Additional programming includes:

Conferences:  In conjunction with the Center for Global Culture and Communication, we host at least one major conference each academic year.  Last year’s programming included a conference on Trope, Affect, and Democratic Subjectivity.  Thus far for the current academic year we have scheduled Visual Democracy: Image Circulation and Political Culture, November 2-4, 2007.

Summer seminars, also in conjunction with CGCC: a one-week period of intensive study of a topic with a dozen graduate students from other institutions and a series of visiting faculty.  Recent topics have included Rhetoric in Early Modern Political Thought; Deliberation and Difference; Visual Rhetoric.

Ad hoc seminars: one-time sessions focused on either a visiting scholar’s presentation or discussion of specific texts or topics.  The most recent events include a seminar on Mood in Public Discourse in April 2007 and a seminar on Liberalism by John McGowan (UNC-Chapel Hill) in October 2007.

Dissertation Seminar: Students who are completing their dissertations will meet periodically to discuss draft chapters, as facilitated by program faculty.  Discussion will focus on the conceptual, theoretical, and rhetorical dimensions of the work in order to encourage critical reflection and revision.