Over the last half-century, scholars transformed the humanities, both in critical response to conventional paradigms and as prolegomena for novel, even radical understandings of the human condition. These critiques and innovations motivate our central objective to consider the conditions - the pursuits, temporalities, obligations and limitations - of the humanities of the 21st century.
The conference will take place at Russell House at 350 High Street. For more information regarding the conference, contact Kathy Tedone or call 860-685-3044.
8:30A.M.
Coffee and Registration
8:45 A.M.
Welcome: Jill Morawski
Director, Center for the Humanities
9 A.M. Michael Roth
President, Wesleyan University
The Humanities and Their Aftermath: Three Tales of Protection, Sophistication,
and Connection
Comments: Victor Gourevitch, Professor of Philosophy, Emeritius
Nancy Armstrong, Gilbert, Louis and Edward Lehman Professor of English, Duke
University
10:30 A.M. Sean McCann
Professor of English and American Studies
Ordeals of Liberal Humanism: The Center for the Humanities and the Cold War
University
Introduction: Ethan Kleinberg,
Associate Professor of History and Letters
Comments: Elizabeth Traube, Professor of Anthropology
Richard Stamelman, Director, The Montgomery Foundation, Dartmouth College,
Professor of French, Emeritus, Williams College
NOON Break
1:10 P.M. Demetrius Eudell
Associate Professor of History and African American Studies
After the Humanities? Or After the episteme?: Toward "a Humanism Made to the
Measure of the World"
Introduction: Christina Crosby,
Professor of English and FGSS
Comments: Richard Vann, Professor of History and Letters, Emeritus
Henry Abelove, Professor of English
2:50 P.M. Lori Gruen
Associate Professor of Philosophy and Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies
Humanities' Others
Introduction: Mary Ann Clawson,
Professor of Sociology and FGSS
Comments: Richard Ohmann, Professor of English, Emeritus
Janet Jakobsen, Director, Barnard Center for Research on Women; Professor of
Women's Studies, Barnard College
4:15 P.M. Cary Nelson
President, American Association of University Professors; Jubilee Professor of
Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
The Last Humanist and the Perfect Storm: The Budgetary and Ideological Threats
to Life as We Have Known It
5:30 P.M. Reception