Dilemmas of Democracy: A Conversation with Timothy Snyder on Freedom and Democracy
Schreyer Honors College is honored to host Timothy Snyder, the Richard C. Levin Professor of History at Yale University and permanent fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna, for A Conversation on Freedom and Democracy.
Snyder speaks five and reads ten European languages. He has authored eight chief books, including On Tyranny, Our Malady, The Road to Unfreedom, Black Earth, and Bloodlands. He has also co-edited three further books and his essays are collected in Ukrainian History, Russian Politics, European Futures (2014), and The Politics of Life and Death (2015).
Snyder’s work has appeared in forty languages and has received numerous prizes, including the Emerson Prize in the Humanities, the Literature Award of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the Václav Havel Foundation prize, the Foundation for Polish Science prize in the social sciences, the Leipzig Award for European Understanding, the Dutch Auschwitz Committee award, and the Hannah Arendt Prize in Political Thought.
Snyder was a Marshall Scholar at Oxford, has received the Carnegie and Guggenheim fellowships, and holds state orders from Estonia, Lithuania, and Poland. He has appeared in documentaries, on network television, and in major films. His books have inspired poster campaigns and exhibitions, films, sculpture, a punk rock song, a rap song, a play, and an opera. His words are quoted in political demonstrations around the world, most recently in Hong Kong. He is researching a family history of nationalism and finishing a philosophical book about freedom.
The lecture is free and open to the public. Guests are not permitted to bring food, drink, and/or backpacks into the auditorium.
A book signing will follow the lecture and Snyder’s book, On Tyranny, will be available for purchase.
An American Sign Language interpreter will be present for the lecture. If you anticipate needing other accommodations, please contact Donna Meyer via email, dlh15@psu.edu.
The Dilemmas of Democracy Program is a year-long conversation funded through a generous gift from Art and Betty Glenn. Art and Betty Glenn are loyal Penn State alumni. Art graduated with a bachelor of science degree in mechanical engineering in 1956, and Betty graduated with bachelor of science degree in home economics in 1957. Art is retired after a career at GE where he served as a vice president of multiple units. Art is a devoted volunteer and supporter of Penn State and the Schreyer Honors College. He served for many years on the External Advisory Board for the Honors College. Penn State honored Art as an Outstanding Engineering Alumnus in 1990, an Alumni Fellow in 1996, and a Distinguished Alumni in 2005.