What is America now?  And who counts as an American?  These are questions that have been much on our minds lately and that we hope to address from a variety of angles in this lecture series.  We look forward to lectures that explore the racial and ethnic groups that make up our society; the arts, including American music, drama, and painting; religion; politics; and changing demographics—many of the strands and influences, in other words, that contribute to a sense of the nation’s ever-changing identity. 

Mar 15:  Fault Lines 

Mar 22: Road Trip America: Finding Musical Theater  

Mar 29: One Quarter of the Nation: Immigration and the Transformation of America 

Apr 5: Jazz: The Persisting Voice of American Identity

Apr 12: “One Way Ticket”: The Meanings of Movement and Migration in African American History and Life 

Apr 19: An American Language: The History of Spanish in the United States

Apr 26: American Nation, American Nature: Nurturing Each in the Anthropocene

May 3: Asian American History and Today’s Anti-Asian Hate