduating from law school, Professor Sherry was a clerk for the Honorable John C. Godbold of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in Montgomery, Alabama, and then served as an associate with the law firm of Miller Cassidy Larroca & Lewin in Washington, D.C.
Professor White is the assistant professor of law at George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School. White served concurrently as a resident scholar at AEI, a research fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, and director of the C. Boyden Gray Center for the Study of the Administrative State. He also served by presidential appointment as a member of the Administrative Conference of the United States. A scholar of administrative law and, he has served on the leadership councils for the Administrative Law sections of both the American Bar Association and the Federalist Society. He clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C Circuit after graduating from the Harvard Law School and the University of Iowa.
The Zoom link may be found at go.middlebury.edu/AHF.
Sponsors: Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Department of Political Science
Live from DC: Election 2020–Two Policy Futures Diverge
Wednesday, October 14, 2020| 6:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The 2020 presidential election will determine the future landscape of policy-related careers. What if the incumbent wins? What if the challenger wins? Richard Haass P’16, President of the Council on Foreign Relations, and Chris Matthiesen ’04, Partner at Federal Hall Policy Advisors, will discuss the foreign and domestic policy continuum represented by the two candidates’ policy prescriptions, as well as, the implications for future federal government agency, think tank, NGO, and international relation career roles. Please join them to understand how the two policy roads lead to two divergent career futures.
Nell Irvin Painter: “The History of White People and What It Means for Now”
Friday, October 9, 2020| 4:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Nell Irvin Painter is Professor Emerita of History at Princeton University. One o the country’s most distinguished historians, she wrote The History of White People in 2010.
ZOOM password = GSFS, link: https://middlebury.zoom.us/j/9976943927?pwd=RERNUVZoY1luNFMxQzZYUTZNdmQ4dz09
Organizer: Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies/Chellis House; co-sponsors: Black Studies Program, Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity, Axinn Center for the Humanities, and Office of the President
Come and See: From Reflection To Affiliation To Anti-Racist Pedagogy
Tuesday, October 6, 2020| 3:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Join us for a talk with Frankie Condon, author of numerous books on anti-racism, including I Hope I Join the Band: Narrative, Affiliation, and Antiracist Rhetoric. To join: 3 pm zoom lecture open to all
In her talk, Condon will explore the significance of moments in the lives of teachers when we might call ourselves to see inherited white and whitely orientations and perspectives that both shadow us as we move through our teaching lives and shape for us the teaching spaces in which we make those lives. This talk is about the significance of critical self-reflection and actionable commitments in the design and development of anti-racist pedagogies across a variety of disciplines. Participants should expect both an exploration of critical race theory as it pertains to teaching and examples of what that theory might look like in action in the college classroom.
Frankie Condon is Associate Professor of English Language and Literature at University of Waterloo and a frequent speaker at colleges and universities across the country. For more info, please see her full event description here, or contact James Sanchez, Assistant Professor of Writing and Rhetoric, jcsanchez@middlebury.edu.
A workshop will follow: 4:15 pm workshop with limited spaces, RSVP required.
Organizer: Writing and Rhetoric Program; co-sponsors: The Center for Teaching, Learning & Research and the Engaged Listening Project
1619 or 1776: Was America Founded on Slavery?
Thursday, October 1, 2020| 4:45 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
At this counterpoint-style event, Leslie Harris and Lucas Morel will offer contrasting views and field questions from you. Leslie Harris is a professor of History at Northwestern University and author of In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans in New York City, 1626-1863. She served as a fact-checker for the 1619 Project, a subject she addressed in a recent Politico article. Lucas Morel is the John K. Boardman, Jr. Professor of Politics at Washington and Lee University. He is author of Lincoln and the American Founding and Lincoln’s Sacred Effort: Defining Religion’s Role in American Self-Government, and editor of two volumes on Ralph Ellison.
The Zoom link may be found at go.middlebury.edu/AHF.
Sponsored by the Hamilton Forum
Inaugural Lecture in Black Studies–“Breonna’s Song: Protest Music Epistemologies of the Right Now.”
Wednesday, September 30, 2020 | 6:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Daphne Brooks, William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of African American Studies at Yale University, will give the inaugural lecture to launch Middlebury’s Black Studies program. To attend, please register here or via go/inaugural or go.middlebury.edu/inaugural.
Sponsor: Black Studies Program
Clifford Symposium–“The Rise of Big Data”
Thursday & Friday, September 24 & 25, 2020
Zoom
Open to the Public
This year’s Clifford symposium, named after the late Nicholas Clifford, an outstanding teacher, scholar, and administrator at Middlebury for many years, will feature Middlebury faculty and students in an exploration of one of the most important phenomena of our times. Through a series of sessions, the symposium will explore what Big Data means, its history, its ubiquity, and its future. It will also examine why Big Data is so important to how we live and learn at Middlebury and highlight how Middlebury students and faculty are using Big Data in innovative and productive ways.
For a full symposium schedule and Zoom links to the individual sessions, please visit https://www.middlebury.edu/office/clifford-symposium or go/clifford.
This Crisis and the Next One: What the Pandemic Suggests About the Century to Come
Friday, September 11, 2020 | 3:00pm
Livestreamed
Open to the Public
Bill McKibben, Schumann Distinguished Scholar, a founder of 350.org (a climate-change organization with deep Middlebury roots), and acclaimed author, including of the recent book, Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?, and the New Yorker article, “What Vermont and Its History Might Teach the Nation About Handling the Coronavirus,” will be speaking on “This Crisis and the Next One: What the Pandemic Suggests About the Century to Come” at 3 p.m. (EDT) on Friday, September 11. His talk can be viewed on the Middlebury live stream:
You can watch this event via live stream, beginning a few minutes before the official start time.
“Anxieties of Empire: New Contexts, Shifting Perspectives”–Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs Annual Conference
Friday-Saturday, March 6 & 7
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room, Robert A. Jones ’59 House
Open to the Public
| The “anxiety of Empire” has been a recurrent idea in studies of colonial discourse, as critics observed how fears about the (in)stability of imperial power were masked by confident assertions of its rightful authority, and by an obsessive drive to reproduce it. Even though the sun may have set on the colonial powers of previous centuries, the power dynamics constructed by Empire and the tangled rhetoric that perpetuated it persist. The conference will bring together scholars from an array of disciplines and fields of inquiry to interrogate understudied modi operandi of Empire and to foreground new critical tools for understanding them.
You can watch this event via live stream, beginning a few minutes before the official start time. |
Sponsored by the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs
“Black is the Body: Writing about Race in America”–Emily Bernard
Thursday, March 5 | 4:30pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
Racial identity is a construction. But just because it is a fiction does not make it untrue. In this talk, Emily Bernard discusses the complex and central role of storytelling as a source of power, meaning, and beauty in her life as a writer, reader, and scholar of African American experience.
Emily Bernard is the Julian Lindsay Green and Gold Professor of English at the University of Vermont. In addition to Black is the Body: Stories from My Grandmother’s Time, My Mother’s Time, and Mine, her books include Remember Me to Harlem: The Letters of Langston Hughes and Carl Van Vechten, Some of My Best Friends: Writings on Interracial Friendships, and Michelle Obama: The First Lady in Photographs.
You can watch this event via live stream, beginning a few minutes before the official start time.
Sponsored by the Axinn Center for the Humanities
“The Long Shadow of the Great War and the Paris Peace Conference”–Margaret MacMillan
Tuesday, March 3 | 7:30 pm
Dana Auditorium, Sunderland Language Center
Open to the Public
Margaret MacMillan, one of the most well-known historians of our time, will deliver the next Charles S. Grant Memorial Lecture on Tuesday evening, March 3, 2020. Professor MacMillan teaches at the University of Toronto, and she is the emeritus Professor of International History and former Warden of St. Anthony’s College at the University of Oxford. Her books include Paris 1919: Six Months that Changed the World (which won the Samuel Johnson prize), The Uses and Abuses of History, History’s People: Personalities and the Past, and the prize-winning The War that Ended Peace: The Road to 1914.
Sponsored by the Charles S. Memorial Lecture Committee
Through the Fog: Towards Inclusive Anti-Racist Teaching
Tuesday, March 3, 2020 | 4:30 pm
Dana Auditorium, Sunderland Language Center
Open to the Public
In this interactive lecture, Professor Tara Affolter, Education Studies, will read selections from her book, Through the Fog: Towards Inclusive Anti-Racist Teaching and invite audience members to engage in some crucial self-reflection. Resisting racism, agitating for change, and walking an inclusive anti-racist path requires a commitment to unflinchingly look at one’s failures and examine silences. Drawing from over 20 years of teaching experience in the U.S., ranging from pre-kindergarten to post-graduate, Affolter’s work illustrates personal, practical, and theoretical ways for teachers to grapple with the complexities of race and racism within their own schools and communities and develop as inclusive anti-racist teachers.
Sponsored by the Education Studies Program and the Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity
“1619 and the Legacy That Built a Nation”– Nikole Hannah-Jones
Tuesday, February 25, 2020 | 7:00pm
Mead Chapel
Open to the Public
Nikole Hannah-Jones is the creator of the New York Times’s “1619 Project” and an award-winning investigative reporter covering civil rights and racial injustice for the New York Times Magazine.
“The 1619 Project” began on August 20, 2019, the 400th anniversary of the start of American slavery, with the publication of a special issue of the New York Times Magazine devoted to the goal of re-examining the legacy of slavery in the United States. Now an ongoing effort, the initiative includes a multi-episode podcast hosted by Hannah-Jones.
The event is one in a series on race and racism. More information is available here.
Sponsored by the Office of the President, MCAB, the Critical Conversations program, and the Black Studies program
“Ultimate Allies: America and Israel, 1620 to the Present”–A Talk by, & Conversation with, Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren
Monday, February 24| 7:00pm
Dana Auditorium, Sunderland Language Center
Open to the Public
This event will occur in Dana Auditorium with additional overflow seating available in Warner Hemicycle where the event will be live-streamed.
Moderator: Prof. Felicia Grey (Political Science)
Statesman, historian, and parliamentarian, Ambassador Michael Oren has devoted his life to serving Israel and the Jewish people around the world.
For nearly five years, he served as Israel’s Ambassador to the United States. He was instrumental in obtaining US defense aid, especially for the Iron Dome system, and American loan guarantees for Israel’s economy. He built bridges with diverse communities across the nation, wrote dozens of op-eds and conducted hundreds of media interviews, fortifying the U.S.-Israel alliance.
More recently, as a Member of the Israel’s parliament (Knesset) and Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office, he continued to interact with foreign leaders and to defend Israel in the media. He spearheaded efforts to strengthen Israel-Diaspora relations, to develop the Golan Heights, and to fight BDS. As Chairman of a classified subcommittee, he dealt with some of Israel’s most sensitive security issues.
A graduate of Princeton and Columbia, Dr. Oren has served as a visiting professor at Harvard, Yale, and Georgetown. His last three books—Six Days of War; Power, Faith, and Fantasy; and Ally: My Journal Across the American-Israel Divide—were all New York Times bestsellers. He received the Los Angeles Times History Book of the Year Award, a National Humanities prize, and the Jewish Book Award.
Frequently interviewed by the U.S. and international press, he has had appeared on the Stephen Colbert and Bill Maher shows, 60 Minutes, and The View. He was the Middle East analyst for CBS and CNN. Michael Oren was named by Politico as one of the fifty most influential thinkers in America.
Sponsored by the Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Department of Political Science
“Do We Need a Green New Deal?”
Thursday, February 20| 4:30 pm
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center)
Open to the Public
A Hamilton Forum Dialogue
Arguing NO: Oren Cass, Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Mr. Cass’s work addresses issues ranging from the labor market to environmental regulation to trade and immigration to education and organized labor. He also writes extensively on the nature and implications of climate change and on the process of formulating and evaluating public policy. Cass has written for publications including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and Foreign Affairs, and he regularly speaks at universities and testifies before Congress. His 2018 book, The Once and Future Worker: A Vision for the Renewal of Work in America, has been called “the essential policy book for our time” by National Affairs. Previously, he served as the domestic policy director for Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign in 2012 and a management consultant with Bain & Company. He earned a B.A. in political economy from Williams College and a J.D. from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review.
Arguing YES: Robert Pollin, Distinguished Professor of Economics at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. Dr. Pollin is Co-Director of the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) and the founder and President of PEAR (Pollin Energy and Retrofits), an Amherst, MA-based green energy company operating throughout the United States. His books include The Living Wage: Building a Fair Economy (co-authored 1998); Contours of Descent: U.S. Economic Fractures and the Landscape of Global Austerity (2003); An Employment-Targeted Economic Program for South Africa (co-authored 2007); A Measure of Fairness: The Economics of Living Wages and Minimum Wages in the United States (co-authored 2008), Back to Full Employment (2012), Green Growth (2014), Global Green Growth (2015) and Greening the Global Economy (forthcoming 2015). He has worked recently as a consultant for the U.S. Department of Energy, the International Labour Organization, the United Nations Industrial Development Organization and numerous non-governmental organizations in several countries on various aspects of building high-employment green economies. He was selected by Foreign Policy magazine as one of the “100 Leading Global Thinkers for 2013,” and is author of several state-level “Green New Deals.” A graduate of UW-Madison, he earned his PhD at the New School for Social Research.
Sponsored by Hamilton Forum
“Who Owns Religion?” An Open Discussion with President Laurie Patton on her new book
Tuesday, February 18, 2020| 4:30 pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
Professor Robert Schine of the Religion Department will moderate. Professor Kristin Bright of the Anthropology Department and Professor William Waldron of the Religion Department will serve as panelists.
Sponsored by Department of Religion and the Axinn Center for the Humanities
Scott A. Margolin ’99 Lecture in Environmental Affairs–Naomi Klein
Thursday, February 13| 7:00 pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
The climate crisis confronts each of us, including and especially young people, with urgent questions and bewildering choices about how to live, who to be, what to learn, where to go and what to do at this momentous historical crossroads. This year’s Margolin Lecture will be delivered by Naomi Klein—an award-winning journalist, celebrated author, and renowned climate justice activist—who will address the radical implications of what we are now facing and how we might come to grips with it. Naomi Klein is a Senior Correspondent at The Intercept, a Puffin Writing Fellow at Type Media Center, and the inaugural Gloria Steinem Endowed Chair in Media, Culture and Feminist Studies at Rutgers University. Her books include On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal, This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate, and The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Bill McKibben will provide opening remarks and Prof. Dan Suarez will facilitate discussion. This Margolin Lecture will mark the first in a series of events at Middlebury exploring what it means to be coming of age in an age of climate catastrophe.
HATE: Why We Should Resist It with Free Speech, Not Censorship
Tuesday, January 28 | 4:30 pm
McCardell Bicentennial Hall 216
Open to the Public
Nadine Strossen, Past President of the ACLU and John Marshall Harlan Professor of Law at NYU Law School
Prof. Strossen seeks to dispel misunderstandings plaguing our perennial debates about “hate speech vs. free speech,” showing that the First Amendment approach promotes free speech and democracy, equality, and societal harmony. “Hate speech” censorship proponents stress the potential harms such speech might further: discrimination, violence, and psychic injuries. However, there has been little analysis of whether censorship effectively counters the feared injuries. Citing evidence from many countries, Strossen argues shows that “hate speech” are at best ineffective and at worst counterproductive. The best way to resist hate and promote equality is not censorship, but rather vigorous “counterspeech” and activism.
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Nadine Strossen is John Marshall Harlan II Professor of Law at New York Law School and the first woman national President of the American Civil Liberties Union, where she served from 1991 through 2008. A frequent speaker on constitutional and civil liberties issues, her media appearances include 60 Minutes, CBS Sunday Morning, Today, Good Morning America, The Daily Show, and other news programs on CNN, C-SPAN, Fox, Al-Jazeera, and in Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. Her op-eds have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Washington Times, and USA Today, among others. Her talk will draw on her most recent book published in 2018 by Oxford.
The League of Nations: 100 Years Since Its Founding
Friday, January 24, 2020 | 12:30 pm
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room, Robert A. Jones ’59 House
Open to the Public
Future of the Past panel “The League of Nations: 100 Years since its founding” with Susan Pedersen, Gouverneur Morris Professor of History, Columbia University, and Nicholas Sambanis ’90, Presidential Distinguished Professor of Political Science, University of Pennsylvania.
Lunch is free for current Middlebury College students/faculty/staff; $5 for others; RSVP by 1/20 to rcga@middlebury.edu.
