Endowed Lectures

Renowned Speakers Take the Stage

The first female Secretary of State. Pulitzer Prize Winners. Powerful activists. Best-selling authors. Renowned musicians. You’ll see them all at Bridgewater.

Endowed Lecture Series
2026-2027

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Past Lectures

We’ve had many amazing speakers and artists take the stage at Bridgewater College.

2025-2026

Author Maggie Jackson presented on the subject of her recent book, “Uncertain: The Wisdom and Wonder of Being Unsure.” Jackson was previously a columnist for The Boston Globe and foreign correspondent for the Associated Press in Europe and Asia. Her book “Distracted: Reclaiming our Focus in a World of Lost Attention” sparked a global conversation about the costs of fragmenting our attention and won the 2020 Dorthy Lee Book Award for excellence in tech criticism.

New York Times bestselling author and educator Irshad Manji presented an Endowed Lecture in Cole Hall about “Moral Courage: How to Make a Difference in a Messy World.” Manji is the founder of Moral Courage College, an organization that equips people worldwide to turn heated issues into healthy conversations and sustained teamwork. The recipient of Oprah’s “Chutzpah Award” for boldness, Manji is also executive producer of the prize-winning documentary film “Mississippi Turning,” about the controversy over Confederate imagery on the state flag. Formerly a professor of leadership at New York University, Manji now teaches with the University of Oxford’s Initiative for Global Ethics and Human Rights.

Paralympic runner Hunter Woodhall and Olympic Long Jumper Tara Davis-Woodhall presented on their experiences with resilience. Woodhall opened the Endowed Lecture by telling the story of how his parents made the decision to amputate his malformed legs when he was just a baby. It was an impossible decision and a heartbreaking story that began with Woodhall’s birth and ended with a photo of him trying on his first pair of prosthetic legs. Yet in Woodhall’s telling, the story became one of redemption, not devastation. Davis-Woodhall began running track and field when she was just four years old, often competing against older athletes. She began breaking long jump records when she was in high school and continued at the University of Georgia and University of Texas. She won a gold medal in the long jump at the 2024 Summer Olympics.

Dr. Katie Hinde, associate professor in the Center for Evolution and Medicine at Arizona State University, presented an Endowed Lecture in Rebecca Hall at Bridgewater College. Her talk, entitled “The Milk of Humankindness,” explored the historical context and contemporary conflicts around infant feeding, women’s health and social justice. Hinde has a B.A. in anthropology from the University of Washington and a Ph.D. in anthropology from UCLA. At Arizona State University, Hinde investigates the food, medicine and signal of mother’s milk. In addition to dozens of peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters, Hinde co-edited Building Babies: Primate Developmental Trajectories in Proximate and Ultimate Perspective (Springer, 2013). Also in 2013, Hinde created March Mammal Madness, a science outreach project modeled on the basketball tournament of a similar name and that has participants predict which mammals will win in a simulated combat.

2024-2025

Acclaimed journalist, author and civil rights historian Wil Haygood delivered the keynote address for Bridgewater College’s Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day Celebration. Haygood discussed his award-winning book “Tigerland: 1968-1969: A City Divided, a Nation Torn Apart, and a Magical Season of Healing.” Haygood’s journalistic awards include a National Association of Black Journalists Award for Foreign Reporting and a New England Associated Press Award, and he was a finalist for the 1991 Pulitzer Prize in Feature Writing. In 2022, he received the Ambassador Richard Holbrooke Lifetime Distinguished Achievement Award, a prestigious literary award that has also been presented to former President Jimmy Carter and “The Handmaid’s Tale” author Margaret Atwood.

Award-winning journalist and public radio host Celeste Headlee presented an endowed lecture at Bridgewater College. Headlee’s lecture provided 10 science-based communication lessons on how to have better conversations, particularly in the wake of the 2024 U.S. presidential election. Headlee is best known for her 20 years in public radio, including as host of NPR programs “Tell Me More,” “Talk of the Nation,” “Here & Now,” “All Things Considered” and “Weekend Edition.”

