2008-09 Contemporary Issues Lecture Series announced
Released: June 6, 2008
The critically acclaimed Contemporary Issues Lecture Series, sponsored by the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater's College of Letters and Sciences, is returning for the 2008-09 school year to again give students the opportunity to think critically outside of the classroom.
The series is known for its distinguished speakers and this year will be no different with a U.S. Congressional Medal winner, a Guggenheim Fellowship recipient as well as other decorated scholars scheduled to speak.
"We are pleased to have once again put together an exciting line-up of speakers. The topics selected for this year's series are very diverse and include topics that we have not addressed before in the series," Political Science Department Chair Susan Johnson said. "We hope that faculty will continue to incorporate the lectures into their classes and that community interest in the series continues to increase."
Listed below are the speakers.
Susan Jacoby
Jacoby is the program director of the Center for Inquiry-New York City. She has been the recipient of grants and awards from the Guggenheim, Rockefeller and Ford Foundations, as well as the National Endowment for the Humanities. Her lecture, "The Age of American Unreason," will take place at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 1, 2008 at Young Auditorium.
Alan Weisman
Weisman is an award-winning journalist whose reports have appeared in "Harpers," "The New York Times Magazine," “"he Atlantic Monthly," "Discover" and on National Public Radio. His essay, "Earth Without People," was selected for Best American Science Writing 2000-2007. His lecture, "The World Without Us," will take place at 7 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 27, 2008 at Young Auditorium.
Christina Garcia
Garcia has become one of the most important Latin American writers of our time. Her first novel, "Dreaming in Cuban," was nominated for a National Book Award. She also served as "TIME" magazine's bureau chief for Florida and the Caribbean and is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Hodder Fellowship at Princeton University and the Whiting Writers Award. Her lecture, "A Handbook to Luck," will take place at 7 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 1, 2008 at Young Auditorium.
Kevin Sites
As Yahoo!'s first news correspondent, Sites spent an entire year covering every major global conflict for the award-winning documentary "Kevin Sites in the Hot Zone." His Web site won a 2007 Webby for Best News/Documentary/Public Affairs site for its coverage of the Israeli-Hezbollah War. His lecture, "One Man. One Year. A World on Conflict," will take place at
7 p.m. on Monday, Feb. 16, 2009 at Young Auditorium.
Minnijean Brown Trickey
Trickey was one of the nine students who helped desegregate Central High School in Little Rock, Ark. in 1957. She also served as deputy assistant secretary of the Department of the Interior in the Clinton administration. She has spent her life fighting for the rights of minority groups and the dispossessed. For her work, she has received the U.S. Congressional Medal, the Wolf Award, the Spingarn Medal and many other citations and awards. Her lecture, "Return to Little Rock: Minnijean Brown Trickey of the Little Rock Nine," will take place at 7 p.m. on Monday, March 9, 2009 at Young Auditorium.
Kwame Anthony Appiah
Appiah is the Laurance S. Rockefeller University Professor of Philosophy at Princeton University. Appiah has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society and was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. His lecture, "Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers," will take place at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, April 7, 2009 at Young Auditorium.
- Tom Applegarth,applegartg17@uww.edu
