Democracy and Academic Freedom: A Forum – Session 3

Event of Interest:
The College of Wooster will welcome three speakers for a series of lectures and dialogues titled Democracy and Academic Freedom, A Forum. Speakers will address a range of topics, reflecting on academic freedom in global, institutional, and educational contexts, with a Q&A session to follow. The series, which begins Wednesday, Sept. 3, includes the annual Constitution Day and Bell Lecture in Law on Sept. 17, and the Annual Lindner Lecture on Ethics on Oct. 15. Open to the public, the talks will take place in Gault Recital Hall of Scheide Music Center (525 E. University Street) at 7:30 p.m. and will also be live streamed on the College website.

The Annual Lindner Lecture in Ethics will conclude the series with “Academic Freedom and Academic Responsibility” featuring Robert Talisse, W. Alton Jones Professor of Philosophy at Vanderbilt University. An American philosopher and political theorist, Talisse will explore the responsibilities that correspond with the guarantee of academic freedom and the liberty of professors to pursue and teach their areas of expertise, “developing the idea that academic responsibility includes helping to equip students to navigate a social world that does not yet exist.” Talisse earned his Ph.D. in philosophy from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York in 2001. His principal area of research is political philosophy, with an emphasis on democratic theory and the civic responsibilities of citizenship. Among his many other works, Talisse recently published Civic Solitude: Why Democracy Needs Distance with Oxford University Press.

More information is available at https://wooster.edu/2025/08/07/wooster-to-welcome-speakers-for-democracy-and-academic-freedom-a-forum-beginning-in-september/