This Week
Monday, November 27
4 p.m. LS 112
Founder's Basement
Tuesday, November 28
10:30 a.m. RefWorks instruction session for faculty
Tredway Library, 2nd floor
11:30 a.m. Reflections – Kelly Schumacher ‘07
Ascension Chapel
Wednesday, November 29
Walk-in hours in the dean’s office: 1:00 p.m. – 2:30 p.m.
4 p.m. RefWorks instruction session for faculty
Tredway Library, 2nd floor
7 p.m. The Ellwood F. Curtis Endowed Lectureship – Susan Jacoby, "Whose God, Whose Trust? Religion, Secularism and American Patriotism"
Olin Auditorium
The lecture will deal with both conflict and complementarity between secular and religious impulses in American history. Jacoby considers the period between the Declaration of Independence and the ratification of the Constitution a high point of complementarity between secular and religious impulses in American life. Today (and, to a considerable extent, for the past two decades) we find ourselves at a high point of conflict between secularism and religion in public affairs. This is partly, but not wholly, attributable to the presence of a large fundamentalist religious minority that may be fairly described as anti-modernist. Liberal religious voices have been more muted, and "secular" has become something of a dirty word. The great American paradox--that of a religious people with a secular government--has never been without tension, but Jacoby will argue that these tensions are worse today than they have ever been.
Susan Jacoby, author of Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism, in its tenth hardcover printing (Metropolitan Books) and just out in paperback. Freethinkers was hailed in the New York Times as an "ardent and insightful work" that "seeks to rescue a proud tradition from the indifference of posterity." Named a notable nonfiction book of 2004 by The Washington Post and The Los Angeles Times, Freethinkers was cited in England as one of the outstanding international books of 2004 by the Times Literary Supplement and The Guardian. The author began her writing career as a reporter for The Washington Post. She is the author of six previous books, including Wild Justice: The Evolution of Revenge (Harper & Row), a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 1984, and Half-Jew: A Daughter's Search for Her Family's Buried Past (Scribner, 2000). A generalist in an era of specialization, Jacoby has been a contributor for more than 25 years, on topics including law, religion, medicine, women's rights, and Russian literature, to a wide range of periodicals and newspapers. Her articles and essays have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, the Washington Post Book World, the Los Angeles Times Book Review, Newsday, Harper's, The Nation, Vogue, and the AARP Magazine, among other publications. They have been reprinted in numerous anthologies of columns and magazine articles. Susan Jacoby has been the recipient of numerous grants and awards, from the Guggenheim, Rockefeller, and Ford Foundations, as well as the National Endowment for the Humanities. In 2001-2002, she was named a fellow of the Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. She has been a guest on numerous National Public Radio programs, including the Diane Rehm and Tavis Smiley shows, as well as regional NPR programs broadcast from Los Angeles , San Francisco , Chicago , Atlanta , Houston , Boston , Philadelphia , and Madison , Wisc. Ms. Jacoby is also program director of the Center for Inquiry-Metro New York, a rationalist think tank with offices at 1 Rockefeller Plaza, Suite 2700, New York, NY 10020.
Thursday, November 30
10:30 a.m. Convocation – Susan Jacoby, "The Folly of Founder Worship: Why We Don't Need to Turn Great Men into Saints"
Centennial Hall
Susan Jacoby will talk about ways in which we tend to distort the founding generation by viewing it through a modern lense and specific political perspectives. The religious right today is quite wrong in its contention that the founders were devoutly orthodox men who intended to found a Christian government, and secularists are wrong to pretend that the founders themselves were thoroughgoing secularists. That they intended to found a secular government does not mean that they themselves were hostile to religion. Far from it. But that many of them had personal religious beliefs doesn't mean that they intended to found a religious government. Far from it.
4:30 p.m. NSSE Celebration
Wilson Center
Friday, December 1
3:30 p.m. Conversations on Scholarship – Allen Bertsche, "Teaching Spain: A Study of the Current Situation of Peninsular Culture & Civilization Courses in the Undergraduate Spanish Curriculum." Pamela Druger will also do sabbatical talk.
Wilson Center
8 p.m. Opera@Augustana
Wallenberg Hall
Opera@Augustana presents scenes from Street Scene by Weill, Gianni Schicchi by Puccini and The Impresario by Mozart. John Pfautz, director
8 p.m. Augustana Dance Company Winter Show
Centennial Hall
Tickets are available from the Augustana Ticket Office and are $5 for the general public, $3 for senior citizens, students, faculty/staff, and free for children age 12 and under.
Saturday, December 2
8 p.m. Opera@Augustana
Wallenberg Hall
Opera@Augustana presents scenes from Street Scene by Weill, Gianni Schicchi by Puccini and The Impresario by Mozart. John Pfautz, director
8 p.m. Quad City Symphony Concert
Centennial Hall
"Celebrate Instruments!" An evening of music from Italy, featuring guest conductor David Bellugi and accordion soloist Ivano Battiston. Tickets are available only from the QCSO office, 563-322-0931, and range in price from $20 - $43.
Concert conversations are offered in Larson Hall one hour prior to each performance. Join QCSO conductor Donald Schleicher and Augustana's Kai Swanson for insight into the music and composers featured in each concert.
Sunday, December 3
2 p.m. Quad City Symphony Concert
Centennial Hall
