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Clint Smith and Reginald Dwayne Betts work at the crossroads of multiple disciplines. Both men have pursued graduate degrees in the Ivy League: Smith is working toward his PhD at Harvard and Betts recently obtained his JD at Yale. But they also stay true to their creative lives, publishing and performing poetry in which they grapple with issues such as politics, inequality...
When late-night funnyman Jimmy Kimmel tried to broker a debate between Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders, the entertainment element of modern politics became undeniable. And as the line has continually blurred between entertainment and news, a full 10 percent of young adults lost their most trusted sources of political news in Jon Stewart's version of “The Daily Show” and St...
For more than three decades, artist Carrie Mae Weems has created a body of work — including photographs, fabric, text, audio, and video — that probes the fault lines of race, gender, class, politics, and power. In this session, the Prix de Rome and MacArthur Fellowship winner stages a collaborative performance of her work and discusses how it merges the personal and the po...
The Aspen Ideas Festival team is proud to showcase the diverse writing of our speakers. Their books will be highlighted in talks at the Festival and available at the campus bookstore.
We argue about politics and economics constantly, but rarely do we speak openly about the most important thing in life: love. Arthur Brooks believes America is experiencing a crisis of love. Using a blend of cutting-edge behavioral science, art, and ancient wisdom, he will expose the roots of this crisis and offer solutions. This transformative lecture will empower the aud...
Two authors of acclaimed but thoroughly different memoirs of growing up in rural American communities dive into their experiences growing up in the heartland, what they think urban Americans get wrong about our rural people and places, and how they are using their platforms to address some of the most complex challenges that rural communities face today.
Whether it is #BlackLivesMatter and #OscarsSoWhite today, or whether it was All in the Family and Ms. Magazine in the past, America’s identity crises have always insinuated themselves into every aspect of our daily lives. And as politics grows more fractured and divisive, these difficult conversations have often found a more reasonable and humane airing in popular entertai...
Get a behind the scenes look at the HBO documentary-news program, “Axios on HBO”, with its Executive Editor and the creative team behind the headline-making series. How did Axios translate its new style of journalism into television story-telling that the Poynter Institute calls "a major player in TV news" and the Baltimore Sun called "the show that almost everyone in the...
A conversation with bestselling author Michael Lewis.
Creative expression takes many forms. Through history, art has provoked a range of feelings: emotion, empathy, fear, surprise, joy, compassion, anger. Now, amidst a time of national angst, where many in society might not hear the voices of those who don’t agree, a group of remarkable artists and political strategists are imagining ways that art can be used to catalyze dif...
"House of Cards" creator and producer Beau Willimon live with Katie Couric.
William Shakespeare started writing plays in an era when popular theater was exploding and cementing its place in culture. Audiences spanned economic classes, professions and educational backgrounds, and he was keenly aware of the need to write for all attendees. He frequently wrestled with topics that retain relevance for society across centuries, such as power struggles,...
Political scientist Rob Reich challenges us to consider the role of philanthropy in democracy.
Journalist Tom Friedman reflects on 28 years of reporting.
Across the nation, cities and metropolitan areas, and the networks of pragmatic leaders who govern them, are taking on the big issues that Washington won’t—or can’t—solve. They are reshaping our economy and fixing our broken political system.
There’s Santa Claus, Shakespeare, Mickey Mouse, the Bible, and then there’s…. Star Wars. In his fun but especially erudite exploration, renowned Harvard Law professor Cass R. Sunstein explores the lessons of Star Wars as they relate to childhood, fathers, the Dark Side, rebellion, and redemption, and how they apply—believe it or not—to constitutional law, economics, and po...
Born out of gospel, R&B, and jazz in late 1950s America, soul has permeated music culture so thoroughly that its influence can be heard everywhere from modern country music to rock and hip-hop. So what is it about soul, and how did it become a soundtrack to some of our nation’s most defining moments? The New Yorker’s Adam Gopnik and Grammy Award-winning artists share —...
In this encore episode Katie Couric interviews House of Cards creator Beau Willimon.
Artist Dustin Yellin spins tales about how the human world and the worlds of critters, plants, and rocks have always been a collection of enmeshed networks, some hidden. Touching on his multidisciplinary approach, which crosses several traditionally siloed fields, he draws attention to the ways in which everyone and everything is interconnected despite various physical, ec...
How can comedy influence our thinking and challenge our prejudices?