Crossing Sonic Borderlands
Media Mentions: May 2020
The latest media mentions, quotes, profiles, and writings from Division of the Humanities faculty, students, staff, and alumni. Visit us on Twitter and Facebook for more updates.
Danielle Allen to Deliver Lecture Series on "Democracy in the Time of Coronavirus"
The United States can become the world leader in virus response—if only the country were able to break the “laws of politics.”
That’s what Danielle Allen wrote in a recent Washington Post column, arguing for the creation of 30 “mega-labs” to test for COVID-19. A few days before that, the Harvard University political theorist helped publish “Roadmap to Pandemic Resilience,” a report describing the coronavirus as “a profound threat to our democracy, comparable to the Great Depression and World War II.”
Allen will further that conversation as part of the Randy L. and Melvin R. Berlin Family Lectures, hosted by the University of Chicago. Registration for the series is free and open to the public.
Six UChicago Scholars Elected to American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Six members of the University of Chicago faculty have been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of the nation’s oldest and most prestigious honorary societies. They include Profs. Joy Bergelson, Maud Ellmann, Giulia Galli, William Howell, André Neves and Alexander Razborov.
These scholars have all conducted groundbreaking research in their fields, from predicting the behavior of molecules to examining U.S. presidential power to creating the foundations of new algorithms. They join the 2020 class of 276 individuals, announced April 23, which includes artists, scholars, scientists, and leaders in the public, non-profit, and private sectors.
UChicago Philosopher Agnes Callard Receives 2020 Lebowitz Prize
For University of Chicago philosopher Agnes Callard, becoming someone is an extended learning process—a project of self-transformation that hinges not on specific rational decisions, but on aspiring to new values.
She introduced that idea in Aspiration: The Agency of Becoming, a 2018 book that one reviewer called “deep and broad in its philosophical reach.” That reviewer was Laurie Paul, the Yale University scholar with whom Callard now shares the 2020 Lebowitz Prize, awarded in recognition of outstanding achievement in the field of philosophy.