Sponsored by the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs
Alison Bechdel–“First Wednesdays” Talk
Wednesday, December 4, 2019 | 7 pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
Alison Bechdel is Cartoonist Laureate for the State of Vermont. Her self-syndicated Dykes to Watch Out For (1983 to 2008) became a countercultural institution. Her 2006 book Fun Home was a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle award and has been adapted into a Tony-Award-winning Broadway musical. Her talk at Middlebury will follow the speaker format of the Engaged Listening Project and is part of the Vermont Humanities Council’s “First Wednesdays” lecture series.
Sponsored by the Engaged Listening Project and the Vermont Humanities Council
Race or Class? An Affirmative Action Debate Featuring: Richard Kahlenberg and Randall Kennedy
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Wednesday, November 20, 2019 | 4:30 pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
Many Americans are of two minds on the issue of affirmative action in college admissions. On the one hand, they recognize that the United States has an egregious history of racial discrimination that needs to be addressed. They also believe that all students learn more—and society benefits—when colleges bring together people of diverse backgrounds. On the other hand, many Americans are uncomfortable with the idea that the racial box an applicant checks has a large impact on his or her chances of admission. They worry that racial preferences stigmatize beneficiaries, breed resentment, and encourage everyone— including whites—to identify by race. And many other Americans think it’s unfair when a wealthy African American or Latino applicant receives a preference over a low-income white or Asian student. Should affirmative action be reimagined? Or, is race-based affirmative action still an optimal tool for cultivating a diverse student body?
Sponsored by the Hamilton Forum
Special Screening of Human Nature
Monday, November 11, 2019 | 7:00 p.m.
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center)
Open to the Public
Please join us for a pre-theatrical screening of a documentary about gene editing and CRISPR entitled Human Nature. Middlebury graduate Dr. Sarah Goodwin (’04) and her organization, iBiology/Wonder Collaborative are producers of the documentary that will air on Monday, November 11, 2019 in Dana Auditorium at 7:00pm. Dr. Goodwin will also appear via video conference for a Q&A session after the screening.
Currently, Human Nature is only playing at film festivals and a few special pre-theatrical screenings before it appears in theaters in early 2020 (and iBiology is working on a TV broadcast and streaming for later in 2020). The documentary has already aired in theaters in Canada, and the press around it has been outstanding, thus far. The film dives into the discovery of CRISPR, and features interviews with many of the scientists who were involved in adapting this technology for genome editing. The societal and ethical issues borne out of this technology are also heavily emphasized in the film.
Should the Democratic Party Have a Centrist or Radical Future?
Wednesday, November 6, 2019 | 4:30 – 6pm
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center)
Open to the Public
A Hamilton Forum Dialogue
FOR A CENTRIST FUTURE:
William A. Galston holds the Ezra K. Zilkha Chair in the Brookings Institution, Washington, DC. Prior to January 2006, he was the Saul Stern Professor at the School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland. From 1993-1995, he was Deputy Assistant to President Clinton for Domestic Policy. He has participated in 6 presidential campaigns and served as Executive Director of the National Commission on Civic Renewal. He is the author of more than 100 articles and nine books, including Anti-Pluralism: The Populist Threat to Liberal Democracy (Yale, 2018). He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and writes a weekly column for the Wall Street Journal.
FOR A RADICAL FUTURE:
Michael Kazin is Professor of History at Georgetown University and editor of Dissent, the leading magazine of the American Left since 1954. His most recent book is War Against War: The American Fight for Peace, 1914-1918 (Simon and Schuster, 2017), which was named an Editor’s Choice by the New York Times Book Review. His previous books include American Dreamers: How the Left Changed a Nation (Knopf, 2011), named a Best Book of 2011 by The New Republic, Newsweek/Daily Beast, and The Progressive. He is currently writing a history of the Democratic Party, to be published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Sponsored by the Hamilton Forum
The Evolving Role of Business in Society, and When Companies Should Take a Stand: A Conversation with Dan Schulman ’80, President and CEO of PayPal
Thursday, October 10, 2019| 6:30 pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
A Livestream Event: A Visit with Congressman John Lewis and Co-Author Andrew Aydin
Monday, October 7, 2019| 6:45 – 9pm
Mahaney Arts Center, Olin C. Robison Concert Hall
Open to the Public
PLEASE NOTE: this is a livestream of an event happening at the Flynn Center in Burlington, VT
Almost sixty years ago, Martin Luther King, Jr. edited a 16-page comic book about the Montgomery Bus Boycott that dramatized the fledgling movement and its tactics to a generation of future leaders, including a young John Lewis. Today, Congressman Lewis is continuing that legacy, using comics to educate and inspire a new generation. Congressman Lewis and his co-author Andrew Aydin will visit the Flynn Center to discuss their transformative and award-winning graphic novels, bringing Lewis’ memories of the civil rights movement to urgent new life as a catalyst for vital discussions about diversity, society, and active engagement in one’s community, in ways that are not just historical, but directly relevant to today’s world.
Political Polarization and the Road to the Trump Presidency
Thursday, October 3 | 4:30 – 6pm
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center)
Open to the Public
As this year’s Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar Lecturer, Julian E. Zelizer, Malcolm Stevenson Forbes, Class of 1941 Professor of History and Public Affairs at Princeton University and CNN Political Analyst, will explore the roots of our turbulent political scene. Professor Zelizer is one of the country’s leading political historians and the author and editor of more than a dozen books.
Co-sponsored by Phi Beta Kappa and the History Department
Ofelia Zepeda–A Public Talk
Thursday, October 3 | 4:30 – 6pm
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room
Open to the Public
“From her birth in Stanfield, Ariz., in 1952 to her current stature as an academic, linguist and a leading poet of the Tohono O’odham of the Sonoran Desert in Arizona and northern Mexico, Zepeda is a master of language, both English and O’odham (the language spoken by the Tohono O’odham, Akimel O’odham and Hia C-ed O’odham). Likewise, she is a fierce advocate for the reclamation and preservation of indigenous tongues. She has been honored as a MacArthur Fellow and, earlier this year, with a Distinguished Service award from the Modern Language Association. But her life and work is firmly rooted in himdag, the Tohono O’odham way of life that permeates the cultural, spiritual and physical realms.” *www.americanindianmagazine.org…
Is Civility a Sham? Speech and the Limits of Tolerance
Wednesday, October 2 | 4:30 – 5:45pm
Axinn Center Abernethy Room
Open to the Public
A Lecture with Q & A
Teresa Bejan
University of Oxford
Politicians and intellectuals today warn that we face a crisis of civility, with partisan hatreds and wars of words polluting our public sphere. In liberal democracies committed to tolerating diversity as well as active, often heated disagreement, the loss of this conversational virtue appears critical. But is civility really a virtue? Or is it, as critics claim, a covert demand for conformity that silences dissent?
Bringing the insights of early modern political thought to bear on this contemporary problem, Dr. Bejan’s lecture will explore a path forward, one that challenges assumptions about what a tolerant and civil society should look like today.
TERESA BEJAN is Associate Professor of Political Theory and Fellow of Oriel College at the University of Oxford. Her first book, Mere Civility: Disagreement and the Limits of Toleration (Harvard University Press, 2017) was called “penetrating and sophisticated” by the New York Times, and her work has been featured on PBS, WNYC, CBC radio, Philosophy Bites and other podcasts. In addition to her many articles in academic journals and edited volumes, she has written on free speech and civility for The Atlantic and The Washington Post. Dr. Bejan received her PhD with distinction from Yale in 2013.
Co-sponsored by the Department of Political Science and the Alexander Hamilton Forum
Sigal Ben-Porath
Wednesday, September 11, 2019 | 4:30 PM
Hillcrest 103 (The Orchard)
Open to the Public
Sigal Ben-Porath received her doctorate in political philosophy from Tel-Aviv university in 2000, after which she joined Princeton University’s Center for Human Values as a post-doctoral fellow. In 2004 she moved to the University of Pennsylvania where she is currently a professor of education, philosophy and political science. Her most recent books are Free Speech on Campus (Penn Press, 2017) and Making up Our Mind: What School Choice is Really About (with Mike Johanek, University of Chicago Press 2019). Her previous books include Citizenship Under Fire: Democratic Education in Times of Conflict (2006) and Tough Choices (2010), both from Princeton University Press. She serves on the board of the Mitchell Center for the Study of Democracy, as well as the Teachers Institute of Philadelphia. She has been chairing Penn’s Committee on Open Expression since 2015.
Co-sponsored by the Dean of the Faculty and the Dean of Students
Human and Environmental Microbial Health: A Global Perspective
Thursday, February 21, 2019 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the public
Jack Gilbert is a Professor in the Department of Pediatrics and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine. Dr. Gilbert earned his Ph.D. in 2002 at Unilever and Nottingham University in the UK and was a senior scientist at Plymouth Marine Laboratory in the UK from 2005 until 2010, when he moved to the University of Chicago and became a Professor of Surgery and the Director of The Microbiome Center there. Professor Gilbert also cofounded the Earth Microbiome Project and the American Gut Project, and has authored more than 250 publications on microbial ecology. In 2014 he was on the Crain’s Business Chicago’s 40 Under 40 List, and was listed as one of the 50 most influential scientists by Business Insider in 2015, as well as on the Brilliant Ten by Popular Scientist.
Professor Gilbert will discuss the human microbiome as a part of the human ecosystem, and how ecology can be used to understand this ecosystem and changes within it. He will present research on how changes in the human ecosystem as related to atopy, neurological disorders, metabolic disorders, and other complex conditions and disease states. He will also discuss the distance we have created between children and the microbial world and how this may be impacting their physiological, immunological, neurological and even endocrinological development.
Sponsored by the Office of the President, the Biology Department, and Atwater Commons.
Pursuing Peace and Justice: a Conversation with Nadia Murad
Tuesday, February 12, 2019 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the public in overflow locations
Author and activist Nadia Murad, a 2018 Nobel Peace Prize co-winner, is a survivor of the Yazidi genocide in northern Iraq by ISIS fighters. She is one of thousands of Yazidi women who were abducted by ISIS in August of 2014 and forced into the ISIS sex slave trade. Losing six of her nine brothers and her mother in the Kocho massacre, she escaped after a month in captivity.
Murad is the founder of Nadia’s Initiative, a nonprofit “aimed at increasing advocacy for women and minorities and assisting to stabilize and redevelop communities in crisis.” She is also the author of the memoir The Last Girl: My Story of Captivity and My Fight against the Islamic State (2017, Tim Duggan Books) and the recipient of numerous awards and honors for her humanitarian work.
She will be joined on stage by Febe Armanios, associate professor of history, who will speak to her about her work as a human rights activist for the Yazidi community and her efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war, and Abid Shamdeen, who will help interpret.
Conversations with Frank Bruni
Wednesday, January 9, 2019 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
Frank Bruni is a renowned columnist for the New York Times. During this event, which is part of the Middlebury First Wednesdays talk series organized by the Vermont Humanities Council, Bruni will engage with the audience over a wide range of topics, including identity politics, free speech, and how these issues play out on campuses and in communities. Find the VHC’s page on this event here.
This event features a new listening & speaking discussion format, developed by the Engaged Listening Project at Middlebury College. To view the event, click here. This requires a Middlebury sign on.
Co-sponsored with the Vermont Humanities Council and supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, in partnership with Middlebury College.
Bill Kristol, “Can the Republican Party be Saved? Can America?”
Tuesday, November 27, 2018 | 4:30 PM- 6:00 PM
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center) | Map
Open to the Middlebury College Campus
Bill Kristol is founder and editor at large of The Weekly Standard, a Washington, D.C. journal of politics and ideas. He is a regular on ABC’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos and has appeared frequently on other leading political commentary shows. During the 2016 elections, Mr. Kristol became known as, and he continues to be, a prominent critic of president Donald Trump.
Mr. Kristol was on the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania’s Political Science Department from 1979 to 1983, and then worked at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government until he moved to Washington in 1985. He worked as Chief of Staff for Vice President Dan Quayle under the first Bush Administration, and for Education Secretary William Bennet under the Reagan administration. Before founding The Weekly Standard in 1995, Mr. Kristol led the Project for the Republican Future, contributing to the 1994 Republican congressional victory.
Bill Kristol received both his A.B. and PH.D. from Harvard University, and is a widely published author and editor in several fields, ranging from foreign policy to constitutional law to political philosophy.
Trauma and the U.S. Immigration System: Immigrant Detention, Family Separation, and Undocumented Work
Thursday, November 15, 2018 | 7:30 PM- 9:30 PM
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center) | Map
Open to the Public
Featuring Sarah Rogerson, J.D., LL. M., Andrea Green, M.D., Hannah Krutiansky ’19, and Meron Benti ’19, this panel will bring together migrant advocates who offer witness to injustices that migrants face on both the institutional and individual levels to talk about responding to current immigration policies.
Sarah Rogerson and Andrea Green are two practitioners and experts in immigration fields. Sarah Rogerson is a Clinical Professor of Law, Director of the Immigration Law Clinic, and Director of the Law Clinic & Justice Center at Albany Law School, and she represents immigrant detainees at the Albany County Jail. Dr. Andrea Green is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Director of the New Americans Clinic at the UVM Larner College of Medicine in Burlington, and she will speak about the effects of family separation and immigration policies on children’s and family health. Hanna Krutiansky and Meron Benti are two Middlebury Seniors who will also speak on the panel. Meron is an asylum recipient and advocate, and Hannah has worked with RAICES, an organization that helps detained immigrant families.
Co-sponsored with American Studies, the Center for Comparative Studies of Race and Ethnicity, Juntos, Alianza, the History Department, the GSFS (Gender, Sexuality, & Feminist Studies) Department, and Latin American Studies/ IGST.
DeRay McKesson, “Political Activism and the Case for Hope”
Wednesday, November 7, 2018 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
DeRay McKesson is a Black Lives Matter activist and graduate of Bowdoin College. Mr. McKesson will speak during this interactive program, centered around political activism, about how his liberal arts education has informed his work. This program is part of the First Wednesdays talk series organized by the Vermont Humanities Council as part of the “Democracy and the Informed Citizen” Initiative. Find the Vermont Humanities Council’s page on this event here.
This event features a new listening & speaking discussion format, developed by the Engaged Listening Project at Middlebury College.
Co-sponsored with the Vermont Humanities Council and supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, in partnership with Middlebury College.
Engaged Listening Project Open House
Tuesday, November 6, 2018 | 4:00 PM- 5:30 PM
Axinn Center 229, Axinn Center Reading Room | Map
Open to Students, Faculty, and Staff of Middlebury College
The Engaged Listening Project is a new initiative at Middlebury College to change the way that we interact with visiting speakers, as well as each other, on this campus. Come engage in conversation, ask questions, and discuss topics around listening and designing new ways to talk with one another. All are welcome to bring their ideas. Light refreshments will be provided.
This event is a part of the Engaged Listening Project event series.
“We Crossed a Bridge and it Trembled: Voices from Syria”
Monday, November 5, 2018 | 12:15 PM- 1:45 PM
Axinn Center 229, Axinn Center Reading Room | Map
Open to the Public
How have Syrians lived the uprising and war transforming their country? What can their personal stories teach us about both tragedy and resilience? Wendy Pearlman, the Martin and Patricia Koldyke Outstanding Teaching Associate Professor of Political Science at Northwestern and a core faculty member of the MENA Program, will explore these questions in this presentation of her acclaimed new book, We Crossed a Bridge and it Trembled: Voices from Syria. Based on interviews that Pearlman conducted with more than 300 Syrian refugees across the Middle East and Europe since 2012, the book is a mosaic of first-hand stories and reflections that chronicle the Syrian conflict exclusively through the words of people who have lived it.
This event features a new listening & speaking discussion format, developed by the Engaged Listening Project at Middlebury College.
The Courts in the Age of Trump
Thursday, October 25, 2018 | 4:30- 6:00 PM
Dana Auditorium | Map
Open to the Public
President Trump has appointed a record number of judges to the federal courts and has nominated two judges to the U.S. Supreme Court. These jurists may reshape the courts for a generation or more. Do they pose a threat to fundamental rights and equality under law? Will Trump-appointed judges take the courts in the wrong direction? Two of the nation’s leading legal minds will provide contrasting answers to this question and take questions from the audience.
John O. McGinnis is the George C. Dix Professor of Constitutional Law at Northwestern University and served as the Deputy Assistant Attorney General under President George H. W. Bush. He is a recipient of the Federalist Society Paul Bator Award and the author of several books. He holds an MA from Balliol College, Oxford, and a BA and JD from Harvard, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review.
