On April 6, 2017, Jonathan Fanton opened the ceremony for the awarding of the Emerson-Thoreau Medal and the Talcott Parsons Prize. Toni Morrison, recipient of the Emerson-Thoreau Medal, accepted her award via video after an introduction from Christopher Benfy. Joan Wallach Scott accepted the Talcott Parsons Prize after being introduced by Laurel Ulrich.

The ceremony served as the 2053^rd Stated Meeting of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Good evening and welcome. I am Jonathan Fanton, President of the Academy, and it is my pleasure to call to order the 2053^rd Stated Meeting of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Today, the Academy’s Council, Trust, and Board met for their semiannual in-person meetings.  Please join me in thanking all of the members of our governance bodies for their guidance, wisdom, and optimism about the Academy.

I especially want to thank the chair of our board, Don Randel, for his partnership throughout the years and his dedication to this institution. Don’s extraordinary term as chair is coming to an end in June.  The Academy is a stronger, more active, interesting, and vibrant organization as a result of his leadership.  Please join me in thanking Don Randel for his service to the American Academy.

This evening is our annual awards program – our version of “the Academy Awards.”  We have seven major prizes and awards representing the variety of field and disciplines within the Academy – the Francis Amory Prize in Biology, the Rumford Prize for Physical Science, Award for Humanistic Studies, the Sarton Prize for Poetry, the Sarton Prize for History of Science – and tonight’s awards – the Talcott Parsons Prize for Social Science and the Emerson-Thoreau Medal for Literature.

Academy prize selections are overseen by a committee chaired with great care by Pauline Yu, president of the American Council of Learned Societies and a member of our board.  The committee solicited nominations from Academy Fellows, compiled strong lists of candidates, and then sent the lists out for appraisal by other Academy Fellows.  We are grateful to all of the Fellows who participated in this process and honored by the selections they have made.

Tonight, we present awards to two Fellows whose work has changed how we think about the past, has helped us to see the present more clearly, and has encouraged us to dream of a future society that is more compassionate and more inclusive.

Continue reading “The Courage to be New” – A Celebration of the Arts and Sciences →

On March 8, 2017, Jonathan Fanton introduced a panel discussion on “Ethics and the Global War on Terror: Can Conflicts with Non-State Actors Be Fought in a Just Way?” The panel was chaired by Allen S. Weiner; and the panel consisted of Gabriella Blum, Neta C. Crawford, and Jennifer Leaning.

The discussion was streamed to groups of Academy members and other distinguished participants gathered in Washington, D.C., Stanford University, and Notre Dame University, in addition to cadets and faculty at West Point, the U.S. Air Force Academy, and the U.S. Naval Postgraduate School. When the panel concluded its presentations, members in each location held their own conversations.

The meeting served as the 2017 Distinguished Morton L. Mandel Public Lecture.

Good evening. It is my pleasure to welcome you and to call to order the 2052^nd Stated Meeting of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

This is also one of our Morton L. Mandel Public Lectures, established through a donation from the Jack, Joseph, and Morton Mandel Foundation based in Cleveland, Ohio. It is part of the Morton L. Mandel Program for Civic Discourse and Membership Engagement, which aims to strengthen the bonds of community among the Academy’s 5,500 members as we stimulate discussion of important issues with the general public. We are enormously grateful to Mort for his generosity.

Tonight’s topic is particularly important and timely; it also raises complex legal, ethical, and political questions. How should military fight against terrorist groups? Should these groups be protected under the Geneva Convention like soldiers of regular armies, or should they instead be treated differently? What are the moral boundaries and constraints that should not be violated in an all-out war against terror?

It was September 20, 2001 when President George W. Bush used the term “war on terror” for the first time. Nine days earlier, the United States had been subjected to the largest and bloodiest terrorist attack ever carried out on its own soil. The term “war on terror” was meant to signify an enduring, global campaign to eradicate terrorism everywhere. But the term itself also produced significant legal and political consequences. The use of the word “war” designated the American counterterrorist strategy no longer as a law enforcement operation but as a war with the scale and consequences that any other war would carry.  Additionally, because terrorism is a global phenomenon, this meant a serious U.S. military commitment around the world to fight a threat that was borderless in nature.

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On Tuesday, February 28, 2017, President of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Jonathan F. Fanton addressed more than 100 Congressional staff members and members of the Academy’s Commission on Language Learning at a press conference to release its final report and recommendations at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

Good morning.  As the President of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, it is my pleasure to welcome you to the release and first public discussion of our new report, America’s Languages: Investing in Language Learning for the 21^st Century.

This is the final publication of the Academy’s Commission on Language Learning.  The Academy created this Commission in response to a bipartisan request from members of the United States Senate and House of Representatives: Senators Orrin Hatch, Brian Schatz, Tammy Baldwin, and Mark Kirk; and Representatives David Price, Don Young, Leonard Lance, and Rush Holt.

The title of this report, America’s Languages, refers to an important historic fact about our nation, and one of its great strengths.  As the Commission writes in the report’s introduction:

“Linguistic diversity is deeply embedded in our history. The English we speak is only one of many European, Native American, African, and Asian languages that have been spoken on the North American continent. This diversity is a cherished part of our nation’s past, a fact of our present, and a key to our future: a valuable asset in our relations with other nations and cultures and a benefit to our children as they grow up in an interconnected world.”

In addressing the need for enhanced language education, this report brings the American Academy all the way back to one of its original concerns.

Continue reading Press Conference on “America’s Languages” →

On November 10, 2016, Jonathan Fanton introduced a panel discussion focused on “Populism and the Future of American Politics.”

The panelists were: Charles Stewart III, Kenan Sahin Distinguished Professor of Political Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Lawrence D. Bobo, W.E.B. Du Bois Professor of the Social Sciences, Harvard University; and Jennifer Hochschild, Henry LaBarre Jayne Professor of Government and Professor of African and African American Studies, Harvard University.

The discussion served as the 2045^th Stated Meeting of the American Academy. 

From left to right: Jennifer Hochschild, Lawrence Bobo, and Charles Stewart discuss populism at the House of the Academy in Cambridge, MA.

Charles Stewart III and Jonathan Fanton converse during the reception for “Populism and the Future of American Politics.”

Good evening.  I am Jonathan Fanton, President of the American Academy. It is my pleasure to welcome you, and to call to order the 2045^th Stated Meeting of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

This evening’s program, on “Populism and the Future of American Politics,” could hardly be more timely—indeed, it has been a subject that has likely been on the mind of everyone in this room for the past several months. And when we chose it we did not anticipate the outcome of Tuesday’s election. I think this is a topic that some—maybe many—of us feel the need to talk about this week.

“Populism” is a term that did not exist when the Academy was founded in 1780. When the authors of the Academy’s charter wrote that the “end and design of the institution of the said Academy is to … cultivate every art and science which may tend to advance the interest, honor, dignity, and happiness of a free, independent, and virtuous people,” they meant something very different by the term “people” than did those who coined the “populist” label in the late 19^th century.

It is clear that the founders of the Academy would not have described themselves as populists in the current sense of the term. Their view of classical populism would have been informed by the warnings of classical philosophers, such as Aristotle, who in Politics defined a “demagogic democracy” as a society where a popular faction “takes the superior share in the government as a prize of victory,” incited by the misleading rhetoric of a charismatic leader. Plato laid out the results in his Republic, predicting that the people—an “obedient mob”—would “set up one man as their special leader … and make him grow great.” These observations have more meaning to me today than when I prepared this Introduction two weeks ago.

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