"50 Glorious Years at Macalester, Then and Now, Warts 'n' All"
Roger Mosvick,
Professor Emeritus,
Communication Studies

The second longest professor in tenure at Macalester recounts his time at the college.

"Using Anthropology in a Multicultural World"
David McCurdy,
Professor Emeritus,
Anthropology

A Macalester senior works for a Minneapolis advertising agency as a "staff anthropologist." Consultants led by an anthropologist help make Harley Davidson into an industry leader. This discussion looks at why anthropologists, who once largely focused on the study of non-Western societies, have found a home in foreign and domestic business, government, and non-profit organizations.

"A conversation on Civic Engagement"
Chuck Green,
Professor Emeritus,
Political Science

Being grateful but wanting to be grateful for more: A conversation on civic engagement in Macalester's past, present, and future.

"Thinking About the Education of Gifted Secondary Students"
Wayne Roberts,
Professor Emeritus,
Mathematics

A bill in the Minnesota legislature proposes creating a state residential school of mathematics and science. And this year, the Department of Education launched a new program called Scholars of Distinction in Mathematics which Roberts directed. Roberts, director of the Minnesota State High School Mathematics League, will share his thoughts on what works in teaching Mathematics to gifted high school students.

"Science as a Way of Knowing: Natural Selection, Global Warming, and
Other Troubling Truths"
Truman Schwartz,
DeWitt Wallace Professor Emeritus of Chemistry

Much of the American public persists in a love/hate relationship with science, its discoveries and its products. Examples of scientific illiteracy are legion and its consequences can be disastrous. This polemic will offer the perspective of a scientist/humanist long-marinated in the Macalester liberal arts tradition.

"Rethinking U. S. History in an Age of Global Catastrophe"
Jim Stewart,
James Wallace Professor of History

Stewart addresses the problem of trying to understand the USA's extraordinarily rich and rapid development over two-and-a-half centuries in light of today's intensifying global problems of over-consumption, mass immiseration and environmental degradation. In the 1950s, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David Potter insightfully wrote of Americans as having been uniquely shaped by a past that made them "People of Plenty." What might his insight on the past allow us to see today, as opposed to when Potter first offered it a half-century ago?

"The Destruction of the Artist"
Robert Warde,
Associate Professor,
English

This talk constitutes a very brief consideration of the writer's consciousness in relation to contemporary critical practices. It's a look at how English Departments are getting it wrong and why that doesn't matter.

"Deals"
Karl Egge,
F. R. Bigelow Professor of Economics

Egge debuted a course last semester called, "Deals." The course gave 35 students, mostly seniors majoring in economics, a chance to hear 25 alumni guest "professors," from the classes of 1971 to 1999, talk about the business deals they were involved in — including IPOs, mergers and acquisitions, structured debt financing and venture capital. They also shared a variety of personal "life lessons" with the class. Egge will summarize the major themes from the course.