James E. Fleming is The Honorable Paul J. Liacos Professor of Law at the Boston University School of Law. One of the country’s leading theorists of constitutional interpretation, he is the author of six books and has also authored dozens of articles in leading law reviews. Mr. Fleming has previously held posts at Fordham University School of Law and served as a litigation attorney at Cravath, Swaine & Moore. A graduate of the University of Missouri, he also holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University and a J.D. from Harvard Law School.
Nadia Murad, “Victims of Ethnic and Religious Violence in the Middle East”
Friday, October 5, 2018 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
Nadia Murad, a survivor of the Yazidi genocide in northern Iraq, will be sharing her story here at Middlebury. Her talk is entitled, “Hope Has an Expiration Date: Exploring the Plight of Victims of Ethnic and Religious Violence in the Middle East.” Here is an excerpt a speech Ms. Murad made in May of 2018:
“My survival came with purpose, responsibility, and hope. I hoped… travelling the world and describing in detail what we had seen and experienced would mobilize governments, organizations and individuals to act and fight the persecution that minorities face. What I have learned is hope is dangerous. For years now, the Yazidi people have only had hope… But, hope has an expiration date. Years of advocacy, years of telling the Yazidi experience to world leaders, has been met with expressions of sympathy and outrage. But, when expressions of sympathy and outrage are not transformed into action to rebuild and protect – hope expires. Hope requires action to survive.”
This event is free and open to the public. There will be a livestream of the event available in Dana Auditorium in the case that overflow seating is necessary.
Sponsored by the Office of the President as part of the Critical Conversations series.
Refugees in the USA- Law and Politics
Friday, May 4, 2018 | 12:15 PM- 1:30 PM
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room | Map
Open to the Public
Rebecca Hamlin, an Assistance Professor of Legal Studies in the political science department at UMass Amherst, will be giving this International and Global Studies Colloquium lecture on the laws and politics surrounding refugees in the United States. Dr. Hamlin has written a book, Let Me be a Refugee, as well as many journal articles and other works on her topics of interest.
Lunch will be provided for Middlebury College ID holders, and there is a suggested donation of $5 without a Middlebury ID. Kindly RSVP by 4/26 to rcga@middlebury.edu.
Sponsored by the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs and the Department of Political Science.
Scott Saul, Reckoning with Richard Pryor- Seventies Comedy Explosion in the Wake of #BlackLivesMatter & #MeToo
Wednesday, May 2, 2018 | 4:30 PM- 6:00 PM
Axinn Center 229 | Map
Open to the Public
Scott Saul is an author, poet, critic, historian, and a Professor of English at UC-Berkeley, where he teaches American Literature and history. An expert on Richard Pryor’s comedy, he is the author of Becoming Richard Pryor and the creator of the book’s digital compliment, Richard Pryor’s Peoria. He also writes for The New York Times, Harper’s Magazine, The Nation, Bookforum, and other publications, and hosts Chapter & Verse, a podcast out of UC-Berkeley’s Center for the Humanities. He will be speaking about the works of Richard Pryor in the context of modern social justice movements. Light refreshments will be served.
Sponsored by the Davis Educational Foundation Curricular Grant, the Digital Liberal Arts Initiative, and the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Research.
Campus Protest in the Trump Era: Where it’s Coming From, Where it’s Going
Friday, April 20, 2018 | 7:30 PM- 8:45 PM
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room | Map
Open to the Public
Angus Johnston, a history professor at the City University of New York, will be the AALAC (Alliance for the Advancement of Liberal Arts Colleges) Conference Keynote Speaker this year. An expert in student activism and organizing, he will be speaking about protesting on campuses in this day and age. Professor Johnston has recently published several articles on student activism, such as, There’s no College PC Crisis: In Defense of Student Protesters, and, Student Protests, Then and Now, as well as a podcast titled, Is Free Speech in a State of Emergency?
Sponsored by the AALAC (Alliance for the Advancement of Liberal Arts Colleges).
Why Free Speech is the Only Safe Place for Minorities
Thursday, April 19 | 4:30 – 6:30 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
This lecture by and Q&A session with Jonathan Rauch will address minority viewpoints and how minorities benefit from free speech. Rauch is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and a widely known writer on public policy, culture, and government, both as a contributing editor at The Atlantic and as the author of six books. He has received many awards, such as the 2005 National Magazine Award, the 2010 National Headliner Award, and the 2011 National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association prize for excellence in opinions writing.
Sponsored by the Open Campus Initiative, the Institute for Humane Studies, Ross Commons, and the Political Science Department.
“Where Do We Go From Here?”: Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Unanswered Question
Tuesday, April 17, 2018 | 7:30 PM
Dana Auditorium | Map
Open to the Public
The annual Charles S. Grant lecture will be given this year by Clayborne Carson, the founding director of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute at Stanford University. Professor Carson oversaw the King Papers Project in 1985 as per the request of the late Coretta Scott King, and has written several books, such as In Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s, which won the OAH’s Frederick Jackson Turner Prize, and Martin’s Dream: My Journey and the Legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr., published in 2013.
Free Speech and Inclusion on College Campuses: A Discussion with Dr. Robert Post
Wednesday, April 11, 2018 | 7:00 PM
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room | Map
Dr. Robert Post is a Sterling Professor of Law at Yale Law School, where he served as the dean from 2009 to 2017. His foci are constitutional law, legal history, equal protection, and the First Amendment, and he has written and edited many books, such as, Citizens Divided: A Constitutional Theory of Campaign Finance Reform. Dr. Post will be discussing the difficulties of applying the social purposes, such as the importance of democratic self- government, of the First Amendment on college campuses. He will present the theory of academic freedom as another way to look at freedom of speech on college campuses. This discussion will be introduced by Dr. Roberto Lint Sagarena and will include a Q&A moderated by Dr. Erik Bleich.
Sponsored by the Center for the Comparative Study of Race & Ethnicity, the Office of the Dean of Students, and the Political Science department.
Mismatch: Does Affirmative Action Hurt More than it Helps?
Tuesday, April 3 | 4:30 – 6:15 PM
Kirk Alumni Center | Map
Open to Middlebury College ID holders
Richard Sander, an author and professor at the UCLA School of Law, will be speaking about what he calls “mismatch theory.” This theory is introduced in his book Mismatch, in which he argues that there are unintended consequences of preference programs in college admissions departments. He will be presenting data from UCLA admission and graduation statistics before and after racial preferences in admission to the Universities of California were banned, which showed in his analysis a higher graduation rate among historically underrepresented groups. These highly contested views will be engaged in a conversation moderated by Professor Caitlin Myers.
Is Civility Dead? Religion, Political Virtue, and Deliberative Democracy in the Age of Trump
Wednesday, April 4, 2018 | 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Speaker: James Davis, Department of Religion. Professor Davis has authored several books and teaches courses on Ethics and Christian studies at Middlebury, as well as serving as co-director of the Privilege and Poverty Academic Cluster.
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
The Many Sides of History: Reflections on the Vietnam War with Ken Burns, Lynn Novick and Mike Heaney
Wednesday, March 21, 2018 | 7:30 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Middlebury College Community, and the public if space permits
Ken Burns and Lynn Novick have collaborated on some of the most highly acclaimed documentary films of our time, such as The War, Jazz, Baseball, and, most recently, The Vietnam War. As a retired attorney and history professor, Vietnam veteran Mike Heaney ’64 offered one of many diverse perspectives presented in this 10-part film series that recently aired on PBS.
Now, all three are coming to screen clips from the film before holding a panel discussion and Q & A session with audience members. Middlebury College ID holders will be able to enter at 7:00 pm, and doors open for the public at 7:15. There will be overflow seating nearby in Crossroads Café with a live feed of the conversation. Join us for this special event, made possible with the Robert P. Youngman ’64 Roundtable Fund, which is committed to engaging in discourse around free speech and challenging topics in the public sphere.
First Food Justice: Why Infant Feeding Is a Central Social and Environmental Equity Issue in the United States
Wednesday, March 21, 2018 | 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Speaker: Erica Morrell, Department of Sociology and Anthropology. Erica Morrell is a Mellon C3 Postdoctoral Fellow in Sociology at Middlebury. She led Middlebury students in research and generating a report this year on charitable food efforts in the Addison County area and how these efforts may be affected by the new recycling and composting laws in Vermont.
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Climate Change: Communicating Across Divides, with Dr. Katherine Hayhoe and Bill McKibben
Tuesday, March 20, 2018 | 4:30 PM
Davis Family Library room 105 | Map
Dr. Katherine Hayhoe is a professor, atmospheric scientist, and the director of the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University. She will be giving a virtual presentation with remarks in-person by Bill McKibben, a Schumann Distinguished Scholar at Middlebury. The two will discuss the process of communication between people of different backgrounds and perspectives surrounding the pressing issue of climate change.
Sponsored by Franklin Environmental Center, ES Program, Scott Center for Spiritual and Religious Life, Office of Digital Learning and Inquiry, Office of Advancement, and Addison County Interfaith Climate Action Network.
To “construct a virtuous…community in Africa”: Extending the Great Redeemer’s Kingdom through the American Colonization Society
Wednesday, March 14, 2018 | 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Speaker: Bill Hart, Department of History. Professor Hart has played a role in the production of several documentaries, such as, “Black Indians: An American Story,” and PBS’s “The War that Made America,” as well as published several essays “on the intersection of race, religion, and identity in 17th-, 18th-, and 19th-century Indian country,” and held several fellowships at universities around the country.
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Rethinking Thoreau: Race, Religion, and Renewal
Wednesday, February 28, 2018 | 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Speaker: Rebecca Gould, Program in Environmental Studies. Professor Gould is an environmental advocate and the author of several books, including At Home in Nature. Now in Environmental Studies, she also served in the Religion department for eight years as well.
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Jill Lepore, Kwame Anthony Appiah and Jonathan Haidt
Wednesday, February 21, 2018 | 7:30 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Middlebury College Community
What does a robust and inclusive public sphere look like? Why is it important to American society and global citizenship? How should we construct it? How can a liberal arts education prepare students to engage it? Jill Lepore is a staff writer for The New Yorker and a professor of American History at Harvard University. Kwame Anthony Appiah is a novelist and professor of law and philosophy at NYU. Jonathan Haidt is a social psychologist and also a professor at New York University, as well as the author of the recent bestseller The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion. Join this trio of distinguished scholars and public intellectuals in engaging these questions in a discussion open to all members of the Middlebury community.
The PEN Convening
January 11–12, 2018
PEN—an organization dedicated to promoting free expression and literary culture—will lead a closed-door discussion on January 11 for 30 faculty members, students, and administrators, in which the participants discuss free speech issues and their relation to matters of inclusivity. That conversation will be followed by a public presentation on January 11, at 5:00 P.M.
What Is Hate Speech?
Wednesday, November 8, 2017| 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Speaker: Erik Bleich, Department of Political Science
How I Shed My Skin: Unlearning the Racist Lessons of a Southern Childhood
Thursday, October 26 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
In 1968, three black girls entered the all-white, sixth grade classroom at Alex H. White Elementary School in Pollocksville, North Carolina. Their presence left a lasting impact on Jim Grimsley, a white boy in that classroom, who found himself confronted with his own ideas about race and difference. Now, nearly 50 years later, Jim Grimsley and those three classmates—Donnie Meadows, Fernanda Copeland, and Rose Bell—gather for a conversation about the history that they lived through when Jones County integrated its public schools. Sponsored by the Alliance for an Inclusive Middlebury
Teaching Controversial Issues
Monday, October 16, 2017| 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Professor Noddings is a co-author of the recent book, Teaching Controversial Issues: The Case for Critical Thinking and Moral Commitment in the Classroom. Over her distinguished career, she has authored many books, including Caring: A Feminine Approach to Ethics and Moral Education and Education and Democracy in the 21st Century. She is the past president of the National Academy of Education. There will be a book signing following the lecture. This event is sponsored by the Center for Teaching, Learning & Research, the Philosophy Department, the Education Studies Program, Wonnacott Commons, and the Academic Enrichment Fund.
Speaker: Nel Noddings, Lee L. Jacks Professor of Education, emerita, of Stanford University
Finding Common Ground: Economic Progress in the Trump Era
Wednesday, October 11 | 4:30–6:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
What does economic progress in the Trump era look like? Former Congressman Barney Frank(D-MA) and former Republican Governor of New Hampshire John Sununu discuss the possibilities. Moderated by Gail Russell Chaddock, former correspondent for the Christian Science Monitor. Opening remarks by former Governor of Vermont and Middlebury College Executive in Residence Jim Douglas ‘72. Sponsored by the Common Ground Committee, Christian Science Monitor, Political Science Department, and the Center for Community Engagement
Representing Trauma: From Testimony to (Post)memory in My Own Artistic Practice
Wednesday, October 4 | 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Speaker: David Miranda-Hardy, Department of Film and Media Culture
Panel Will Explore ‘What Can Feminism Speak To?’
Wednesday, September 27 | 4:30 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
Writer Katha Pollitt and scholar Janell Hobson will examine what feminism can—and cannot—speak to.
Speakers: Katha Pollitt, and Janell Hobson
Discourse and Discord at Middlebury: A Way Forward
Wednesday, September 20 | 4:30 PM
Dana Auditorium | Map
Open to the Public
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Speaker: Jonathan Miller-Lane, Education Studies Program
”–Robert W. van de Velde, Jr. ’75 Memorial Lecture
Monday, March 14, 2022| 7:00 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
Tamar Mayar, Robert R. Churchill Professor of Geosciences, will deliver an inaugural lecture entitled, “How Stateless Nations Claim Their Homelands: A case study in attachment, memory, and resilience.”
All ethnic nations mark attachment to their homelands by erecting markers in the landscape that denote important events in the life of the nation. These markers serve not only as material proof of the nation’s past in the homeland but also as sites for the ongoing ritual affirmation of national identity. But when the ethnic nation is stateless and has become a marginalized minority in its own homeland, members of the nation must devise new ways to maintain their identity. This is especially difficult if the homeland is governed by an authoritarian regime that wishes to erase the nation along with its attachment to its homeland. In those cases, resilience is not enough and maintaining national identity becomes the work of the diaspora.
Vaccinations and masks required.
Apoorva Mandavilli, New York Times reporter, will deliver the 2022 Robert W. van de Velde, Jr. ’75 Memorial lecture, “Reporting on an unprecedented pandemic.”
Since the early days of 2020, when the world slowly woke to the coronavirus pandemic, reporting on the virus has been relentless, fast-paced and immeasurably complicated. It has also been exhilarating. This event will offer a brief glimpse into the experience of a journalist who has written almost exclusively only about the pandemic for nearly two years.
To join by Zoom, please go to https://www.middlebury.edu/events/event/robert-w-van-de-velde-jr-75-memorial-lecture
Past events
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“Reporting on an Unprecedented Pandemic”–Robert W. van de Velde, Jr. ’75 Memorial Lecture
Monday, March 14, 2022| 7:00 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
Apoorva Mandavilli, New York Times reporter, will deliver the 2022 Robert W. van de Velde, Jr. ’75 Memorial lecture, “Reporting on an unprecedented pandemic.”
Since the early days of 2020, when the world slowly woke to the coronavirus pandemic, reporting on the virus has been relentless, fast-paced and immeasurably complicated. It has also been exhilarating. This event will offer a brief glimpse into the experience of a journalist who has written almost exclusively only about the pandemic for nearly two years.
To join by Zoom, please go to https://www.middlebury.edu/events/event/robert-w-van-de-velde-jr-75-memorial-lecture
“Russia’s War on Ukraine”–A Round Table Discussion
Tuesday, March 8, 2022| 6:30 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
Please join Timothy Frye ’86 and William Pyle for a discussion on Russia’s war on Ukraine. The discussion will take via Zoom webinar and will be followed by an audience Q & A.
Register Now: https://middlebury.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_27Q-4pFxSZ2XRUd5j908EA
Timothy Frye ’86 is the Marshall D. Shulman Professor of Post-Soviet Foreign Policy at Columbia University. Professor Frye received a BA in Russian language and literature from Middlebury College, an MIA from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, and a PhD in political science from Columbia. His research and teaching interests are in comparative politics and political economy with a focus on the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. He is the author of Brokers and Bureaucrats: Building Markets in Russia, which won the 2001 Hewett Prize from the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies; Building States and Markets after Communism: The Perils of Polarized Democracy, which won a Best Book Prize from the APSA Comparative Democratization section in 2010; and Property Rights and Property Wrongs: How Power, Institutions, and Norms Shape Economic Conflict in Russia, which was published in 2017. His most recent book is Weak Strongman: The Limits of Power in Putin’s Russia. He co-directs the International Center for the Study of Institutions and Development at the Higher Economics School in Moscow and edits Post-Soviet Affairs.
