The ‘60s at 50: BPALC Symposium and Film Series

BPALC Symposium (Fall 2018-Spring 2019):
The ‘60s at 50: Reflections on America a Half-Century Later

The year 1968 has come to stand as a symbolic representative for the entirety of the tumultuous period of conflict, contestation, and change in American society that was the 1960s. In that year alone, Americans witnessed
• the Tet Offensive in the Vietnam War,
• the startling decision by the sitting President, Lyndon B. Johnson, not to seek re-election,
• the student insurrection at Columbia University,
• the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy,
• the violent clashes between protesters and police in the streets of Chicago during the Democratic National Convention,
• the Black Power gesture of American athletes at the Mexico City Olympics,
• and the election to the presidency of Richard M. Nixon.

A half century after this symbolically rich though tortured year, we are planning a symposium dedicated to a reconsideration of the political, social, and cultural legacy of the American 1960s. We will offer to the community a series of conversations in which nationally known speakers from a range of disciplinary backgrounds with established records of scholarship related to the legacy of the ‘60s explore this topic in conversation with members of our own faculty.

The invited speakers represent significantly differing and even conflictual perspectives on the ‘60s, as do the Bucknell faculty members who will be in dialogue with them. Making sense of something as complex and disputed as the legacy of the 1960s on American society requires many different voices, many different disciplinary perspectives, many different political viewpoints. The format for each event is a civil but intensive intellectual conversation. Our intent is to provide information about the consequences of the 1960s to the community, but also to model the civil argumentative exchange between individuals with different perspectives that adheres to the academic virtues and values we cherish at Bucknell.

Listen to a discussion of the series on WVIA radio.

The schedule of guests is as follows:

October 18, 2018
Todd Gitlin (Columbia) author of The Sixties: Years of Hope, Days of Rage

(Sponsored by the Office of the President, the University Lectureship Committee, and the Howard I. Scott Chair, and supported by the Department of Sociology/Anthropology and the Bucknell Institute for Public Policy)

Video of Todd Gitlin’s visit 10/18/18

November 8, 2018
Mark Bauerlein (Emory University), author of The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future (Or, Don’t Trust Anyone Under 30)