Jon Peede: The Liberal Arts in an Illiberal Age
December 9, 2020, 6 p.m. Online only. Free and open to the public. Registration required.
³Ô¹ÏÍø the Lecture
The lecture will discuss the enduring value of the liberal arts to university life and American society. It will also establish the centrality of the ever-expanding Western literary canon to the liberal arts and how illiberal ideologies have weakened the free exchange of ideas and other essential elements of a truly inclusive educational community.
³Ô¹ÏÍø the Speaker
Jon Parrish Peede, ChairmanÌýof the National Endowment for the Humanities, has awarded more than $500 million in federal grants to cultural organizations and universities since 2017. His previous positions include publisher of theÌýVirginia Quarterly Review (VQR)Ìýat the ³Ô¹ÏÍø of Virginia, literature grants director at the National Endowment for the Arts,Ìýdirector of the NEA Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience program, director of the NEA Big Read program, and editor at Mercer ³Ô¹ÏÍø Press. He has written speeches for a U.S. president and a Librarian of Congress. Mr. Peede holds degrees from Vanderbilt ³Ô¹ÏÍø and the ³Ô¹ÏÍø of Mississippi.ÌýHe is the coeditor ofÌýInside the Church of Flannery O’Connor: Sacrament, Sacramental, and the Sacred in Her Fiction and editor of a bilingual anthology of contemporary American fiction.
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