William Pyle is the Frederick C. Dirks Professor of International Economics at Middlebury College and an affiliate of the programs in International Politics and Economics and Russian and East European Studies. He is Associate Fellow of the International Center for the Study of Institutions and Development at the HSE University in Moscow, and he has recently held visiting research positions at CESifo in Munich and the Bank of Finland Institute for Emerging Economies.
Sponsor: Alumni and Parents Program Office
“The Impact of the Fall of Afghanistan on the US in Asia”
Tuesday, March 8, 2022| 4:30 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs program on Security and Global Affairs presents Lisa Curtis speaking on “The Impact of the Fall of Afghanistan on the US in Asia” via Zoom.
Lisa Curtis is a Senior Fellow and Director of the Indo-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security (CNAS). She is a foreign policy and national security expert with over 20 years of service in the U.S. government, including at the NSC, CIA, State Department, and Capitol Hill. Her work has centered on U.S. policy toward the Indo-Pacific and South Asia, with a particular focus on U.S.- India strategic relations; Quad (U.S., Australia, India, and Japan) cooperation; counterterrorism strategy in South and Central Asia; and China’s role in the region.
Ms. Curtis served as Deputy Assistant to the President and NSC Senior Director for South and Central Asia from 2017-2021 under three successive National Security Advisors. During her tenure at the NSC, she coordinated U.S. policy development and implementation of the South Asia Strategy approved by the
President in 2017 and was a key contributor to the Indo-Pacific Strategic Framework, which included expanding Quad security cooperation. She coordinated policies designed to strengthen the U.S.-India defense, diplomatic, and trade partnership, resulting in a widely recognized elevation of the relationship.
To join this webinar, please use this Zoom link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
“The War in Ukraine”–A Roundtable Discussion
Friday, March 4, 2022| 12:30 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
The RCGA International and Global Colloquium series presents William Pyle, Frederick C. Dirks Professor of International Economics, and the lecture, “ Exiting Communism’s Enduring Effect on Russian Public Opinion.”
One cannot fully understand the country that Russia is today without appreciating the enduring effect of its dramatic exit from communism thirty years ago. The shocks of transitioning from one economic system to another and witnessing the Soviet empire’s collapse left a deep and enduring impression on Russians’ worldview. Public opinion surveys and election data highlight how this history has had lasting and often differential effects on individuals and entire regions.
Sponsored by the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs, the International and Global Colloquium offers students, faculty, and staff the opportunity to learn about global and international research activities. Speakers include Middlebury College faculty and alumni, as well as other scholars and professionals in the global arena.
To join this webinar, please use this Zoom link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
“The War in Ukraine”–A Roundtable Discussion
Tuesday, March 1, 2022| 4:30 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs presents a group of experts, students and faculty in a roundtable discussion regarding “The War in Ukraine.” Participants include Vitaly Charnetsky (University of Kansas), Jeff Buettner (Middlebury), Sarah Bidgood (MIIS), Kevin Moss (Middlebury), Tatiana Smorodinska (Middlebury), Michael Kraus (Middlebury) Marila Dzholos (Class of ‘24) with Rebecca Mitchell (Middlebury) moderating.
A timely, educational and informative discussion. To join this webinar, please use this Zoom link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
Sponsor: Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs
“The War over History: Russia and Ukraine on the Brink of Defining Their Identities”
Thursday, February 23, 2022| 4:30 PM (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs program on Global History presents Dr. Serhy Yekelchyk and “The War over History: Russia and Ukraine on the Brink of Defining Their Identities.”
While the world media and military strategists focus on the next move of the Russian armada massing near the Ukrainian border, only history can tell us why the Russian troops are there. This talk will trace the historical origins of the Russians’ unwillingness to accept an independent Ukrainian state and explain how Ukraine became the battleground in the centuries-long Russian crusade against Western influences, including the very concept of democracy. Whether or not a major war begins soon, the ongoing conflict has only strengthened the Ukrainian national identity. In order for peace to become possible, Russia would also need to reimagine itself as a nation rather than an empire.
Serhy Yekelchyk is professor of Slavic Studies and History at the University of Victoria and the author of Ukraine: What Everyone Needs to Know, 2nd edition (Oxford University Press, 2020).
To join this webinar, please use this Zoom link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
“Understanding 9/11: Causes, Legacies, Lessons”
Friday, January 28, 2022| 9:00 am (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs will host the conference “Understanding 9/11: Causes, Legacies and Lessons. This conference will bring together academic, economic, legal, security, and strategic specialists to examine 9/11’s impact—domestically and abroad—to better understand its transformative effects and the lessons it offers in the areas of foreign policy, security, and domestic politics.
Panelists for this conference include: Spencer Ackerman (The Daily Beast, Substack newsletter “Forever Wars”), Andrew Bacevich (Quincy Institute), Linda Bilmes (Harvard Kennedy School), Juliette Kayyem (Harvard Kennedy School), James Marone ‘75 (Brown University), Faiza Patel (Brennan Center for Justice), Stan Sloan (Atlantic Council), and Shibley Telhami (University of Maryland).
For more information on this conference, please visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs website. You can join the webinar right here.
“Does Capitalism Run On Greed?: Adam Smith on Living a Better Life”
Thursday, December 2, 2021| 4:30 pm (ET)
Axinn 229
Open to the Public
Adam Smith is best known today as the defender of capitalism, but he was also an uncommonly brilliant philosopher who was especially interested in the perennial question of how to live a good life. In Our Great Purpose (2021), Professor Hanley, one of today’s leading Smith scholars, shows us Smith in an entirely new light—and along the way, teaches us what it truly means to possess an excellent character and lead a worthy life.
Ryan Patrick Hanley is Professor of Political Science at Boston College. Prior to joining the faculty at Boston College, he was the Mellon Distinguished Professor of Political Science at Marquette University, and held visiting appointments or fellowships at Yale, Harvard, and the University of Chicago. A specialist on the political philosophy of the Enlightenment period, he is the author of Adam Smith and the Character of Virtue (Cambridge, 2009) and Love’s Enlightenment: Rethinking Charity in Modernity (Cambridge, 2017), and Our Great Purpose: Adam Smith on Living a Better Life (Princeton, 2019). His most recent projects include The Political Philosophy of Fénelon, and a companion translation volume, Fénelon: Moral and Political Writings, both of which will be published by Oxford in 2020.
“Liberal Arts for an Information Age”
Tuesday, November 30, 2021| 7:00 pm (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public–registration required
The Middlebury Initiative for Data and Digital Methods (midd.data) is pleased to present “Liberal Arts for an Information Age”, a fireside chat with Eric Schmidt, Co-founder, Schmidt Futures, who served as Google’s Chief Executive Officer and Chairman from 2001 to 2011, Executive Chairman from 2011 to 2018, and most recently as Technical Advisor.
In this webinar, moderated by Professor Caitlin Myers, John G. McCullough Professor of Economics and co-Director of midd.data, Mr. Schmidt and Professor Myers will discuss key questions related to how liberal arts colleges and similar institutions might adapt to a rapidly changing world marked by the rise of big data, big computing, and big tech.
Guests are encouraged to submit their questions for the conversation ahead of time via this form.
This event is open to all members of the Middlebury Community and to the public. Register in advance here.
“Artists in Dialogue: Jon Henry & Mikael Owunna, Moderated by Andrew Plumley ‘ 11”
Wednesday, November 17, 2021| 7:00 pm (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public–registration required
Photographers Jon Henry and Mikael Owunna discuss their artistic responses to police murder of Black men. Andrew Plumley ’11 (Senior Director, Equity & Culture, American Alliance of Museums) moderates this online conversation, which will include audience Q&A. Free.
Advance registration required. Learn more and register: https://bit.ly/OwunnaHenry.
American Sign Language interpretation and live closed captioning provided. Accessibility questions? Contact Mikki Lane, 802.443.2309 or mlane@middlebury.edu.
This event is organized in conjunction with the exhibition “Art & Protest: Artists as Agents of Social Change,” on view at the Middlebury College Museum of Art through December 12. Museum hours & visitation policies in flux due to COVID-19: visit http://museum.middlebury.edu/visit for up-to-date information.
Co-Sponsors: American Studies Department; Anderson Freeman Resource Center; Anti-Racist Task Force; Axinn Center for the Humanities; Black Studies Program; Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity; Critical Conversations Series; Faculty Director of Equity, Justice, and Inclusion; First Year Seminar Program; History of Art & Architecture Department; Justice Projects; Office of Institutional Diversity, Equity and Inclusion; The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs Program on Global Anti-Racism; and Studio Art Department
“Afghan Women’s Songs: Lament and Resistance”
Tuesday, November 16, 2021| 4:30 pm (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public–registration required
Folk songs are a means of communication, a tool of expression, and a way to both resist and nurture patriarchy for some Afghan women. Through songs, women tell a story or express feelings that amplify other women’s voices, and women, usually present in the audience, resonate with them. The song themes are often centered around the stories of womanhood, marriage, migration, war, and poverty. Through various interviews in Northeastern Afghanistan, Tabasum Wolayat ’12 established that these songs help women both express their feelings and imagine alternatives.
To register, for this event, click here.
Co-Sponsors: Feminist Resource Center at Chellis House; the Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies Program; the Anthropology Department; and the Critical Conversations Series.
“Honorée Fanonne Jeffers, An Issue of Mercy: Exploring the Life of Phillis Wheatley Peters Through Documents & Poetry”
Thursday, November 4, 2021| 7:00 pm (ET)
Virtual Middlebury
Open to the Public
In this online lecture, poet, essayist, and novelist Honorée Fanonne Jeffers will discuss the research and practice that led to her latest book of poetry, The Age of Phillis (2020), a collection based upon fifteen years of research on the life and times of Phillis Wheatley Peters (1753-1784), a formerly enslaved person who was the first African American woman to publish a book. The Age of Phillis won the 2021 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Literary Work in Poetry, was long-listed for the 2020 National Book Award in Poetry, was a finalist for both the 2021 PEN/Volcker Award and the 2021 Los Angeles Times Book Prize in Poetry, and The Age of Phillis was chosen as the “common read” for the scholarly conference, Society of Early Americanists for the academic year of 2020-2021.
For over twenty years, Honorée Fanonne Jeffers has been lifting her voice on issues of Black culture, racism, American history, and gender through the medium of writing. She is also the author of The Gospel of Barbecue (2000); Outlandish Blues (2003); Red Clay Suite (2007); and The Glory Gets (2015). Jeffers is also a prose writer and author of the forthcoming novel The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois (2021). She is the recipient of fellowships from the American Antiquarian Society, the Bread Loaf Writers Conference, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Vermont Studio Center, the Witter Bynner Foundation through the Library of Congress, and the Tennessee Williams’ Scholarship in Fiction from the Sewanee Writers Conference. She was also the winner of the Emerging Fiction Fellowship from the Aspen Summer Words Conference and recently was honored with the 2018 Harper Lee Award for Literary Distinction, a lifetime achievement award. She is a Professor of English at the University of Oklahoma.
To join the webinar, please use
https://middlebury.zoom.us/j/92017154874?pwd=Yks1ZVp4SFNOZlByNS9CZjRoWHdoQT09
Passcode: 347204
“Montpelier Comes to Vermont”
Tuesday, November 2, 2021| 12:30-1:30 pm (ET)
Axinn 229
Join Visiting Lecturer and Senator Ruth Hardy and students in her Women in U.S. Electoral Politics class for a panel discussion with women in Vermont politics, including Speaker Jill Krowinski, Senate Pro Tempore Becca Balint, Lieutenant Governor Molly Gray, and several more women in state and local elected office. Panelists will discuss the barriers and opportunities they have faced as women in politics, how they approach campaigning and public service, and their priorities as we move into a new legislative session and election year.
Sponsors: Feminist Resource Center at Chellis House and the Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies
“What happens if Roe v. Wade is overturned?”
Wednesday, October 20, 2021| 4:30 pm (ET)
Hillcrest 103 (The Orchard)
Open to the Public (as long as Middlebury COVID protocols are observed)
The U.S. Supreme Court will soon hear oral arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, a case that is widely expected to determine the fate of Roe v. Wade and the constitutional right to abortion. Caitlin Myers of the Middlebury College Economics Department will explore how might the Court’s decision reshape the landscape of abortion access and impact women’s pursuit of economic security and family? Professor Myers will describe what we know about the causal effects of abortion access and what this implies for a possible post-Roe America. Along the way she will discuss spearheading and writing an economists’ amicus brief to the Supreme Court in this landmark case.
Sponsor: The Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
“Should the United States Increase Immigration”
Thursday, October 14, 2021| 5:00 pm (ET)
McCardell Bicentennial Hall 216
Open to the Public (as long as Middlebury COVID protocols are observed)
Should the United States increase immigration? At this event, Peter Skerry, Professor of Political Science at Boston College, and Alex Nowrasteh, Director of Immigration Studies at the Cato Institute, will present different views, converse with each other, and take questions on this timely and important question in American politics.
Sponsors: Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Political Science Department
Afghanistan and the Future of Girls’ and Women’s Education
Saturday, October 2, 2021 | 4:00 PM
Wilson Hall
RSVPs requested (RSVP to PresOffRSVP@middlebury.edu by 4pm Friday, Oct 1)
Shabana Basij-Rasikh ’11, in conversation with President Patton.
Shabana Basij-Rasikh is Middlebury Class of 2011, and is president and cofounder of SOLA, the first girls’ boarding school in Kabul, Afghanistan. She and hundreds of her faculty, staff, and students narrowly escaped the city in August as the Taliban took over. SOLA has relocated in Kigali, Rwanda, in order to provide continuity of education. Shabana has written about her recent experiences, and the importance of women’s education, in the Washington Post and other venues. She is now a regular contributor to their opinion section. We are delighted to welcome her back home to Middlebury.
Sponsor: The CTLR and the Office of the President
“Madison’s Hand: Revising the Constitutional Convention”
Tuesday, September 28, 2021| 5:00 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
Mary Sarah Bilder, winner of the 2018 Bancroft Prize, will explore James Madison’s revisions of his famous notes from the Constitutional Convention and what those revisions tell us about the Constitutional Convention and how we regard the Constitution itself.
To join the lecture, please join via Zoom at go.middlebury.edu/AHF.
Sponsors: Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Political Science Department (at the request of Professor Gary Winslett)
Clifford Symposium–“Radical Implications: Facing a Planetary Emergency”
Thursday-Saturday, September 23-25, 2021
In-person for College Community/Zoom for the Public
Join us for this year’s Clifford Symposium, packed with top-flight speakers, discussions, and more. For a full description and for the program, please see
Sponsor: Clifford Symposium Organizing Committee
Charles S. Grant Memorial Lecture–Timothy Snyder, “Does American Politics have a Future? A Reflection on Time and Democracy”
Thursday, May 6, 2021| 3:00-4:15 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
Timothy Snyder, the Richard C. Levin Professor of History at Yale University and a permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna and one of the most influential historians of our times, will deliver this year’s Charles S. Grant Memorial Lecture.
The Grant lectureship is named in honor of Charles S. Grant, who was a gifted teacher and leading scholar of early American history in Middlebury’s History Department prior to his untimely death in 1961. Shortly thereafter, his college colleagues and friends in the community raised funds to establish a lectureship in his honor. Over the past fifty years, the Grant Fund has brought many distinguished historians to Middlebury.
To join the lecture, please go to
Sponsors: Charles S. Grant Memorial Lectureship and the History Department
How Can We Achieve Educational Equity?
Wednesday, May 5, 2021| 4:45-6:00 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
Gensler Family Symposium on Feminism in the Global Arena–“Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals”
Friday, April 30, 2021| 4:30 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
Join us for a discussion with Alexis Pauline Gumbs about her book entitled Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals.
Register in advance for this webinar here. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the webinar.
Van de Velde Lecture–Connie Schultz, “Next: Journalism in an Age of Reckoning”
Tuesday, April 27, 2021| 4:30-6:00 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
Connie Schultz is a nationally syndicated columnist for Creators Syndicate and Professional-in-Residence at Kent State University School of Journalism. She won the Pulitzer Prize in 2005 for Commentary for columns that judges praised for providing “a voice for the underdog and the underprivileged.” She also won the Robert F. Kennedy Award for Social Justice Reporting and the Batten Medal, which honors “a body of journalistic work that reflects compassion, courage, humanity and a deep concern for the underdog.”
