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2020/21 Portland Arts & Lectures: Joy Harjo

Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall 1037 SW Broadway, Portland, OR, United States

Joy Harjo is a renowned performer and writer of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation and was named the 23rd Poet Laureate of the United States in 2019. Harjo is the author of nine books of poetry—most recently An American Sunrise—several plays and children’s books, and a memoir, Crazy Brave. She has received numerous prominent awards, including the 2017 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize and 2015 Wallace Stevens Award. The Librarian of Congress, Carla Hayden, says: “Her work powerfully connects us to the earth and the spiritual world with direct, inventive lyricism that helps us reimagine who we are.” Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Harjo earned her MFA at the Iowa Writ­ers’ Work­shop and has taught Eng­lish, Cre­ative Writ­ing, and Amer­i­can Indi­an Stud­ies at numerous universities, while per­form­ing music and poet­ry…

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$90 – $355

An Evening with Elaine Weiss

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

One hundred years after the ratification of the 19th Amendment, the Oregon Historical Society is excited to host Elaine Weiss for a powerful lecture on her latest book, The Woman’s Hour: The Great Fight to Win the Vote. This special lecture is presented in collaboration with our exhibit, Nevertheless, They Persisted: Women’s Voting Rights and the 19th Amendment, on view through December 5, 2021. Copies of The Woman’s Hour and The Woman’s Hour young readers adaptation are available for sale through the OHS Museum Store. Order your copy by emailing museumstore@ohs.org. All proceeds from sales in the OHS Museum Store support the OHS mission. Ability Accommodation Information This event provides the following accommodations: Handicap Accessible About The Woman’s Hour Nashville, August 1920. Thirty-five states have approved the 19th Amendment, granting women the right to…

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Free

Oregon Historical Society’s Mark O. Hatfield Lecture Series: Jon Meacham

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

His Truth Is Marching On: John Lewis and the Power of Hope Presidential historian and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jon Meacham is one of America's most prominent public intellectuals. A contributor to TIME and The New York Times Book Review, Meacham is a highly sought-after commentator, regularly appearing on CNN and MSNBC. Known as a skilled orator with a depth of knowledge about politics, religion, and current affairs, Meacham brings historical context to the issues and events affecting our daily lives. In his latest #1 New York Times best-seller, His Truth is Marching On, Meacham draws on decades of wide-ranging interviews with the late Congressman John Lewis. In this biography, Meacham shares how Lewis, the great-grandson of a man who was enslaved and son of an…

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$30 – $80

2020/21 Portland Arts & Lectures: Yaa Gyasi (RESCHEDULED)

Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall 1037 SW Broadway, Portland, OR, United States

Yaa Gyasi is the author of the forthcoming novel, Transcendent Kingdom (Knopf, August 2020). Her best-selling debut novel, Homegoing (2016), is an intergenerational saga following two split branches of a Ghanaian family through three hundred years of history. Homegoing won the PEN/Hemingway Award and the National Book Critics Circle’s John Leonard Award for best first book, was shortlisted for the British Book Award – Debut of the Year, was named a New York Times and Washington Post Notable Book, and was included on numerous Best Books of the Year lists. National Book Award winner Ta-Nehisi Coates praised Homegoing as “an inspiration” and “what happens when you pair a gifted literary mind to an epic task.” Gyasi was born in Ghana and raised in Huntsville, Alabama.…

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$90 – $355

“From South Street to Not Doctor Street: Historicism and the African American Novel” with Kenneth Warren

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Join us for "From South Street to Not Doctor Street: Historicism and the African American Novel," a lecture with Kenneth Warren. Prof. Warren's lecture will be followed by a question and answer session. Kenneth Warren is Fairfax M. Cone Distinguished Service Professor in the Department of English at The University of Chicago. His work focuses on American and African American literature from the late nineteenth through the middle of the twentieth century, in particular the way debates about literary form and genre articulate with discussions of political and social change. He is the author of three books: What Was African American Literature? (2010), So Black and Blue: Ralph Ellison and the Occasion of Criticism (2003), and Black and White Strangers: Race and American Literary Realism (1993).

