News

WCAI Program to Collaborate with Alpha Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa
Scholar to Speak on the Struggle for the College Curriculum

For the 2006-2007 academic year, the Program in Western Civilization and American Institutions (WCAI) is collaborating with the Alpha Chapter of in a series of lectures and discussions with the theme, "The Essence of a Liberal Education: Defining the Core."

The eighth and last speaker in the series, Dr. Herbert I. London, president of the Hudson Institute in New York City, will speak on "The Struggle for the Curriculum," on Thursday Dec. 6th at 6:00 PM in the Avaya Auditorium, ACES building.

Phi Beta Kappa Guest Lecturers

Herbert I. London has been president of Hudson Institute, a think tank based in New York City, since 1997. He is the former John M. Olin University Professor of Humanities at New York University, responsible for creating the Gallatin School in 1972, and served as dean until 1992. London graduated from Columbia University in 1960 and received his Ph.D. from New York University in 1966. He has created several television programs, including "Myths that Rule America" and a 47-part CBS series, "The American Character."

London is the author and editor of 21 books, including Myths That Rule America (with Al Weeks), which inspired an NBC television series of the same title; Why Are They Lying to Our Children?; Military Doctrine and the American Character; Armageddon in the Classroom; From the Empire State to the Vampire State (with Ed Rubenstein); and Decade of Denial.

During the 2007 academic year, WCAI will be conducting a regular series of lectures and faculty/student panel discussions centering around the main theme of defining the core of a liberal education.

Featured speakers are drawn from a number of major US universities and institutions, including Harvard, Princeton, Yale, the University of Chicago Law School, University of Pennsylvania, and University of California-Fresno. In addition to the academic speakers, several prominent authors will also speak. Several of the speakers will also lecture at other Texas universities in Houston, Waco, San Antonio, and Dallas.

UT Faculty and students will be given regular opportunities throughout the year to meet for panel discussions on these lectures.

This lecture series is co-sponsored by the program in Western Civilization and American Institutions, Humanities Texas, the Jack Miller Center of the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, the Alpha of Texas chapter of Phi Beta Kappa, the Phi Beta Kappa Association of Greater Austin, and the UT Humanities Institute.

Lecture schedule:

Victor Davis Hanson, Hoover Institution, Stanford
February 15, 2007
6-7:30 pm
Avaya Auditorium

Victor Davis Hanson, Hoover Institution, Stanford
February 16, 2007
6-7 pm
Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture, 2719 Routh Street, Dallas, Texas 75201

Prof. Wai Chee Dimock, Yale University
April 10, 2007
6-7:30 pm
Avaya Auditorium

Prof. Martha Nussbaum, University of Chicago
September 20th, 2007
6-7:30 pm
Avaya Auditorium

Prof. Michael Bèrubè, Penn State University
October 11th, 2007
6-7:30 pm Avaya Auditorium

Danielle Allen, Institute for Advanced Study
November 8th, 2007
6-7:30 pm
Avaya Auditorium

Herbert I. London, Hudson Institute
December 6th, 2007
6-7:30 pm
Avaya Auditorium

Phi Beta Kappa

2007 Phi Beta Kappa Lecture Series