Dr. David Hollinger, a historian specializing in American intellectual and religious history, discussed his most recent work, “Christianity’s American Fate: How Religion Became More Conservative and Society More Secular,” which was published in 2022. Hollinger is the Preston Hotchkis professor of history, emeritus, at the University of California, Berkeley. He is an elected member of the American Philosophical Society and the Society of American Historians. Hollinger also served as president of the Organization of American Historians from 2010-2011.

Two of America’s most experienced political analysts discussed national politics, current events and the 2024 election season. Jonah Goldberg, a popular conservative pundit, and veteran NPR reporter Mara Liasson paired up to deliver clear-cut analysis on the headlines impacting Americans in a panel discussion facilitated by Bobbi Gentry, Bridgewater College Associate Professor of Political Science. Gentry, an expert in elections and youth voting, was joined by BC undergraduate student Jory Cardoza ’26, a political science major.

2023-2024

Writer, researcher and entrepreneur Margot Lee Shetterly delivered the keynote address, “The Importance of Representation and Racial Progress,” as part of BC’s annual celebration of the life and legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. Shetterly is the author of Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race, which was a top book of 2016 for bothTIME and Publisher’s Weekly, a USA Today bestseller and an instant No. 1 New York Times bestseller.

Known for her humor and satire, Washington Post columnist Alexandra Petri addressed creative writing, the role of humor and satire in journalism, and the effects of A.I. on journalism. She is the author of A.P.’s U.S. History: Important American Documents (I Made Up) and the essay collections Nothing Is Wrong and Here Is Why and A Field Guide to Awkward Silences. Petri joined The Washington Post as an intern in 2010 after graduating from Harvard College.

Award-winning Black non-binary author and activist George M. Johnson used their inspiring life story to teach individuals, corporations and policymakers about LGBTQIA+ activism and social justice in healthcare. Johnson’s New York Times bestselling memoir All Boys Aren’t Blue, a powerful recounting of their adolescence growing up as a young Black queer boy in New Jersey, was called “an exuberant, unapologetic memoir infused with a deep but cleareyed love for its subjects” by the New York Times.

Award-winning author James McBride spoke about his latest novel Deacon King Kong, which tells the story of a 1969 shooting in Brooklyn and the strange intersections of the lives of the characters involved in the incident. Told with insight and wit, Deacon King Kong demonstrated that love and faith live in all of us.

2022-2023

In her 2018 book Lower Ed: The Troubling Rise of For-Profit Colleges in the New Economy and in subsequent essays, Dr. Tressie McMillan Cottom examines the impact of higher education on society and the way it interacts with the economy, the labor market and the collective ideal of the American dream. Her second book, Thick: And Other Essays, explores a range of topics including Black womanhood, body image and Cottom’s experience as a Southern Black female academic. Thick became a finalist for the 2019 National Book Award, and the following year Cottom received a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship—also known as a “genius grant.” Cottom is a professor at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and a New York Times contributing writer. She holds a B.A. from North Carolina Central University and a Ph.D. from Emory University.
The Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II, president and senior lecturer of Repairers of the Breach and co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign has pastored the Greenleaf Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in Goldsboro, N.C. Since Barber began his ministry at Greenleaf 29 years ago, the church has sponsored efforts that have led to more than $12 million of community development in addition to welcoming all into the body of Christ. Barber has given keynote addresses at hundreds of national and state conferences, including the 2016 Democratic National Convention. He gave the homily at the 59th Inaugural Prayer Service for President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris and spoke at the Vatican in 2017 in response to Pope Francis’ encyclical “Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home.” He also spoke in 2021 at a conference hosted by the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences and before the 5th UNI Global Union World Congress to more than 25 countries. He was added to the Black Achievers Wall in the International Slavery Museum in Liverpool, England.
Director and producer of documentary films Lynn Novick spoke about the three-part PBS documentary The U.S. and the Holocaust, which she co-directed with fellow filmmakers Ken Burns and Sarah Botstein. Novick has been making documentary films about American life and culture, history, politics, sports, art, architecture, literature and music for more than 30 years. She has created nearly 100 hours of acclaimed programming for PBS in collaboration with Burns including Hemingway, The Vietnam War, Baseball, Jazz, Frank Lloyd Wright, The War and Prohibition. These landmark series have garnered 19 Emmy nominations, and Novick herself is the recipient of Emmy, Peabody and Alfred I. duPont-Columbia awards.
Author, musician and screenwriter James McBride’s latest novel, Deacon King Kong, tells the story of a 1969 shooting in Brooklyn, N.Y., and the strange intersections of the lives of the characters involved in the incident. Told with insight and wit, Deacon King Kong demonstrates that love and faith live in all of us. McBride’s landmark memoir, The Color of Water, rested on The New York Times bestseller list for two years and explored McBride’s search for identity as the son of a white Jewish woman and a Black man. The memoir is considered an American classic and is read in schools and universities across the U.S. His debut novel, Miracle at St. Anna, was translated into a major motion picture directed by American film icon Spike Lee. In addition, McBride wrote the script for Miracle at St. Anna and co-wrote Lee’s 2012 film, Red Hook Summer. McBride also authored the novels Song Yet Sung and The Good Lord Bird, the 2013 National Book Award Winner for Fiction that has been adapted by Ethan Hawke and Jason Blum into a Showtime series bearing the same name.

