The Liberal Education - Dead or Alive?

Conference Program

Location for all Saturday and Sunday events: Filene Auditorium

Friday, November 5, 6:30 pm, Boathouse

Dinner for invited Dartmouth guests and keynote talk by Steven Pinker (Harvard; Psychology). Dartmouth faculty only.

Saturday, November 6, 9:00 am

Introductions; welcoming address by Dartmouth President James Wright

9:30 - 10:15 am

Raimond Gaita (King's College, London; Philosophy), keynote address, "Callicles' Challenges"

Panels:

1. U.S. Higher Education Today, 10:45 am - 1:15 pm

  • Panel chair: Peter Tse (Dartmouth, Psychology and Brain Science)
  • Marcelo Gleiser (Dartmouth; Theoretical Physics), "Learn Free or Die: Dartmouth Students Speak on Liberal Education"
  • William Kirby (Harvard; History of China, Dean of Arts and Sciences), "American Higher Education in Global Perspective"
  • Stan Katz (Princeton; Wilson School of Public Affairs), "Liberal Education After the Ruin of the University"
  • Nicholas Negroponte (MIT; Media Technology), No title

2. The Liberal Education: Past and Present, 2:30 - 5:00 pm

  • Panel chair: Michael Ermarth (Dartmouth, History)
  • Anthony Grafton (Princeton; History), "Reforming the Humanities in the American University: Some Models"
  • Louis Menand (Harvard; English), "The Liberal Arts Saved From Drowning"
  • Susan Neiman (Einstein Forum; Philosophy), "Ideals in the Public World"

Sunday, November 7

3. The Liberal Education Across Disciplines and Divisions, 10:00 am - 12:30 pm

  • Panel chair: Ada Cohen (Dartmouth, Art History)
  • Philip Fisher, Elaine Scarry (Harvard; English), "Shared Ground"
  • Keith Moxey ( Barnard; Art History), "The Promise of the Visual"
  • David Mumford (Brown; Applied Mathematics), "Mathematics Belongs in a Liberal Education -- If We Do It Right "
  • Freeman Dyson (School of Advanced Studies, Princeton; Physicist), "Fact and Fancy"

4. Renovating the Liberal Education? 2:00 - 4:30 pm

  • Panel chair: Kathryn Cottingham (Dartmouth, Biology)
  • Gene Likens (Institute of Ecosystem Studies; Biology/Ecology), "A Biologist's View of Liberal Education"
  • Vernon Rosario (UCLA; Psychiatric clinician/author), "Psychiatry without Humans"
  • Tony Kushner (Author-playwright), Public Interview on the Liberal Education