In today’s highly-charged political atmosphere, many Americans are searching for a common ground where they can meet as a first step to hearing, appreciating and understanding values in America. Tulane/Aspen Institute Values in America Speaker Series will feature a variety of speakers who give voice to the nuanced and stimulating topic of values in America.
Contemporary Voices on Race, The South, and The American Struggle
Imani Perry and Natasha Trethewey, in conversation with moderator Eddie S. Glaude Jr, grapple with what it means to be a Southern writer at the Values in America Speaker Series panel at the 2023 New Orleans Book Festival at Tulane University. How is the specter of Southern history mobilized in one’s aesthetic? How does one begin to render the beauty of life that is not reducible to that history, but emerges from this soil, this place, this ground with its distinct sound, timbre and rhythm? And, what does a Black Southern writer offer in this moment?
Previous Speakers
The American Spirit: Invention, Ingenuity and Social Movements that Shape America
Moderated by David Rubenstein
March 11, 2022
David Rubenstein, Jon Meacham, Walter Isaacson, and John Barry discuss The American Spirit: Invention, Ingenuity and Social Movements that Shape America. This event was the Tulane-Aspen Values in America Speaker Series event at the 2022 New Orleans Book Festival at Tulane University on March 11th, 2022. For more information about additional sessions at the festival, visit bookfest.tulane.edu.
Madeleine Albright, Former Secretary of State
Moderated by Walter Isaacson
Feb. 12, 2019
The event featured former Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, and was moderated by Tulane professor of history, Walter Isaacson. They discussed nationalism, populism, and Albright’s new book, Fascism: A Warning.
Pulitzer Prize winner and historian Annette Gordon-Reed
Moderated by Walter Isaacson
Oct. 30, 2018
The second series event featured Pulitzer Prize winner and historian Annette Gordon-Reed. She and Walter Isaacson discussed how we judge Thomas Jefferson, and other important historical figures, in light of today’s values.
Presidential historian Jon Meacham
Moderated by Walter Isaacson
May 2, 2018
The event, “When America’s Values are Tested: Lessons from Jefferson, Lincoln and other great leaders in the Age of Trump,” featured presidential historian Jon Meacham, and was moderated by Tulane professor of history, Walter Isaacson. Meacham drew on his great biographies and answered a variety of questions from the audience to create an in-depth discussion about the inner strength of America.
