WFU dialogue, discourse theme year spring calendar of events

Feb. 12
Dr. Hoda Hosseini, co-founder of the Broward County Institute for the Healing of Racism, will give the free, public lecture “The Destiny of America: RACE-ing into the 21st Century” at 7 p.m. in the Annenberg Forum (Room 111) in Carswell Hall.

Feb. 16
Delman Coates of Columbia University will give the free, public lecture “The Black Church in the 21st Century” at 7 p.m. in Wingate Hall’s lower auditorium. The lecture is given as part of the Divinity School’s Akoni service.

Feb. 17
The Divinity School will host an 11 a.m. Akoni service and lecture in Wait Chapel. The service, which will be led by Delman Coates, will celebrate great African ancestors.

Feb. 19
Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and best-selling author Anna Quindlen will give the Founders’ Day Convocation address at 11 a.m. in Wait Chapel.

Feb. 20
Retired Col. Roger H.C. Donlon, U.S. Army Special Forces, will lead an open discussion forum titled “Teamwork and the Vietnam War” at 9 a.m. in Room 162 of the Information Systems Building. Donlon, the first recipient of the Medal of Honor for Valor in the Vietnam War, is now the executive director of The Westmoreland Scholar Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to rebuilding understanding between the United States and Vietnam through academic scholarships and exchange programs for students. He is the author of “Beyond Nam Dong” and “Outpost Freedom.” A booksigning with informal discussions will be held at the College Book Store from 3 p.m. – 5 p.m.

Feb. 26
Donald C. Johanson, probably the best known American paleoanthropologist, will give a free, public lecture at 7 p.m. in Wait Chapel. Johanson’s discovery in 1974 of a 3.18 million-year-old hominid skeleton — popularly known as “Lucy” — in the Hadar region of Ethiopia has had an extraordinary influence on the modern understanding of early hominid evolution. The lecture will coincide with the 30th anniversary of the discovery of “Lucy.”

Feb. 29
Renowned physician Patch Adams will give a public talk in Wait Chapel at 7 p.m. The program is intended to help raise money for Mother Teresa’s Sisters of Charity and for Adams’ free healthcare hospital “The Gesundheit Institute.” Tickets can be purchased for $12 in the Benson University Center Ticket Office.

March 15-19
The university will host two Irish symposiums scheduled to coincide with the annual Wake Forest University Press Irish Festival. The symposiums, “Opposing Views and Common Ground: Examining the Road to Peace in Ireland” and “Dialogue through Poetry,” bring to campus several noted Irish historical and literary scholars to discuss the path ahead for the peace process in Ireland.

March 22
Congressman Rick Boucher will give a free, public talk as part of Wake Forest University’s 2nd Annual Technology Consortium. Boucher, who represents Virginia’s ninth congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives, is a member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. He originated the House Internet Caucus in 1996 and serves as one of two House co-chairmen of the more than 170-member group. In that position, he is a leading architect of federal policy for information technology and the Internet.

March 23
Best-selling novelist Orson Scott Card will give a free, public lecture at 7 p.m. Card is the author of “Ender’s Game” and its sequel “Speaker for the Dead,” as well as many other books. Location to be announced.

April 5-6
The Divinity School will sponsor a program by Father Thomas Keating titled “Global Prayer, Peace, and Interfaith Dialogue.” Keating, a leader in the Centering Prayer Movement, is a Cistercian Trappist priest, monk and abbot. He resides at St. Benedict’s Monastery in Snowmass, Colo. He is the former abbot of Spencer Abbey in Spencer, Mass.

April 16-17
A program titled “On Being an Animal,” sponsored by the university’s philosophy department.

Other events will be announced later. Most programs are free and open to the public unless otherwise noted.