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The LaFollette Lecture Series

The LaFollette Lecture Series was established by the Wabash College Board of Trustees to honor Charles D. LaFollette, their longtime colleague on the Board. The lecture is given each year by a Wabash College Faculty member who is charged to address the relation of his or her special discipline to the humanities broadly conceived.

The full list of LaFollette Lectures since the first in 1977.


44th LaFollette Lecture, 2024
"Neurosis Spasmodica" (October 17, 2024)
Crystal Benedicks, Department of English. Photos

43rd LaFollette Lecture, 2023
"Glory and the Dovetail" (September 28, 2023)
Derek Nelson, Department of Religion. Photos, YouTube, Podcast

42nd LaFollette Lecture, 2022
"Embodied" (September 22, 2022)
Bronwen Wickkiser, Department of Classics. Photos, YouTube, Podcast

41st LaFollette Lecture, 2021
"Shaped by History" (September 16, 2021)
Amanda Ingram, Department of Biology. Photos, YouTube, Podcast

40th LaFollette Lecture, 2019
"Ethnomusicology: Its Role, Power, and Significance in the Humanities" (September 26, 2019)
James Makubuya, Department of Music. Wabash Magazine Story, Podcast

39th LaFollette Lecture, 2018
"What Does Economics Have to Say About Culture?" (September 27, 2018)
Joyce Burnette, Department of Economics. News StoryYouTube

38th LaFollette Lecture, 2017
"The Invisible Movement That Reading Is" (October 27, 2017)
Brian Tucker, Department of Modern Languages. News StoryPhotos

37th LaFollette Lecture, 2016
"Walking Hadrian's Wall: Meditations on Romans, Christians, Birds, and Growing Older" (October 21, 2016)
Robert Royalty, Department of Religion. News Story, PhotosYouTube, Book

36th LaFollette Lecture, 2015
“Grappling with the Quantum: Trying to Understand the Fundamental Rules Governing Our World” (October 30, 2015)
Dennis E. Krause, Department of Physics. News Story, Photos

35th LaFollette Lecture, 2014
"Itinerant Humanities: Learning from James Joyce’s Voluntary Exile" (October 3, 2014)
Agata Szczeszak-Brewer, Department of English. News Story, YouTube

34th LaFollette Lecture, 2013
“One for the Books: Rhetoric, Community, and Memory” (October 10, 2013)
Todd McDorman, Department of Rhetoric. News Story, YouTube

33rd LaFollette Lecture, 2012
“Faces Past: Ancient Imaginations and the Craft of Social History” (October 19, 2012)
Jeremy Hartnett, Department of Classics. News Story, YouTube

32nd LaFollette Lecture, 2011
“Ibn Khaldun Views Olitski” (October 7, 2011)
Stephen R. Morillo, Department of History. News Story, YouTube

31st LaFollette Lecture, 2010
“An ‘Abridgement’ between Nathaniel Dunn’s and the Graveyard” (October 29, 2010)
Dwight E. Watson, Department of Theater. News Story, YouTube

30th LaFollette Lecture, 2009
“The Dominion of the Dead and the Witness of the Liberal Arts” (October 9, 2009)
Gary A. Phillips, Dean of the College, Department of Religion. News Story, YouTube

29th LaFollette Lecture, 2008
“Life at a Half Bubble Off Plumb: Rethinking Truth, Beauty, and Jumbo Shrimp” (October 10, 2008)
Greg Huebner, Department of Art. News Story

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