Schultz is the author of two memoirs, Life Happens – And Other Unavoidable Truths, and . . . His Lovely Wife, a memoir about her husband Sherrod Brown’s successful 2006 race for the U.S. Senate. Her first novel, The Daughters of Erietown, was recently published and became a New York Times bestseller.
Robert van de Velde Jr. attended Middlebury College where he majored in Sociology and was an active member of the staff of WRMC-FM, the college radio station. Not long after his graduation, he died suddenly. Shortly after his death, family members and friends established the Robert W. van de Velde, Jr. ’75 Memorial Lecture. This lecture provides an annual opportunity for a searching examination of the confluence of public affairs and journalism.
The link to join this webinar can be found on the Middlebury Events Calendar.
Sponsor: Robert W. van de Velde ’75 Memorial Lectureship
Hannah A. Quint Lecture in Jewish Studies–David Nirenberg, “What Does the History of Anti-Semitism Tell Us About its Future?”
Thursday, April 22, 2021| 5:00-6:30 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
David Nirenberg is Dean of the Divinity School at the University of Chicago and the Deborah R. and Edgar D. Jannotta Distinguished Service Professor of Medieval History and Social Thought. This is the 32nd Annual Hannah A. Quint Lecture in Jewish Studies, established by the late Eliot Levinson, Class of 1964, in honor of his late mother, Mrs. Quint. For a history of the lectureship, go to http://www.middlebury.edu/academics/jewish/events/quint
Sponsor: Jewish Studies
What are the Limits of Religious Liberty?
Thursday, April 15, 2021| 4:45-6:00 pm (ET)
Zoom
Open to the Public
A Counterpoint Webinar
DAVID FRENCH, fellow at the National Review Institute and editor of The Dispatch. Previously, he was the President of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE); a senior attorney for the American Center for Law and Justice and the Alliance Defending Freedom, where he specialized in religious liberty cases; and a staff writer for Time and National Review. During the Trump era, Mr. French became nationally known as a leading conservative voice in the “Never Trump” movement. He is author of four books including, Divided We Fall: America’s Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation (2020). A veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, French was deployed to Iraq in 2007 during the Iraq War and was awarded a Bronze Star. He is a graduate of Harvard Law School.
LINDA C. MCCLAIN, Robert B. Kent Professor of Law at Boston University School of Law. She is known for her work in family law, gender and law, and feminist legal theory. Her scholarship addresses the respective roles of families, other institutions of civil society, and government in fostering citizens’ capacities for democratic and personal self-government. Prof. McClain coordinates the law school’s participation in the Women’s Gender & Sexuality Studies (WGS) Certificate Program and has served as a faculty fellow at the Boston University School of Theology. Her seven books include Who’s the Bigot? Learning from Conflicts Over Marriage and Civil Rights; Gay Rights and the Constitution; and Ordered Liberty: Rights, Responsibilities and Virtues. Prof. McClain has held visiting fellowships at Harvard, Princeton, Virginia, and Penn. A graduate of Georgetown and NYU law schools, she also earned a degree in Religious Studies from University of Chicago Divinity School.
Via Zoom at go.middlebury.edu/ahf
Sponsors: The Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Department of Political Science (upon request of K. Callanan)
Architectures of the Flesh
Wednesday, March 31, 2021| 4:30-6:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Zakiyyah Iman Jackson is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Southern California. She is the author of Becoming Human: Matter and Meaning in an Antiblack World, published by NYU Press in 2020 as part of their Sexual Cultures series. She is at work on a second book, tentatively entitled “Obscure Light: Blackness and the Derangement of Sex-Gender.” She has published numerous articles in Gay and Lesbian Quarterly, Feminist Studies, South Atlantic Quarterly, and others.
Sponsor: Axinn Center for the Humanities
Co-Sponsors: Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies, The Feminist Resource Center at Chellis House, Black Studies, Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity
Are Social Justice and Capitalism Compatible?
Wednesday, March 10, 2021| 4:45 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The Alexander Hamilton Forum is hosting this counterpoint webinar featuring Professor John Tomasi of Brown University and author of Free Market Fairness (Princeton) and Professor Pablo Gilabert of Concordia University (Montreal) and author of From Global Poverty to Global Equality: A Philosophical Exploration (Oxford).
To join this forum, please click go.middlebury.edu/ahf
International Communication during COVID-19
Tuesday, March 9, 2021| 7:00-8:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs program on Global Health Challenges presents Professor Jean Claude Kwitonda who will share his perspective on international communications during the COVID-19 pandemic and how discourse about aid and development has shifted as countries are competing for resources to fight the pandemic. He will also discuss the role of positive deviance during the pandemic.
Jean Claude Kwitonda has diverse experiences working as copywriter, researcher, translator and a college teacher. Prior to joining Howard University, he taught in different universities in Rwanda and Ohio. His teaching and research interests include Health Communication, Communication for Development and instructional communication.
To join this webinar, use this Zoom Link (Passcode = 141150) or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
Broadening the Conversation: Communicating to Non-Experts About Your Work
Friday, February 5, 2021| 12:15-1:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Guest speaker Joshua Tucker from New York University and co-author of The Washington Post’s Monkey Cage will lead us in a discussion on how we speak to a general audience about our research. Whether the topic is data science, climate change, policy, history, or art, it can seem difficult for those of us steeped in the details of a subject to present our work in ways that are accessible to non-experts. In this workshop we will hear from an expert on bridging the expert-non-expert gap and will be reminded of resources at Middlebury that can assist us in broadening the audience for our work. Register for this session HERE.
Co-Sponsors: Center for Teaching, Learning & Research, Department of Political Science, and MiddData
Profound Learning and Full Participation: Utilizing High Impact Practices for Student Success
Monday, February 1, 2021| 12:15-1:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Pivoting on a full participation framework, Timothy Eatman, Dean of the Honors Living-Learning Community and Associate Professor of Urban Education in the College of Arts & Sciences at Rutgers University, will share the evidence-based research demonstrating a positive relationship between student participation in high-impact practices (HIPs) and improved student outcomes. These curricular and co-curricular practices support student engagement, advance curricular coherence, and generate equitable outcomes. Register for this session HERE.
Co-Sponsors: Center for Community Engagement and Center for Teaching, Learning & Research
Spirituality and Social Justice: A Multifaith Panel Discussion Honoring the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Tuesday, January 26, 2021| 8:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Please join us for a discussion with a multi-faith group of panelists to reflect on the question “what do wisdom traditions offer us in navigating the challenges of oppression and injustice in these challenging times.” We’ll discuss the religious, secular, and spiritual foundations of civic actions for social justice.
Panelists:
Rev. Barnaby Feder (Unitarian Universalist)
Fr. Luke Austin (Christian)
Sensei Joshin Byrnes (Buddhist)
Rabbi Danielle Stillman (Jewish)
Chaplain Saifa Hussain(Muslim)
Vijaya Wunnava (Hindu)
Rajnii Eddins (spiritual artist/activist)
Moderated by the Rev. Mark R. Orten, Dean of Spiritual and Religious Life
Zoom link here: https://middlebury.zoom.us/j/97399624075?pwd=WGRQUGphRWMwblI4bEo4MTFmekMzZz09
Sponsor: Charles P. Scott Center for Religious and Spiritual Life
The Post Pandemic College: Trends, Opportunities, and Threats
Tuesday, January 19, 2021| 12:15-1:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
In this opening presentation to the 2020 Contemporary Teaching in the Liberal Arts Series, noted futurist and educational commentator Bryan Alexander will analyze how the COVID-19 pandemic is transforming American higher education and will outline the key dynamics that will shape the post-pandemic college. Bryan’s presentation will set a broad and deep context for the rest of the sessions in this year’s series. Bryan will also respond to questions and comments from attendees.
Bryan Alexander is an internationally known futurist, researcher, writer, speaker, consultant, and teacher, working in the field of higher education’s future. From 2002 to 2014 Bryan worked with the National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education (NITLE), a non-profit working to help small colleges and universities best integrate digital technologies. In 2013 he launched a business, Bryan Alexander Consulting, LLC. Through BAC he consults throughout higher education in the United States and abroad. Recently, he moved to the Washington, D.C., area from Ripton, Vermont. He is currently a senior scholar at Georgetown University and teaches graduate seminars in their Learning, Design, and Technology program.
Bryan speaks widely and publishes frequently, with articles appearing in venues including The Atlantic Monthly and Inside Higher Ed. He has been interviewed by and featured in the Washington Post, MSNBC, The Wall Street Journal, US News and World Report, National Public Radio (2017, 2020, 2020, 2020, 2020), the Chronicle of Higher Education (2016, 2020), the Atlantic Monthly, Reuters, the National Association of College and University Business Officers, Pew Research, Campus Technology, The Hustle, and the Connected Learning Alliance.
Bryan recently published Academia Next: The Futures of Higher Education for Johns Hopkins University Press (January 2020), which won an Association of Professional Futurists award. He is currently working on Universities on Fire: Higher Education in the Age of Climate Crisis (2022). His two other recent books are Gearing Up For Learning Beyond K-12 and The New Digital Storytelling (second edition).
On several occasions, Bryan has contributed to the Center for Teaching, Learning & Research’s Contemporary Teaching in the Liberal Arts Series, which has been held during winter terms since 2015.
For more on Bryan, see https://bryanalexander.org/
Register HERE
Sponsor: Center for Teaching, Learning & Research
The U.S. Gender Gap: Past, Present, and Future
Thursday, December 3, 2020| 12:15-1:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
You may have seen gender gap described in the media this way: “Women are only paid 82 cents for every dollar paid to men.” We will talk about where that measure comes from and how it relates to gender discrimination. Professor Byker will discuss how the gender gap has evolved since the 1980s and where it may be going particularly in light of the Covid pandemic.
Tanya Byker (B.A., Swarthmore; PhD, University of Michigan) joined the Middlebury Economics faculty as an assistant professor in the fall of 2014. She teaches courses in regression, and the economics of gender. Her research falls under the categories of labor and development economics and focuses on the interrelated choices individuals make about education, work and parenthood. She has studied how birth-related career interruptions in the US vary by mother’s education, and the ways that parental leave laws impact those labor-supply decisions. In a developing country context, she has studied how access to family planning impacts fertility and longer-term outcomes such as schooling and employment in Peru and South Africa.
Hosted by Sarah Stroup, Associate Professor of Political Science.
See the Faculty at Home website for additional information, including how to register for this free event: www.middlebury.edu…
Sponsor: Faculty at Home series
Conversation at the Crossroads: The Intimacy of Right Relations (Who’s Got Skin the Game?)
Tuesday, November 17, 2020| 7:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Red Nation, Black Nation. Environmentalism. Undoing Racism. Reparations & Decolonization.
In the spirit of embracing 2020 vision, Diné (Navajo) activist, artist and ceremonial leader Woman Stands Shining (Pat McCabe) & African American storyteller, activist, performer-in-the-making and Middlebury Scholar-in-Residence Dr. Carolyn Finney are coming together in an intentional conversation about race, the environment, intimacy and right relations. Bring your questions and your open heart and let’s see what might emerge…
Curated by Divya Gudur ’21 and Gabe Desmond ’20.5
Register to receive Zoom link: https://middlebury.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_Uwet2x8pSCiKQ4Fzy25vuQ
Sponsors: Franklin Environmental Center, Black Studies Program, Program in Environmental Studies, Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity, Sunday Night Environmental Group, Student Government Association, Office of the Provost, The Climate Action Capacity Project, and New Perennials Project
Internet Hate Speech: What Can We Do?
Monday, November 16, 2020| 5:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Online extremism and internet hate speech show no signs of abating, and have been linked with violent atrocities across the country and around the world. In this talk, two experts on internet speech issues address the following questions: What is the best way to deal with hate speech on the internet? What role should governments, social media companies, and others play in curbing internet hate speech? What other options are there for addressing online extremism?
Rebecca MacKinnon is founding director of Ranking Digital Rights, a program that promotes freedom of expression and privacy on the internet.
Becca Lewis researches online political subcultures and grassroots media movements, with a focus on influence-building, media manipulation, and disinformation efforts among these groups.
Click this ZOOM link to join.
Password: 372443
Anxiety to Action: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis
Thursday, November 12, 2020| 6:00 pm
Zoom
Focused on the College Community, but open to the Public
When climate change looms large, election uncertainties have us all on edge, the pandemic has no definitive end in sight, racism and racial injustices continue to compound, and everything feels overwhelming, what do you do? How do you find your way to meaningful intersectional action? Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Katharine Wilkinson will join Middlebury virtually on Thursday, November 12 at 6 p.m. EST for a special conversation about their experiences and draw on insights from their new book, All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis, a collection of essays by women spanning backgrounds, approaches, and generations at the forefront of the climate movement. This talk is an incredible opportunity to dive into topics crucial to our campus and our world. We hope you will weigh in on what you’d like to see covered. A recording of the conversation will be available for those unable to attend the synchronous event.
Follow up conversations to discuss and reflect will be hosted by cosponsors are being planned – stayed tuned.
More details:
- 90-min Discussion and Q&A of pre-submitted and live questions facilitated by Assistant Professor Mez Baker-Medard
- Register HERE! (First 50 registrants will receive a free copy of Johnson and Wilkinson’s All We Can Save)
- Submit your questions HERE by Sunday, Nov 8th
- Find more information and speaker bios at go/anxietytoaction
For more information, contact CACP Project Director Minna Brown at mbbrown@middlebury.edu or MCAB Speakers Committee at MCABspeakers@middlebury.edu.
Sponsors: Climate Action Capacity Project (CACP) in collaboration with Middlebury College Activities Board, Franklin Environmental Center, Sunday Night Environmental Group, among others.
When Should We Trust the Experts?
Tuesday, November 10, 2020| 4:45 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The COVID-19 pandemic has raised fresh perennial questions about the relationship between scientific knowledge and political power. As citizens have been asked to transform their way of life on the basis of scientific guidance, many have expressed alarm at widespread disregard for scientific expertise throughout the crisis, while others have argued that scientific expertise is no substitute for political prudence and ethical judgment, even in the age of pandemic. What role should guidance by technical experts play in a democratic regime? Is scientific expertise a sufficient guide for public policy decisions? How should we understand the problems posed by anti-intellectualism on one hand and technocracy on the other?
For this counterpoint-style webinar, the guest speakers will be:
TOM NICHOLS of the Naval War College. He is author of The Death of Expertise: The Campaign against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters. He was recently named one of POLITICO Magazine’s “POLITICO 50.”
PATRICK J. DENEEN of the University of Notre Dame. He is author most recently of the widely reviewed book, Why Liberalism Failed, which President Obama praised for its “cogent insights into the loss of meaning and community that many in the West feel.”
For the Zoom link, visit go.middlebury.edu/AHF.
Sponsors: Hamilton Forum and the Department of Political Science
Black Spring, White Winter: Reflections on the Long History of the Black Radical Tradition in a Fascist World
Friday, November 6, 2020| 4:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs Program on Anti-Racist Theory and Action around the Globe presents Robin D.G. Kelley, Distinguished Professor of History and African American Studies at UCLA and Gary B. Nash Endowed Chair in U.S. History, speaking about “Black Spring, White Winter: Reflections on the Long History of the Black Radical Tradition in a Fascist World.”
Professor Kelley’s research has explored the history of social movements in the U.S., the African Diaspora, and Africa; Black radical thought; music and visual culture; Black Surrealism; and anti-imperial Marxism. His recent books include, Africa Speaks, America Answers: Modern Jazz in Revolutionary Times (2012); Thelonious Monk: The Life and Times of an American Original (2009); and Freedom Dreams: The Black Radical Imagination (2002). He is also co-editor of numerous books, including: Walter Rodney, The Russian Revolution: A View from the Third World (2018); The Other Special Relationship: Race, Rights and Riots in Britain and the United States (2015); and Black, Brown and Beige: Surrealist Writings from Africa and the African Diaspora (2009).
Use this Zoom webinar link to join or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs event website.
Co-sponsors: The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs, the Feminist Resource Center at Chellis House, the Program in Gender, Sexuality & Feminist Studies, the Center for Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity, Black Studies and the Twilight Project
Making Sense of the 2020 Election
Thursday, November 5, 2020| 4:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Please join us for a panel discussion featuring commentary and reflections on the 2020 election by professors and students. There will also be an opportunity for those joining the webinar to ask questions.
