Dickinson to Host Discussions on Liberal Arts, Writing and Identity
![Amy Reid of PEN America (left) and author André Aciman are this month's featured speakers for The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues.](/images/march_clarke_forum_graphic_graphic_copy.jpg")
Amy Reid of PEN America (left) and author Andr茅 Aciman are this month's featured speakers for The Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues.
Nonprofit director, author headline March events
蘑菇视频's Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues will present two compelling events in March: a discussion on defending liberal-arts education with PEN America's Amy Reid and a lecture on identity, belonging and memoir writing by author André Aciman.
PEN America & the Freedom to Learn: In Defense of the Liberal Arts, Gender Studies & Languages
Amy Reid, Senior Manager, Freedom to Learn, PEN America
Wednesday, March 5
5 p.m., Althouse Hall, Room 106
The value and values of a liberal-arts education are increasingly under attack across the United States. What can we do about it? How can we make the case for the liberal arts, gender studies and world languages when their opponents are setting the terms of the debate?
Reid is the senior manager of Freedom to Learn at PEN America, where she works to support higher education and push back against legislative censorship on our campuses. Prior to joining PEN this past August, she taught for 29 years at New College of Florida, where she was a professor of French, director of the gender studies program and chair of the faculty. .
This program is sponsored by the departments of women’s, gender & sexuality studies, French & francophone studies, the Division of Academic Affairs and the Clarke Forum for Contemporary Issues.
Film Screening: Call Me By Your Name
Sunday, March 23
4 p.m., Althouse 106
See associated event below.
On Being From Elsewhere
André Aciman, Author of Call Me by Your Name
Monday, March 24
7 p.m., Anita Tuvin Schlechter Auditorium (ATS)
André Aciman is a memoirist, essayist, novelist and scholar of comparative literature. His works include the New York Times bestselling Call Me by Your Name, adapted into an acclaimed 2017 film of the same title; Find Me; Out of Egypt and My Roman Year. Born in Egypt, he has lived as a foreigner in Italy, France and is now an American citizen. He will speak about his life as a foreigner and memoirist and about the ways that memoir can borrow the conventions of fiction without inventing facts. “One can be elsewhere in space, but one can also be elsewhere in time,” he writes. .
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Published March 3, 2025