Free

Oregon Historical Society: Rethinking American Grand Strategy

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Rethinking American Grand Strategy recasts both historical and modern dimensions of U.S. grand strategy by broadening the factors, events, and figures that could be considered political, and therefore strategic. Join us for a 30-minute lecture with one of the volume’s co-editors and co-authors, Christopher McKnight Nichols, laying out some of the broad themes, major events, and transformations in U.S. grand strategy, including an explanation of how an ensemble of leading scholars approached the history of the United States’ place in the world from the framework of rethinking. Following the book talk, Derrick Olsen will facilitate a discussion between Nichols and Ambassador Mary Carlin Yates on how the historical insights provided in Rethinking American Grand Strategy could aid in reconceptualizing domestic needs and foreign policy in a post-COVID-19 world. Copies…

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Free

Cirro-numinous Presents: CIRRO-NUMINOUS SALON: THE MASK

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

THE MASK is the first in an ongoing series of lectures/salons investigating the components of craft, embodiment, and perception. During each event, we’ll take a different lens to the question “how do these interrelated undertakings interact with a holistic creative practice?” Masks aren’t just tools of performance—they can also be an important ritual artifact. When we introduce an obstructing layer between ourselves and the world, we further our own power to move beyond a limiting view of the self. We’ll explore the topic deeply over the course of an hour and a half through a combination of lecture, discussion, and generative writing.

Free

HOOD FEMINISM with Mikki Kendall

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

Literary Arts, Meyer Memorial Trust, and The Women’s Foundation of Oregon present Mikki Kendall, author of Hood Feminism. Join us for a special event with best-selling author Mikki Kendall. Kendall will discuss her book Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women that a Movement Forgot. After her talk, Kendall will be in conversation with Shadiin Garcia, board chair of the Women’s Foundation of Oregon. Featuring introduction by Michelle DePass of Meyer Memorial Trust. GET THE BOOK! You can find Hood Feminism in hardcover and paperback at Third Eye Books. About Hood Feminism “One of the most important books of the current moment.”—Time“A rousing call to action… It should be required reading for everyone.”—Gabrielle Union, author of We’re Going to Need More Wine   “A brutally candid and unobstructed portrait of…

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Free – $100

On The Metaphysics of Deep Gossip: Bagley Wright Lecture Series

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

In this memoir and craft talk, Lisa Jarnot reflects on her entanglement in the New York poetry scene over twenty-five years. Beginning with the proposition that deep gossip and urban mindfulness are sacred practices, she explores the places where the New York School’s feminine, marvelous, and tough irreverence opens into a deeper mystery that is passed down as a liturgy of ecstatic connectedness. The Bagley Wright Lecture Series on Poetry supports contemporary poets as they explore in-depth their own thinking on poetry and poetics, and give a series of lectures resulting from these investigations. Lectures are delivered publicly in partnership with institutions and organizations nationwide. Find out more about past, present, and future lecturers, and explore the archive at www.bagleywrightlectures.org. Charlie Wright, Publisher of Wave…

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Free

PROFILES – The Banning of George Orwell

Online N/A, Portland, OR, United States

A virtual program series with Dr. Bill Thierfelder This ongoing series of 60-minute presentations explores the people, places, and events that shape our lives, our world, our universe. Presented by Dr. Bill Thierfelder, professor emeritus and docent at the American Museum of Natural History. This program explores Orwell’s writing, with an emphasis on Animal Farm and 1984, both of which have been banned over the years. Participants should be ages 18 and older. Sign up to receive the Zoom access code and password for the meeting. Where: Zoom (Not sure what that is? Call us and we'll help you! 503-682-2744) When : Wednesday, September 1, 2021, 11:00 am-12:30 pm Hosts: Dr. Bill Thierfelder & Andrea Erickson Topic: The Banning of George Orwell To sign up,…

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Free
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