Please click the link below to join the webinar:
https://middlebury.zoom.us/j/99002198873?pwd =eTMxMkFmbXFYdU11cm5TV2prd2xZZz09
Passcode: 593810
Here’s the link to the vimeo hosting of the post-election webinar.
Sponsor: Critical Conversations
Forecasting the 2020 Presidential Election during in a Global Pandemic
Thursday, October 29, 2020| 7:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Professor of Political Science Matt Dickinson will give a preelection talk examining the state of the race and whether traditional forecast models hold any meaning during a time of crisis.
A Zoom link will be posted to the campus calendar.
Sponsor: Critical Conversations
The Global Pandemic: Lessons for Governments and Citizens of the World
Thursday, October 29, 2020| 4:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs (RCGA) Program on Global Health Challenges presents Olga Jonas, senior fellow, Harvard Global Health Institute. She will be discussing “The Global Pandemic: Lessons for Governments and Citizens of the World.”
To join this webinar, use this Zoom Link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events. Password: 141150
Sponsor: Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs
Will COVID-19 Kill the Liberal International Order?
Thursday, October 22, 2020| 4:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Ambassador Bonnie Jenkins will discuss “Will COVID-19 Kill the Liberal International Order” as part of the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs (RCGA) Program Lecture Series on Security and Global Affairs.
The liberal international order—those institutions, organizations, and arrangements established after WWII to help stabilize global politics, incentivize inter-state collaboration, promote prosperity, and manage challenges multilaterally—has been a hallmark of international relations for decades. In this talk Ambassador Bonnie Jenkins assesses how this global governance infrastructure has fared in light of the corona pandemic. To what extent have components of world order—like the Bretton Woods institutions, EU, WHO, and UN, etc.—worked as their framers’ intended, to facilitate cooperation, collaboration, and effective multilateral action against the pandemic? What security implications arise from her assessment? And will COVID-19 ultimately kill the liberal international order?
To join this webinar, use this Zoom Link or visit the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs events.
Sponsor: Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs
Has the Supreme Court Become Too Powerful?
Wednesday, October 21, 2020| 7:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
At this counterpoint-style event, Suzanna Sherry ’76 and Adam J. White will offer contrasting views and field questions from you.
Professor Sherry ’76 is the Herman O. Loewenstein Chair in Law at Vanderbilt University School of Law. Sherry’s work in the area of constitutional law has earned her national recognition as one of the most well-known scholars in the field. The author of more than 100 books and articles, she also writes extensively on federal courts and federal court procedures. After graduating from law school, Professor Sherry was a clerk for the Honorable John C. Godbold of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in Montgomery, Alabama, and then served as an associate with the law firm of Miller Cassidy Larroca & Lewin in Washington, D.C.
Professor White is the assistant professor of law at George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School. White served concurrently as a resident scholar at AEI, a research fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, and director of the C. Boyden Gray Center for the Study of the Administrative State. He also served by presidential appointment as a member of the Administrative Conference of the United States. A scholar of administrative law and, he has served on the leadership councils for the Administrative Law sections of both the American Bar Association and the Federalist Society. He clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C Circuit after graduating from the Harvard Law School and the University of Iowa.
The Zoom link may be found at go.middlebury.edu/AHF.
Sponsors: Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Department of Political Science
Live from DC: Election 2020–Two Policy Futures Diverge
Wednesday, October 14, 2020| 6:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
The 2020 presidential election will determine the future landscape of policy-related careers. What if the incumbent wins? What if the challenger wins? Richard Haass P’16, President of the Council on Foreign Relations, and Chris Matthiesen ’04, Partner at Federal Hall Policy Advisors, will discuss the foreign and domestic policy continuum represented by the two candidates’ policy prescriptions, as well as, the implications for future federal government agency, think tank, NGO, and international relation career roles. Please join them to understand how the two policy roads lead to two divergent career futures.
Nell Irvin Painter: “The History of White People and What It Means for Now”
Friday, October 9, 2020| 4:30 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Nell Irvin Painter is Professor Emerita of History at Princeton University. One o the country’s most distinguished historians, she wrote The History of White People in 2010.
ZOOM password = GSFS, link: https://middlebury.zoom.us/j/9976943927?pwd=RERNUVZoY1luNFMxQzZYUTZNdmQ4dz09
Organizer: Gender, Sexuality, and Feminist Studies/Chellis House; co-sponsors: Black Studies Program, Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity, Axinn Center for the Humanities, and Office of the President
Come and See: From Reflection To Affiliation To Anti-Racist Pedagogy
Tuesday, October 6, 2020| 3:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Join us for a talk with Frankie Condon, author of numerous books on anti-racism, including I Hope I Join the Band: Narrative, Affiliation, and Antiracist Rhetoric. To join: 3 pm zoom lecture open to all
In her talk, Condon will explore the significance of moments in the lives of teachers when we might call ourselves to see inherited white and whitely orientations and perspectives that both shadow us as we move through our teaching lives and shape for us the teaching spaces in which we make those lives. This talk is about the significance of critical self-reflection and actionable commitments in the design and development of anti-racist pedagogies across a variety of disciplines. Participants should expect both an exploration of critical race theory as it pertains to teaching and examples of what that theory might look like in action in the college classroom.
Frankie Condon is Associate Professor of English Language and Literature at University of Waterloo and a frequent speaker at colleges and universities across the country. For more info, please see her full event description here, or contact James Sanchez, Assistant Professor of Writing and Rhetoric, jcsanchez@middlebury.edu.
A workshop will follow: 4:15 pm workshop with limited spaces, RSVP required.
Organizer: Writing and Rhetoric Program; co-sponsors: The Center for Teaching, Learning & Research and the Engaged Listening Project
1619 or 1776: Was America Founded on Slavery?
Thursday, October 1, 2020| 4:45 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
At this counterpoint-style event, Leslie Harris and Lucas Morel will offer contrasting views and field questions from you. Leslie Harris is a professor of History at Northwestern University and author of In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans in New York City, 1626-1863. She served as a fact-checker for the 1619 Project, a subject she addressed in a recent Politico article. Lucas Morel is the John K. Boardman, Jr. Professor of Politics at Washington and Lee University. He is author of Lincoln and the American Founding and Lincoln’s Sacred Effort: Defining Religion’s Role in American Self-Government, and editor of two volumes on Ralph Ellison.
The Zoom link may be found at go.middlebury.edu/AHF.
Sponsored by the Hamilton Forum
Inaugural Lecture in Black Studies–“Breonna’s Song: Protest Music Epistemologies of the Right Now.”
Wednesday, September 30, 2020 | 6:00 pm
Zoom
Open to the Public
Daphne Brooks, William R. Kenan, Jr. Professor of African American Studies at Yale University, will give the inaugural lecture to launch Middlebury’s Black Studies program. To attend, please register here or via go/inaugural or go.middlebury.edu/inaugural.
Sponsor: Black Studies Program
Clifford Symposium–“The Rise of Big Data”
Thursday & Friday, September 24 & 25, 2020
Zoom
Open to the Public
This year’s Clifford symposium, named after the late Nicholas Clifford, an outstanding teacher, scholar, and administrator at Middlebury for many years, will feature Middlebury faculty and students in an exploration of one of the most important phenomena of our times. Through a series of sessions, the symposium will explore what Big Data means, its history, its ubiquity, and its future. It will also examine why Big Data is so important to how we live and learn at Middlebury and highlight how Middlebury students and faculty are using Big Data in innovative and productive ways.
For a full symposium schedule and Zoom links to the individual sessions, please visit https://www.middlebury.edu/office/clifford-symposium or go/clifford.
This Crisis and the Next One: What the Pandemic Suggests About the Century to Come
Friday, September 11, 2020 | 3:00pm
Livestreamed
Open to the Public
Bill McKibben, Schumann Distinguished Scholar, a founder of 350.org (a climate-change organization with deep Middlebury roots), and acclaimed author, including of the recent book, Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?, and the New Yorker article, “What Vermont and Its History Might Teach the Nation About Handling the Coronavirus,” will be speaking on “This Crisis and the Next One: What the Pandemic Suggests About the Century to Come” at 3 p.m. (EDT) on Friday, September 11. His talk can be viewed on the Middlebury live stream:
You can watch this event via live stream, beginning a few minutes before the official start time.
“Anxieties of Empire: New Contexts, Shifting Perspectives”–Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs Annual Conference
Friday-Saturday, March 6 & 7
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room, Robert A. Jones ’59 House
Open to the Public
| The “anxiety of Empire” has been a recurrent idea in studies of colonial discourse, as critics observed how fears about the (in)stability of imperial power were masked by confident assertions of its rightful authority, and by an obsessive drive to reproduce it. Even though the sun may have set on the colonial powers of previous centuries, the power dynamics constructed by Empire and the tangled rhetoric that perpetuated it persist. The conference will bring together scholars from an array of disciplines and fields of inquiry to interrogate understudied modi operandi of Empire and to foreground new critical tools for understanding them.
You can watch this event via live stream, beginning a few minutes before the official start time. |
Sponsored by the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs
“Black is the Body: Writing about Race in America”–Emily Bernard
Thursday, March 5 | 4:30pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
Racial identity is a construction. But just because it is a fiction does not make it untrue. In this talk, Emily Bernard discusses the complex and central role of storytelling as a source of power, meaning, and beauty in her life as a writer, reader, and scholar of African American experience.
Emily Bernard is the Julian Lindsay Green and Gold Professor of English at the University of Vermont. In addition to Black is the Body: Stories from My Grandmother’s Time, My Mother’s Time, and Mine, her books include Remember Me to Harlem: The Letters of Langston Hughes and Carl Van Vechten, Some of My Best Friends: Writings on Interracial Friendships, and Michelle Obama: The First Lady in Photographs.
You can watch this event via live stream, beginning a few minutes before the official start time.
Sponsored by the Axinn Center for the Humanities
“The Long Shadow of the Great War and the Paris Peace Conference”–Margaret MacMillan
Tuesday, March 3 | 7:30 pm
Dana Auditorium, Sunderland Language Center
Open to the Public
Margaret MacMillan, one of the most well-known historians of our time, will deliver the next Charles S. Grant Memorial Lecture on Tuesday evening, March 3, 2020. Professor MacMillan teaches at the University of Toronto, and she is the emeritus Professor of International History and former Warden of St. Anthony’s College at the University of Oxford. Her books include Paris 1919: Six Months that Changed the World (which won the Samuel Johnson prize), The Uses and Abuses of History, History’s People: Personalities and the Past, and the prize-winning The War that Ended Peace: The Road to 1914.
Sponsored by the Charles S. Memorial Lecture Committee
Through the Fog: Towards Inclusive Anti-Racist Teaching
Tuesday, March 3, 2020 | 4:30 pm
Dana Auditorium, Sunderland Language Center
Open to the Public
In this interactive lecture, Professor Tara Affolter, Education Studies, will read selections from her book, Through the Fog: Towards Inclusive Anti-Racist Teaching and invite audience members to engage in some crucial self-reflection. Resisting racism, agitating for change, and walking an inclusive anti-racist path requires a commitment to unflinchingly look at one’s failures and examine silences. Drawing from over 20 years of teaching experience in the U.S., ranging from pre-kindergarten to post-graduate, Affolter’s work illustrates personal, practical, and theoretical ways for teachers to grapple with the complexities of race and racism within their own schools and communities and develop as inclusive anti-racist teachers.
Sponsored by the Education Studies Program and the Center for the Comparative Study of Race and Ethnicity
“1619 and the Legacy That Built a Nation”– Nikole Hannah-Jones
Tuesday, February 25, 2020 | 7:00pm
Mead Chapel
Open to the Public
Nikole Hannah-Jones is the creator of the New York Times’s “1619 Project” and an award-winning investigative reporter covering civil rights and racial injustice for the New York Times Magazine.
“The 1619 Project” began on August 20, 2019, the 400th anniversary of the start of American slavery, with the publication of a special issue of the New York Times Magazine devoted to the goal of re-examining the legacy of slavery in the United States. Now an ongoing effort, the initiative includes a multi-episode podcast hosted by Hannah-Jones.
The event is one in a series on race and racism. More information is available here.
Sponsored by the Office of the President, MCAB, the Critical Conversations program, and the Black Studies program
“Ultimate Allies: America and Israel, 1620 to the Present”–A Talk by, & Conversation with, Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren
Monday, February 24| 7:00pm
Dana Auditorium, Sunderland Language Center
Open to the Public
This event will occur in Dana Auditorium with additional overflow seating available in Warner Hemicycle where the event will be live-streamed.
Moderator: Prof. Felicia Grey (Political Science)
Statesman, historian, and parliamentarian, Ambassador Michael Oren has devoted his life to serving Israel and the Jewish people around the world.
For nearly five years, he served as Israel’s Ambassador to the United States. He was instrumental in obtaining US defense aid, especially for the Iron Dome system, and American loan guarantees for Israel’s economy. He built bridges with diverse communities across the nation, wrote dozens of op-eds and conducted hundreds of media interviews, fortifying the U.S.-Israel alliance.
More recently, as a Member of the Israel’s parliament (Knesset) and Deputy Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office, he continued to interact with foreign leaders and to defend Israel in the media. He spearheaded efforts to strengthen Israel-Diaspora relations, to develop the Golan Heights, and to fight BDS. As Chairman of a classified subcommittee, he dealt with some of Israel’s most sensitive security issues.
A graduate of Princeton and Columbia, Dr. Oren has served as a visiting professor at Harvard, Yale, and Georgetown. His last three books—Six Days of War; Power, Faith, and Fantasy; and Ally: My Journal Across the American-Israel Divide—were all New York Times bestsellers. He received the Los Angeles Times History Book of the Year Award, a National Humanities prize, and the Jewish Book Award.
Frequently interviewed by the U.S. and international press, he has had appeared on the Stephen Colbert and Bill Maher shows, 60 Minutes, and The View. He was the Middle East analyst for CBS and CNN. Michael Oren was named by Politico as one of the fifty most influential thinkers in America.
Sponsored by the Alexander Hamilton Forum and the Department of Political Science
“Do We Need a Green New Deal?”
Thursday, February 20| 4:30 pm
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center)
Open to the Public
A Hamilton Forum Dialogue
Arguing NO: Oren Cass, Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Mr. Cass’s work addresses issues ranging from the labor market to environmental regulation to trade and immigration to education and organized labor. He also writes extensively on the nature and implications of climate change and on the process of formulating and evaluating public policy. Cass has written for publications including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and Foreign Affairs, and he regularly speaks at universities and testifies before Congress. His 2018 book, The Once and Future Worker: A Vision for the Renewal of Work in America, has been called “the essential policy book for our time” by National Affairs. Previously, he served as the domestic policy director for Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign in 2012 and a management consultant with Bain & Company. He earned a B.A. in political economy from Williams College and a J.D. from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review.
Arguing YES: Robert Pollin, Distinguished Professor of Economics at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. Dr. Pollin is Co-Director of the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) and the founder and President of PEAR (Pollin Energy and Retrofits), an Amherst, MA-based green energy company operating throughout the United States. His books include The Living Wage: Building a Fair Economy (co-authored 1998); Contours of Descent: U.S. Economic Fractures and the Landscape of Global Austerity (2003); An Employment-Targeted Economic Program for South Africa (co-authored 2007); A Measure of Fairness: The Economics of Living Wages and Minimum Wages in the United States (co-authored 2008), Back to Full Employment (2012), Green Growth (2014), Global Green Growth (2015) and Greening the Global Economy (forthcoming 2015). He has worked recently as a consultant for the U.S. Department of Energy, the International Labour Organization, the United Nations Industrial Development Organization and numerous non-governmental organizations in several countries on various aspects of building high-employment green economies. He was selected by Foreign Policy magazine as one of the “100 Leading Global Thinkers for 2013,” and is author of several state-level “Green New Deals.” A graduate of UW-Madison, he earned his PhD at the New School for Social Research.
Sponsored by Hamilton Forum
“Who Owns Religion?” An Open Discussion with President Laurie Patton on her new book
Tuesday, February 18, 2020| 4:30 pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
Professor Robert Schine of the Religion Department will moderate. Professor Kristin Bright of the Anthropology Department and Professor William Waldron of the Religion Department will serve as panelists.
