Seminar News

Dear Seminars Community,

This has been a memorable spring in every way. Many in our community gathered on April 17 for the Annual Dinner. On this joyous occasion, Bob Pollack and I presented the Tannenbaum-Warner Award to Alice Newton. Steve Coll of Columbia Journalism School presented a compelling Tannenbaum lecture entitled “What Was Saddam Hussein Thinking? A Case Study in Misunderstanding Dictators.” While the Annual Dinner is always a major effort for the University Seminars and Faculty House, the resounding success of the evening was even more of an accomplishment than usual given the limited access to campus during this year’s event. On numerous occasions this semester, seminars and other meetings involving participants from outside the University have required additional effort and resourcefulness as security measures on campus responded to campus protests. The Seminars team and the rapporteurs have risen to the challenge gracefully, and we are grateful.

The Seminars office handles a large amount of business supporting the operations of over 90 seminars. Although the team was reduced for several months, in March we welcomed the new Program Coordinator, Gary Mayta Lizarraga. Originally from Peru, Gary has a BA in Political Science from Columbia with a specialization in Latin American politics. With his arrival, the Seminars office has once again attained its full size.

By the end of the semester, further restrictions on access to campus precluded meetings in Faculty House altogether. Some seminars cancelled their meetings, while others met online. As always, individual seminars are intellectually autonomous. In a time of conflict and division, The Seminars provide rare opportunities for discussion and debate outside of traditional academic structures, in a setting where ideas are more important than status or institutional affiliation. The collaborative, horizontal framework of The University Seminars has long offered a replicable model for cooperation. Today we treasure this tradition of collegial discourse more than ever. We look forward to the seminars’ reconvening in the fall in what we hope will be a context of enhanced dialogue and mutual understanding.

Sincerely,

Susan Boynton
Director, The University Seminars