Great Social Studies Speakers from the Vermont Humanities Council

From Peter Gilbert, Executive Director of the Vermont Humanities Council:

Professor Woden Teachout will be speaking as part of the Vermont Humanities Council’s First Wednesdays program -- about how the American flag has been used by diverse groups through American history to promote support for their cause – including, for example, nativist and segregation groups on the one hand, and the civil rights movement on the other. She will be speaking at 7 pm on December 2nd at the library in Newport.

NOTE Also the other social studies/history distinguished speakers that will be part of First Wednesdays, a monthly series of free public talks offered on the first Wednesday of every month from October through May – in NINE Vermont towns – Brattleboro, Burlington, Manchester, Middlebury, Montpelier, Newport, Norwich, Rutland, and St. Johnsbury. (click on the link to get a complete listing of events) Other speakers include:

• Ken Burns on National Parks, an American idea;
• Pre-eminent civic engagement scholar, Harvard’s Robert Putnam (Bowling Alone) examines disconcerting new evidence showing that community bonds can be weakened by ethnic diversity and considers how we can overcome those challenges to realize diversity’s benefits.
• Middebury College President Emeritus and historian John McCardell on Lincoln and the Causes of the Civil War
• NY Times’s Chief Washington correspondent David Sanger on the world Obama confronts and the Challenges to American power
• “Don’t Know Much about History” author Kenneth Davis on hidden history.
• Alistair Cooke’s daughter Susan Cooke Kittredge talks about the Unseen Alistair Cooke
• George Dennis O’Brien, former president of Bucknell and U. of Rochester, on the legendary grunge band Nirvana and Kurt Cobain, which offers insight into the world of rock, its promise, and its dangers.
• Retired NBC correspondent Robert Hager talks about 40 years of covering disasters, including the Munich Olympics massacre, the Islamic revolution in Iran, OK City, space shuttle disasters, 9/11, and more.
• Historian Allen Koop on NH’s only WWII POW camp and the inspiring story of how ordinary people in Stark, NH turned bitter division into camaraderie
• Former Iranian Ambassador to the UN Mansour Farhang on Iran
• Pulitzer-Prize winner Thomas Powers on “It’s all Uphill in Afghanistan”
• Retired CIA Chief of Counterterrorism considers problem-resolving in the Middle East and South Asia
• Middle East expert Gordon Robison considers whether Obama’s policies toward the Middle East differ from his predecessor’s
• VT Folklife Center founder Jane Beck on Vermont oral history gems
• Dartmouth art historian Jane Carroll on how images of leaders in art can be used to create myths more powerful than reality
• UVM Professor Frank Bryan compares New England Town Meetings with Congress
  Bryan will also consider why no president since 1952 has been ranked as great by presidential scholars.
• VT State Curator David Schutz on Vt’s State House at 150 years old
• Pre-eminent Native American history scholar Colin Calloway on 1763 and how a war of independence waged by Indian people set America on course for a second, more famous war of independence.
• Bill “Spaceman” Lee recounts his adventures in major league baseball
• Banned literature, Professor Elaine Razzano considers the reasons why books are banned, and more
• Dartmouth’s Annelise Orleck reflects on the 1911 fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory in Greenwich Village, which killed 146 workers, mostly young immigrant Jewish and Italian women.
• Dartmouth English professor Tom Luxon explores how John Milton’s redefinition of marriage unintentionally charted a path toward making same-sex marriages imaginable.
  Historian Allen Koop explores the history, traditions of the Appalachian Mt Club’s Hut System in NH
• Middlebury’s Susan Watson explores the nearly mythical influence of Einstein on the twentieth century.
• Amherst College professor Ilan Stavans on the impact that immigrants have had on American culture and language and the role immigrant writers have played in your national consciousness.
• Dartmouth professor Irene Kacandes on the enduring appeal of Anne Frank and her diary.
  Author and illustrator David Macaulay traces the development of his books.