Lyceum Lectures

Sandy Hartwiger, Fall Lyceum Speaker

Monday, September 14, 2020

Rethinking the Global Citizen at FSU

Toward the end of Framingham State’s Mission Statement, there is a significant but underexamined phrase, “global citizen.” FSU purports to cultivate “thoughtful, responsible local and global citizens,” but what does that mean in practice? Sandy will take up this question in the first half of his Lyceum talk in order to engage with the concept of global citizenship within the context of higher education, particularly at FSU, before moving into a discussion of the ways in which contemporary world literature pushes the boundaries of the idea of global citizenship to reimagine the concept outside of the context of neoliberal globalization.

With the demands for global competencies increasing, especially in the private sector, universities are responding with rhetoric that highlights the cultivation of these global skill sets. Subsequently, this aspirational language incorporated into official university documents has become common place, however, too often there is gap between a university’s vision of what it means to be a global citizen and the realities of day-to-day student learning. Furthermore, when these initiatives are driven by corporate sponsors, the danger increases that the term “global citizen” simply becomes a euphemism for transnational capitalist class.

In this talk, Sandy suggests that the cosmopolitan underpinnings of the notion of global citizenship adopted by many institutions of higher education frequently reproduce a troubling dynamic between those who are cultivated to feel at home in the world and those who are cast adrift in an unwelcoming global public sphere. He will turn to contemporary world literature as a space to work through these contrasting global identities. More specifically, Sandy moves away from the celebratory narratives of globalization and global citizenship embodied by Thomas Friedman’s naïve notion of the world being “flat” to examine the stratification of global spaces and the spectral populations that haunt these locations.

Lyceum Lecture Proposals

In an effort to highlight sabbatical activities, faculty research, and teaching interests, CELTSS is proud to sponsor the Lyceum Lecture series. The FSU Lyceum continues a distinguished tradition:

In 1862 Josiah Holbrook, an educational reformer, established the first American Lyceum in Millbury, MA, named after the Lyceum of Aristotle in ancient Greece. Holbrook invited local people to organize a society to prepare papers on “useful” subjects such as science, history and literature, and lecture to friends and neighbors on a weekly basis during the winter months.

The basic goals of the Lyceum remain intact: to impart scientific and humanistic knowledge deemed vital to the moral and intellectual improvement of the individual and the community.

In AY 2020-2021, one speaker will be chosen for this event and will be presented with a stipend of $250.

Lyceum speakers provide dynamic, engaging presentations of their work and research interests at a level suitable for a general audience that may include Board of Trustee and Foundation Board members. Lyceum events inform our trustees about the value of sabbaticals and funding for research and teaching innovation.

In September 2020, we will invite applications from faculty members who have completed sabbatical activities, received CELTSS funding, and/or participated in ongoing CELTSS workshops that have promoted their professional development. Preference will be given to speakers with recent sabbaticals and/or major scholarly developments.

If you are interested in applying for consideration, we will ask you to submit your Lyceum Application no later than Friday, October 16, 2020. Items included in Lyceum application:

1. A brief autobiographical sketch and c.v.
2. A 500 word abstract of your work and proposed lecture, which includes:
a. Description of your project
b. Description of how the sabbatical experience enabled you to complete this work, if applicable
c. Description of the benefit of this experience to your academic career and/or institution

The committee will notify all applicants after the selection process is completed.

Lyceum Lecture Series

Fall 2009
Tell Me What You Eat and I’ll Tell You What You Are
Janet Schwartz
Spring 2010
Leslie Starobin
What Can I Tell a Five Year Old
Fall 2010
Ira Silver
How Much Good am I Doing? Bittersweet Charity and America’s Poor
Spring 2011
Robert Alter
Round the World Ticket: A Photographers’ Journey
Fall 2011
Vandana Singh
Beyond the Ordinary: Science Through the Lens of Story
Spring 2012
Lisa Eck
“I am the Other’s Other”, Cross Cultural Literacy in India and China
Spring 2013
The Quakes of Christchurch, Natural and Social
Elaine Hartwick
Fall 2013
Can’t You Put on a Little Lipstick
Laura Osterweis
Spring 2014
Minorities in China
Mary-Ann Stadtler-Chester
Fall 2014
Raising Spirits: Victorian Ghost Stories
Lynn Parker
Spring 2015
Food Agriculture and Water Rights: Report from the West Bank, Palestine
Susan Massad
Fall 2015
Families As They Really Are
Virginia Rutter
Spring 2016
A Poetry Reading from Johnny & Maggie
Evelyn Perry
Fall 2016
How Radio Made Brian Friel a Playwright
Kelly Matthews
Spring 2017
In Search of Vincent Van Gogh: An Art Historian’s Pilgrimage to the Netherlands and France
Erika Schneider
Fall 2017
“A Vassal to his Majesty”: Loyalty, Betrayal, and Slaves’ Pursuit of Freedom in Mid-Eighteenth-Century Jamaica
Lissa Bollettino
Spring 2018
Are all the deer on Nantucket really descended from just three deer?
Richard Beckwitt
Fall 2018
Hidden Stories Behind Social Problems
Ira Silver
Spring 2019
Is Your Piggy Bank Too Big? International Reserve Accumulation in Latin America
Luis Rosero
Fall 2019
Be Like Water (就像水一样): Inside Stories from Fulbright Scholars in China
Shin Freedman
Spring 2020
Rethinking the Global Citizen at FSU
Alexander (Sandy) Hartwiger

Lyceum Lectures

Lyceum Lecture Series