Sponsored by Department of Religion and the Axinn Center for the Humanities
Scott A. Margolin ’99 Lecture in Environmental Affairs–Naomi Klein
Thursday, February 13| 7:00 pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
The climate crisis confronts each of us, including and especially young people, with urgent questions and bewildering choices about how to live, who to be, what to learn, where to go and what to do at this momentous historical crossroads. This year’s Margolin Lecture will be delivered by Naomi Klein—an award-winning journalist, celebrated author, and renowned climate justice activist—who will address the radical implications of what we are now facing and how we might come to grips with it. Naomi Klein is a Senior Correspondent at The Intercept, a Puffin Writing Fellow at Type Media Center, and the inaugural Gloria Steinem Endowed Chair in Media, Culture and Feminist Studies at Rutgers University. Her books include On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal, This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate, and The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism. Bill McKibben will provide opening remarks and Prof. Dan Suarez will facilitate discussion. This Margolin Lecture will mark the first in a series of events at Middlebury exploring what it means to be coming of age in an age of climate catastrophe.
HATE: Why We Should Resist It with Free Speech, Not Censorship
Tuesday, January 28 | 4:30 pm
McCardell Bicentennial Hall 216
Open to the Public
Nadine Strossen, Past President of the ACLU and John Marshall Harlan Professor of Law at NYU Law School
Prof. Strossen seeks to dispel misunderstandings plaguing our perennial debates about “hate speech vs. free speech,” showing that the First Amendment approach promotes free speech and democracy, equality, and societal harmony. “Hate speech” censorship proponents stress the potential harms such speech might further: discrimination, violence, and psychic injuries. However, there has been little analysis of whether censorship effectively counters the feared injuries. Citing evidence from many countries, Strossen argues shows that “hate speech” are at best ineffective and at worst counterproductive. The best way to resist hate and promote equality is not censorship, but rather vigorous “counterspeech” and activism.
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Nadine Strossen is John Marshall Harlan II Professor of Law at New York Law School and the first woman national President of the American Civil Liberties Union, where she served from 1991 through 2008. A frequent speaker on constitutional and civil liberties issues, her media appearances include 60 Minutes, CBS Sunday Morning, Today, Good Morning America, The Daily Show, and other news programs on CNN, C-SPAN, Fox, Al-Jazeera, and in Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. Her op-eds have appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Washington Times, and USA Today, among others. Her talk will draw on her most recent book published in 2018 by Oxford.
The League of Nations: 100 Years Since Its Founding
Friday, January 24, 2020 | 12:30 pm
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room, Robert A. Jones ’59 House
Open to the Public
Future of the Past panel “The League of Nations: 100 Years since its founding” with Susan Pedersen, Gouverneur Morris Professor of History, Columbia University, and Nicholas Sambanis ’90, Presidential Distinguished Professor of Political Science, University of Pennsylvania.
Lunch is free for current Middlebury College students/faculty/staff; $5 for others; RSVP by 1/20 to rcga@middlebury.edu.
Sponsored by the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs
Alison Bechdel–“First Wednesdays” Talk
Wednesday, December 4, 2019 | 7 pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
Alison Bechdel is Cartoonist Laureate for the State of Vermont. Her self-syndicated Dykes to Watch Out For (1983 to 2008) became a countercultural institution. Her 2006 book Fun Home was a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle award and has been adapted into a Tony-Award-winning Broadway musical. Her talk at Middlebury will follow the speaker format of the Engaged Listening Project and is part of the Vermont Humanities Council’s “First Wednesdays” lecture series.
Sponsored by the Engaged Listening Project and the Vermont Humanities Council
Race or Class? An Affirmative Action Debate Featuring: Richard Kahlenberg and Randall Kennedy
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Wednesday, November 20, 2019 | 4:30 pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
Many Americans are of two minds on the issue of affirmative action in college admissions. On the one hand, they recognize that the United States has an egregious history of racial discrimination that needs to be addressed. They also believe that all students learn more—and society benefits—when colleges bring together people of diverse backgrounds. On the other hand, many Americans are uncomfortable with the idea that the racial box an applicant checks has a large impact on his or her chances of admission. They worry that racial preferences stigmatize beneficiaries, breed resentment, and encourage everyone— including whites—to identify by race. And many other Americans think it’s unfair when a wealthy African American or Latino applicant receives a preference over a low-income white or Asian student. Should affirmative action be reimagined? Or, is race-based affirmative action still an optimal tool for cultivating a diverse student body?
Sponsored by the Hamilton Forum
Special Screening of Human Nature
Monday, November 11, 2019 | 7:00 p.m.
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center)
Open to the Public
Please join us for a pre-theatrical screening of a documentary about gene editing and CRISPR entitled Human Nature. Middlebury graduate Dr. Sarah Goodwin (’04) and her organization, iBiology/Wonder Collaborative are producers of the documentary that will air on Monday, November 11, 2019 in Dana Auditorium at 7:00pm. Dr. Goodwin will also appear via video conference for a Q&A session after the screening.
Currently, Human Nature is only playing at film festivals and a few special pre-theatrical screenings before it appears in theaters in early 2020 (and iBiology is working on a TV broadcast and streaming for later in 2020). The documentary has already aired in theaters in Canada, and the press around it has been outstanding, thus far. The film dives into the discovery of CRISPR, and features interviews with many of the scientists who were involved in adapting this technology for genome editing. The societal and ethical issues borne out of this technology are also heavily emphasized in the film.
Should the Democratic Party Have a Centrist or Radical Future?
Wednesday, November 6, 2019 | 4:30 – 6pm
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center)
Open to the Public
A Hamilton Forum Dialogue
FOR A CENTRIST FUTURE:
William A. Galston holds the Ezra K. Zilkha Chair in the Brookings Institution, Washington, DC. Prior to January 2006, he was the Saul Stern Professor at the School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland. From 1993-1995, he was Deputy Assistant to President Clinton for Domestic Policy. He has participated in 6 presidential campaigns and served as Executive Director of the National Commission on Civic Renewal. He is the author of more than 100 articles and nine books, including Anti-Pluralism: The Populist Threat to Liberal Democracy (Yale, 2018). He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and writes a weekly column for the Wall Street Journal.
FOR A RADICAL FUTURE:
Michael Kazin is Professor of History at Georgetown University and editor of Dissent, the leading magazine of the American Left since 1954. His most recent book is War Against War: The American Fight for Peace, 1914-1918 (Simon and Schuster, 2017), which was named an Editor’s Choice by the New York Times Book Review. His previous books include American Dreamers: How the Left Changed a Nation (Knopf, 2011), named a Best Book of 2011 by The New Republic, Newsweek/Daily Beast, and The Progressive. He is currently writing a history of the Democratic Party, to be published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Sponsored by the Hamilton Forum
The Evolving Role of Business in Society, and When Companies Should Take a Stand: A Conversation with Dan Schulman ’80, President and CEO of PayPal
Thursday, October 10, 2019| 6:30 pm
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center
Open to the Public
A Livestream Event: A Visit with Congressman John Lewis and Co-Author Andrew Aydin
Monday, October 7, 2019| 6:45 – 9pm
Mahaney Arts Center, Olin C. Robison Concert Hall
Open to the Public
PLEASE NOTE: this is a livestream of an event happening at the Flynn Center in Burlington, VT
Almost sixty years ago, Martin Luther King, Jr. edited a 16-page comic book about the Montgomery Bus Boycott that dramatized the fledgling movement and its tactics to a generation of future leaders, including a young John Lewis. Today, Congressman Lewis is continuing that legacy, using comics to educate and inspire a new generation. Congressman Lewis and his co-author Andrew Aydin will visit the Flynn Center to discuss their transformative and award-winning graphic novels, bringing Lewis’ memories of the civil rights movement to urgent new life as a catalyst for vital discussions about diversity, society, and active engagement in one’s community, in ways that are not just historical, but directly relevant to today’s world.
Political Polarization and the Road to the Trump Presidency
Thursday, October 3 | 4:30 – 6pm
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center)
Open to the Public
As this year’s Phi Beta Kappa Visiting Scholar Lecturer, Julian E. Zelizer, Malcolm Stevenson Forbes, Class of 1941 Professor of History and Public Affairs at Princeton University and CNN Political Analyst, will explore the roots of our turbulent political scene. Professor Zelizer is one of the country’s leading political historians and the author and editor of more than a dozen books.
Co-sponsored by Phi Beta Kappa and the History Department
Ofelia Zepeda–A Public Talk
Thursday, October 3 | 4:30 – 6pm
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room
Open to the Public
“From her birth in Stanfield, Ariz., in 1952 to her current stature as an academic, linguist and a leading poet of the Tohono O’odham of the Sonoran Desert in Arizona and northern Mexico, Zepeda is a master of language, both English and O’odham (the language spoken by the Tohono O’odham, Akimel O’odham and Hia C-ed O’odham). Likewise, she is a fierce advocate for the reclamation and preservation of indigenous tongues. She has been honored as a MacArthur Fellow and, earlier this year, with a Distinguished Service award from the Modern Language Association. But her life and work is firmly rooted in himdag, the Tohono O’odham way of life that permeates the cultural, spiritual and physical realms.” *www.americanindianmagazine.org…
Is Civility a Sham? Speech and the Limits of Tolerance
Wednesday, October 2 | 4:30 – 5:45pm
Axinn Center Abernethy Room
Open to the Public
A Lecture with Q & A
Teresa Bejan
University of Oxford
Politicians and intellectuals today warn that we face a crisis of civility, with partisan hatreds and wars of words polluting our public sphere. In liberal democracies committed to tolerating diversity as well as active, often heated disagreement, the loss of this conversational virtue appears critical. But is civility really a virtue? Or is it, as critics claim, a covert demand for conformity that silences dissent?
Bringing the insights of early modern political thought to bear on this contemporary problem, Dr. Bejan’s lecture will explore a path forward, one that challenges assumptions about what a tolerant and civil society should look like today.
TERESA BEJAN is Associate Professor of Political Theory and Fellow of Oriel College at the University of Oxford. Her first book, Mere Civility: Disagreement and the Limits of Toleration (Harvard University Press, 2017) was called “penetrating and sophisticated” by the New York Times, and her work has been featured on PBS, WNYC, CBC radio, Philosophy Bites and other podcasts. In addition to her many articles in academic journals and edited volumes, she has written on free speech and civility for The Atlantic and The Washington Post. Dr. Bejan received her PhD with distinction from Yale in 2013.
Co-sponsored by the Department of Political Science and the Alexander Hamilton Forum
Sigal Ben-Porath
Wednesday, September 11, 2019 | 4:30 PM
Hillcrest 103 (The Orchard)
Open to the Public
Sigal Ben-Porath received her doctorate in political philosophy from Tel-Aviv university in 2000, after which she joined Princeton University’s Center for Human Values as a post-doctoral fellow. In 2004 she moved to the University of Pennsylvania where she is currently a professor of education, philosophy and political science. Her most recent books are Free Speech on Campus (Penn Press, 2017) and Making up Our Mind: What School Choice is Really About (with Mike Johanek, University of Chicago Press 2019). Her previous books include Citizenship Under Fire: Democratic Education in Times of Conflict (2006) and Tough Choices (2010), both from Princeton University Press. She serves on the board of the Mitchell Center for the Study of Democracy, as well as the Teachers Institute of Philadelphia. She has been chairing Penn’s Committee on Open Expression since 2015.
Co-sponsored by the Dean of the Faculty and the Dean of Students
Human and Environmental Microbial Health: A Global Perspective
Thursday, February 21, 2019 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the public
Jack Gilbert is a Professor in the Department of Pediatrics and the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego School of Medicine. Dr. Gilbert earned his Ph.D. in 2002 at Unilever and Nottingham University in the UK and was a senior scientist at Plymouth Marine Laboratory in the UK from 2005 until 2010, when he moved to the University of Chicago and became a Professor of Surgery and the Director of The Microbiome Center there. Professor Gilbert also cofounded the Earth Microbiome Project and the American Gut Project, and has authored more than 250 publications on microbial ecology. In 2014 he was on the Crain’s Business Chicago’s 40 Under 40 List, and was listed as one of the 50 most influential scientists by Business Insider in 2015, as well as on the Brilliant Ten by Popular Scientist.
Professor Gilbert will discuss the human microbiome as a part of the human ecosystem, and how ecology can be used to understand this ecosystem and changes within it. He will present research on how changes in the human ecosystem as related to atopy, neurological disorders, metabolic disorders, and other complex conditions and disease states. He will also discuss the distance we have created between children and the microbial world and how this may be impacting their physiological, immunological, neurological and even endocrinological development.
Sponsored by the Office of the President, the Biology Department, and Atwater Commons.
Pursuing Peace and Justice: a Conversation with Nadia Murad
Tuesday, February 12, 2019 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the public in overflow locations
Author and activist Nadia Murad, a 2018 Nobel Peace Prize co-winner, is a survivor of the Yazidi genocide in northern Iraq by ISIS fighters. She is one of thousands of Yazidi women who were abducted by ISIS in August of 2014 and forced into the ISIS sex slave trade. Losing six of her nine brothers and her mother in the Kocho massacre, she escaped after a month in captivity.
Murad is the founder of Nadia’s Initiative, a nonprofit “aimed at increasing advocacy for women and minorities and assisting to stabilize and redevelop communities in crisis.” She is also the author of the memoir The Last Girl: My Story of Captivity and My Fight against the Islamic State (2017, Tim Duggan Books) and the recipient of numerous awards and honors for her humanitarian work.
She will be joined on stage by Febe Armanios, associate professor of history, who will speak to her about her work as a human rights activist for the Yazidi community and her efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war, and Abid Shamdeen, who will help interpret.
Conversations with Frank Bruni
Wednesday, January 9, 2019 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
Frank Bruni is a renowned columnist for the New York Times. During this event, which is part of the Middlebury First Wednesdays talk series organized by the Vermont Humanities Council, Bruni will engage with the audience over a wide range of topics, including identity politics, free speech, and how these issues play out on campuses and in communities. Find the VHC’s page on this event here.
This event features a new listening & speaking discussion format, developed by the Engaged Listening Project at Middlebury College. To view the event, click here. This requires a Middlebury sign on.
Co-sponsored with the Vermont Humanities Council and supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, in partnership with Middlebury College.
Bill Kristol, “Can the Republican Party be Saved? Can America?”
Tuesday, November 27, 2018 | 4:30 PM- 6:00 PM
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center) | Map
Open to the Middlebury College Campus
Bill Kristol is founder and editor at large of The Weekly Standard, a Washington, D.C. journal of politics and ideas. He is a regular on ABC’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos and has appeared frequently on other leading political commentary shows. During the 2016 elections, Mr. Kristol became known as, and he continues to be, a prominent critic of president Donald Trump.
Mr. Kristol was on the faculty of the University of Pennsylvania’s Political Science Department from 1979 to 1983, and then worked at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government until he moved to Washington in 1985. He worked as Chief of Staff for Vice President Dan Quayle under the first Bush Administration, and for Education Secretary William Bennet under the Reagan administration. Before founding The Weekly Standard in 1995, Mr. Kristol led the Project for the Republican Future, contributing to the 1994 Republican congressional victory.
Bill Kristol received both his A.B. and PH.D. from Harvard University, and is a widely published author and editor in several fields, ranging from foreign policy to constitutional law to political philosophy.
Trauma and the U.S. Immigration System: Immigrant Detention, Family Separation, and Undocumented Work
Thursday, November 15, 2018 | 7:30 PM- 9:30 PM
Dana Auditorium (Sunderland Language Center) | Map
Open to the Public
Featuring Sarah Rogerson, J.D., LL. M., Andrea Green, M.D., Hannah Krutiansky ’19, and Meron Benti ’19, this panel will bring together migrant advocates who offer witness to injustices that migrants face on both the institutional and individual levels to talk about responding to current immigration policies.
Sarah Rogerson and Andrea Green are two practitioners and experts in immigration fields. Sarah Rogerson is a Clinical Professor of Law, Director of the Immigration Law Clinic, and Director of the Law Clinic & Justice Center at Albany Law School, and she represents immigrant detainees at the Albany County Jail. Dr. Andrea Green is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Director of the New Americans Clinic at the UVM Larner College of Medicine in Burlington, and she will speak about the effects of family separation and immigration policies on children’s and family health. Hanna Krutiansky and Meron Benti are two Middlebury Seniors who will also speak on the panel. Meron is an asylum recipient and advocate, and Hannah has worked with RAICES, an organization that helps detained immigrant families.
Co-sponsored with American Studies, the Center for Comparative Studies of Race and Ethnicity, Juntos, Alianza, the History Department, the GSFS (Gender, Sexuality, & Feminist Studies) Department, and Latin American Studies/ IGST.
DeRay McKesson, “Political Activism and the Case for Hope”
Wednesday, November 7, 2018 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
DeRay McKesson is a Black Lives Matter activist and graduate of Bowdoin College. Mr. McKesson will speak during this interactive program, centered around political activism, about how his liberal arts education has informed his work. This program is part of the First Wednesdays talk series organized by the Vermont Humanities Council as part of the “Democracy and the Informed Citizen” Initiative. Find the Vermont Humanities Council’s page on this event here.
This event features a new listening & speaking discussion format, developed by the Engaged Listening Project at Middlebury College.
Co-sponsored with the Vermont Humanities Council and supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, in partnership with Middlebury College.
Engaged Listening Project Open House
Tuesday, November 6, 2018 | 4:00 PM- 5:30 PM
Axinn Center 229, Axinn Center Reading Room | Map
Open to Students, Faculty, and Staff of Middlebury College
The Engaged Listening Project is a new initiative at Middlebury College to change the way that we interact with visiting speakers, as well as each other, on this campus. Come engage in conversation, ask questions, and discuss topics around listening and designing new ways to talk with one another. All are welcome to bring their ideas. Light refreshments will be provided.
This event is a part of the Engaged Listening Project event series.
“We Crossed a Bridge and it Trembled: Voices from Syria”
Monday, November 5, 2018 | 12:15 PM- 1:45 PM
Axinn Center 229, Axinn Center Reading Room | Map
Open to the Public
How have Syrians lived the uprising and war transforming their country? What can their personal stories teach us about both tragedy and resilience? Wendy Pearlman, the Martin and Patricia Koldyke Outstanding Teaching Associate Professor of Political Science at Northwestern and a core faculty member of the MENA Program, will explore these questions in this presentation of her acclaimed new book, We Crossed a Bridge and it Trembled: Voices from Syria. Based on interviews that Pearlman conducted with more than 300 Syrian refugees across the Middle East and Europe since 2012, the book is a mosaic of first-hand stories and reflections that chronicle the Syrian conflict exclusively through the words of people who have lived it.
This event features a new listening & speaking discussion format, developed by the Engaged Listening Project at Middlebury College.
The Courts in the Age of Trump
Thursday, October 25, 2018 | 4:30- 6:00 PM
Dana Auditorium | Map
Open to the Public
President Trump has appointed a record number of judges to the federal courts and has nominated two judges to the U.S. Supreme Court. These jurists may reshape the courts for a generation or more. Do they pose a threat to fundamental rights and equality under law? Will Trump-appointed judges take the courts in the wrong direction? Two of the nation’s leading legal minds will provide contrasting answers to this question and take questions from the audience.
John O. McGinnis is the George C. Dix Professor of Constitutional Law at Northwestern University and served as the Deputy Assistant Attorney General under President George H. W. Bush. He is a recipient of the Federalist Society Paul Bator Award and the author of several books. He holds an MA from Balliol College, Oxford, and a BA and JD from Harvard, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review.
James E. Fleming is The Honorable Paul J. Liacos Professor of Law at the Boston University School of Law. One of the country’s leading theorists of constitutional interpretation, he is the author of six books and has also authored dozens of articles in leading law reviews. Mr. Fleming has previously held posts at Fordham University School of Law and served as a litigation attorney at Cravath, Swaine & Moore. A graduate of the University of Missouri, he also holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University and a J.D. from Harvard Law School.
Nadia Murad, “Victims of Ethnic and Religious Violence in the Middle East”
Friday, October 5, 2018 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
Nadia Murad, a survivor of the Yazidi genocide in northern Iraq, will be sharing her story here at Middlebury. Her talk is entitled, “Hope Has an Expiration Date: Exploring the Plight of Victims of Ethnic and Religious Violence in the Middle East.” Here is an excerpt a speech Ms. Murad made in May of 2018:
“My survival came with purpose, responsibility, and hope. I hoped… travelling the world and describing in detail what we had seen and experienced would mobilize governments, organizations and individuals to act and fight the persecution that minorities face. What I have learned is hope is dangerous. For years now, the Yazidi people have only had hope… But, hope has an expiration date. Years of advocacy, years of telling the Yazidi experience to world leaders, has been met with expressions of sympathy and outrage. But, when expressions of sympathy and outrage are not transformed into action to rebuild and protect – hope expires. Hope requires action to survive.”
This event is free and open to the public. There will be a livestream of the event available in Dana Auditorium in the case that overflow seating is necessary.
Sponsored by the Office of the President as part of the Critical Conversations series.
Refugees in the USA- Law and Politics
Friday, May 4, 2018 | 12:15 PM- 1:30 PM
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room | Map
Open to the Public
Rebecca Hamlin, an Assistance Professor of Legal Studies in the political science department at UMass Amherst, will be giving this International and Global Studies Colloquium lecture on the laws and politics surrounding refugees in the United States. Dr. Hamlin has written a book, Let Me be a Refugee, as well as many journal articles and other works on her topics of interest.
Lunch will be provided for Middlebury College ID holders, and there is a suggested donation of $5 without a Middlebury ID. Kindly RSVP by 4/26 to rcga@middlebury.edu.
Sponsored by the Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs and the Department of Political Science.
Scott Saul, Reckoning with Richard Pryor- Seventies Comedy Explosion in the Wake of #BlackLivesMatter & #MeToo
Wednesday, May 2, 2018 | 4:30 PM- 6:00 PM
Axinn Center 229 | Map
Open to the Public
Scott Saul is an author, poet, critic, historian, and a Professor of English at UC-Berkeley, where he teaches American Literature and history. An expert on Richard Pryor’s comedy, he is the author of Becoming Richard Pryor and the creator of the book’s digital compliment, Richard Pryor’s Peoria. He also writes for The New York Times, Harper’s Magazine, The Nation, Bookforum, and other publications, and hosts Chapter & Verse, a podcast out of UC-Berkeley’s Center for the Humanities. He will be speaking about the works of Richard Pryor in the context of modern social justice movements. Light refreshments will be served.
Sponsored by the Davis Educational Foundation Curricular Grant, the Digital Liberal Arts Initiative, and the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Research.
Campus Protest in the Trump Era: Where it’s Coming From, Where it’s Going
Friday, April 20, 2018 | 7:30 PM- 8:45 PM
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room | Map
Open to the Public
Angus Johnston, a history professor at the City University of New York, will be the AALAC (Alliance for the Advancement of Liberal Arts Colleges) Conference Keynote Speaker this year. An expert in student activism and organizing, he will be speaking about protesting on campuses in this day and age. Professor Johnston has recently published several articles on student activism, such as, There’s no College PC Crisis: In Defense of Student Protesters, and, Student Protests, Then and Now, as well as a podcast titled, Is Free Speech in a State of Emergency?
Sponsored by the AALAC (Alliance for the Advancement of Liberal Arts Colleges).
Why Free Speech is the Only Safe Place for Minorities
Thursday, April 19 | 4:30 – 6:30 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
This lecture by and Q&A session with Jonathan Rauch will address minority viewpoints and how minorities benefit from free speech. Rauch is a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution and a widely known writer on public policy, culture, and government, both as a contributing editor at The Atlantic and as the author of six books. He has received many awards, such as the 2005 National Magazine Award, the 2010 National Headliner Award, and the 2011 National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association prize for excellence in opinions writing.
Sponsored by the Open Campus Initiative, the Institute for Humane Studies, Ross Commons, and the Political Science Department.
“Where Do We Go From Here?”: Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Unanswered Question
Tuesday, April 17, 2018 | 7:30 PM
Dana Auditorium | Map
Open to the Public
The annual Charles S. Grant lecture will be given this year by Clayborne Carson, the founding director of the Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute at Stanford University. Professor Carson oversaw the King Papers Project in 1985 as per the request of the late Coretta Scott King, and has written several books, such as In Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s, which won the OAH’s Frederick Jackson Turner Prize, and Martin’s Dream: My Journey and the Legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr., published in 2013.
Free Speech and Inclusion on College Campuses: A Discussion with Dr. Robert Post
Wednesday, April 11, 2018 | 7:00 PM
Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room | Map
Dr. Robert Post is a Sterling Professor of Law at Yale Law School, where he served as the dean from 2009 to 2017. His foci are constitutional law, legal history, equal protection, and the First Amendment, and he has written and edited many books, such as, Citizens Divided: A Constitutional Theory of Campaign Finance Reform. Dr. Post will be discussing the difficulties of applying the social purposes, such as the importance of democratic self- government, of the First Amendment on college campuses. He will present the theory of academic freedom as another way to look at freedom of speech on college campuses. This discussion will be introduced by Dr. Roberto Lint Sagarena and will include a Q&A moderated by Dr. Erik Bleich.
Sponsored by the Center for the Comparative Study of Race & Ethnicity, the Office of the Dean of Students, and the Political Science department.
Mismatch: Does Affirmative Action Hurt More than it Helps?
Tuesday, April 3 | 4:30 – 6:15 PM
Kirk Alumni Center | Map
Open to Middlebury College ID holders
Richard Sander, an author and professor at the UCLA School of Law, will be speaking about what he calls “mismatch theory.” This theory is introduced in his book Mismatch, in which he argues that there are unintended consequences of preference programs in college admissions departments. He will be presenting data from UCLA admission and graduation statistics before and after racial preferences in admission to the Universities of California were banned, which showed in his analysis a higher graduation rate among historically underrepresented groups. These highly contested views will be engaged in a conversation moderated by Professor Caitlin Myers.
Is Civility Dead? Religion, Political Virtue, and Deliberative Democracy in the Age of Trump
Wednesday, April 4, 2018 | 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Speaker: James Davis, Department of Religion. Professor Davis has authored several books and teaches courses on Ethics and Christian studies at Middlebury, as well as serving as co-director of the Privilege and Poverty Academic Cluster.
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
The Many Sides of History: Reflections on the Vietnam War with Ken Burns, Lynn Novick and Mike Heaney
Wednesday, March 21, 2018 | 7:30 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Middlebury College Community, and the public if space permits
Ken Burns and Lynn Novick have collaborated on some of the most highly acclaimed documentary films of our time, such as The War, Jazz, Baseball, and, most recently, The Vietnam War. As a retired attorney and history professor, Vietnam veteran Mike Heaney ’64 offered one of many diverse perspectives presented in this 10-part film series that recently aired on PBS.
Now, all three are coming to screen clips from the film before holding a panel discussion and Q & A session with audience members. Middlebury College ID holders will be able to enter at 7:00 pm, and doors open for the public at 7:15. There will be overflow seating nearby in Crossroads Café with a live feed of the conversation. Join us for this special event, made possible with the Robert P. Youngman ’64 Roundtable Fund, which is committed to engaging in discourse around free speech and challenging topics in the public sphere.
First Food Justice: Why Infant Feeding Is a Central Social and Environmental Equity Issue in the United States
Wednesday, March 21, 2018 | 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Speaker: Erica Morrell, Department of Sociology and Anthropology. Erica Morrell is a Mellon C3 Postdoctoral Fellow in Sociology at Middlebury. She led Middlebury students in research and generating a report this year on charitable food efforts in the Addison County area and how these efforts may be affected by the new recycling and composting laws in Vermont.
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Climate Change: Communicating Across Divides, with Dr. Katherine Hayhoe and Bill McKibben
Tuesday, March 20, 2018 | 4:30 PM
Davis Family Library room 105 | Map
Dr. Katherine Hayhoe is a professor, atmospheric scientist, and the director of the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University. She will be giving a virtual presentation with remarks in-person by Bill McKibben, a Schumann Distinguished Scholar at Middlebury. The two will discuss the process of communication between people of different backgrounds and perspectives surrounding the pressing issue of climate change.
Sponsored by Franklin Environmental Center, ES Program, Scott Center for Spiritual and Religious Life, Office of Digital Learning and Inquiry, Office of Advancement, and Addison County Interfaith Climate Action Network.
To “construct a virtuous…community in Africa”: Extending the Great Redeemer’s Kingdom through the American Colonization Society
Wednesday, March 14, 2018 | 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Speaker: Bill Hart, Department of History. Professor Hart has played a role in the production of several documentaries, such as, “Black Indians: An American Story,” and PBS’s “The War that Made America,” as well as published several essays “on the intersection of race, religion, and identity in 17th-, 18th-, and 19th-century Indian country,” and held several fellowships at universities around the country.
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Rethinking Thoreau: Race, Religion, and Renewal
Wednesday, February 28, 2018 | 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Speaker: Rebecca Gould, Program in Environmental Studies. Professor Gould is an environmental advocate and the author of several books, including At Home in Nature. Now in Environmental Studies, she also served in the Religion department for eight years as well.
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Jill Lepore, Kwame Anthony Appiah and Jonathan Haidt
Wednesday, February 21, 2018 | 7:30 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Middlebury College Community
What does a robust and inclusive public sphere look like? Why is it important to American society and global citizenship? How should we construct it? How can a liberal arts education prepare students to engage it? Jill Lepore is a staff writer for The New Yorker and a professor of American History at Harvard University. Kwame Anthony Appiah is a novelist and professor of law and philosophy at NYU. Jonathan Haidt is a social psychologist and also a professor at New York University, as well as the author of the recent bestseller The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion. Join this trio of distinguished scholars and public intellectuals in engaging these questions in a discussion open to all members of the Middlebury community.
The PEN Convening
January 11–12, 2018
PEN—an organization dedicated to promoting free expression and literary culture—will lead a closed-door discussion on January 11 for 30 faculty members, students, and administrators, in which the participants discuss free speech issues and their relation to matters of inclusivity. That conversation will be followed by a public presentation on January 11, at 5:00 P.M.
What Is Hate Speech?
Wednesday, November 8, 2017| 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Speaker: Erik Bleich, Department of Political Science
How I Shed My Skin: Unlearning the Racist Lessons of a Southern Childhood
Thursday, October 26 | 7:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
In 1968, three black girls entered the all-white, sixth grade classroom at Alex H. White Elementary School in Pollocksville, North Carolina. Their presence left a lasting impact on Jim Grimsley, a white boy in that classroom, who found himself confronted with his own ideas about race and difference. Now, nearly 50 years later, Jim Grimsley and those three classmates—Donnie Meadows, Fernanda Copeland, and Rose Bell—gather for a conversation about the history that they lived through when Jones County integrated its public schools. Sponsored by the Alliance for an Inclusive Middlebury
Teaching Controversial Issues
Monday, October 16, 2017| 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Professor Noddings is a co-author of the recent book, Teaching Controversial Issues: The Case for Critical Thinking and Moral Commitment in the Classroom. Over her distinguished career, she has authored many books, including Caring: A Feminine Approach to Ethics and Moral Education and Education and Democracy in the 21st Century. She is the past president of the National Academy of Education. There will be a book signing following the lecture. This event is sponsored by the Center for Teaching, Learning & Research, the Philosophy Department, the Education Studies Program, Wonnacott Commons, and the Academic Enrichment Fund.
Speaker: Nel Noddings, Lee L. Jacks Professor of Education, emerita, of Stanford University
Finding Common Ground: Economic Progress in the Trump Era
Wednesday, October 11 | 4:30–6:00 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
What does economic progress in the Trump era look like? Former Congressman Barney Frank(D-MA) and former Republican Governor of New Hampshire John Sununu discuss the possibilities. Moderated by Gail Russell Chaddock, former correspondent for the Christian Science Monitor. Opening remarks by former Governor of Vermont and Middlebury College Executive in Residence Jim Douglas ‘72. Sponsored by the Common Ground Committee, Christian Science Monitor, Political Science Department, and the Center for Community Engagement
Representing Trauma: From Testimony to (Post)memory in My Own Artistic Practice
Wednesday, October 4 | 4:30 PM
The Orchard (Room 103), Franklin Environmental Center at Hillcrest | Map
Open to the Public
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Speaker: David Miranda-Hardy, Department of Film and Media Culture
Panel Will Explore ‘What Can Feminism Speak To?’
Wednesday, September 27 | 4:30 PM
Wilson Hall, McCullough Student Center | Map
Open to the Public
Writer Katha Pollitt and scholar Janell Hobson will examine what feminism can—and cannot—speak to.
Speakers: Katha Pollitt, and Janell Hobson
Discourse and Discord at Middlebury: A Way Forward
Wednesday, September 20 | 4:30 PM
Dana Auditorium | Map
Open to the Public
Part of the Carol Rifelj Faculty Lecture Series
Speaker: Jonathan Miller-Lane, Education Studies Program