2021-2022

Photojournalist Lynsey Addario, who covers major conflict zones across the globe including the Middle East, South Asia, Haiti and Africa, discussed the importance of art in our society and the role it has in making us think, to inspire and to push us out of our comfort zones in her lecture, “Leaving Your Comfort Zone: The Importance of Art.” Addario has been the recipient of numerous international awards throughout her career, including a MacArthur Fellowship, or “Genius Grant,” in 2009; the Overseas Press Club’s Olivier Rebbot Award for her series “Veiled Rebellion: Afghan Women”; and the 2009 Pulitzer Prize for international reporting for her photographs in the New York Times Magazine’s “Talibanistan.” Addario was also part of The New York Times team nominated for an Emmy Award for the series “The Displaced,” which documented the lives of three children displaced from war in Syria, Ukraine and South Sudan.
Journalist and writer Emma Green gave the keynote address for Bridgewater College’s two-day symposium held March 10-11 on “Brethren and the Polarizing Pandemic: What Next?” Green has written extensively on culture, politics and religion, and her lecture, “A Sickness in the Body Politic and the Body Faithful: How COVID Has Shaped U.S. Religious Communities,” brought reflections on religion in post-COVID America. A New York City native, Green covers cultural conflicts in academia. She currently works as a staff writer for The New Yorker and was previously a staff writer at The Atlantic, where she covered politics and religion. Her work has been anthologized in several books, including The American Crisis and The God Beat.
Emmy-winning TV host, conservationist and Wildlife Biologist Jeff Corwin is a leader in conservation, recognized for his work as a television host, producer, journalist, author, explorer and wildlife biologist. For more than two decades, Corwin has been telling stories of wildlife and nature to global audiences through his many celebrated television series on ABC, NBC, Travel Channel, Food Network, Disney Channel and Discovery. He has received three Emmys and the top broadcast industry awards for his work. In April 2020, Corwin created and executively produced the critically acclaimed Nat Geo Wild TV series Alaska Animal Rescue, which is now in its third season. His critically acclaimed NBC documentary and book, 100 Heartbeats, engaged both the readers and broadcast audience in the 21st-century plight of endangered species. Corwin has authored 10 books on wildlife and nature, including Living on the Edge: Amazing Relationships in the Natural World.
Dr. Madeleine Albright was named the first female Secretary of State in 1997 and became, at that time, the highest-ranking woman in the history of the U.S. government. As Secretary of State, Albright reinforced America’s alliances, advocated for democracy and human rights, and promoted American trade, business, labor and environmental standards abroad. A seven-time New York Times bestselling author, Albright’s most recent book, Hell and Other Destinations, was published in April 2020. Her other books include her autobiography, Madam Secretary: A Memoir (2003), The Mighty and the Almighty: Reflection on America, God, and World Affairs (2006), Memo to the President: How We Can Restore America’s Reputation and Leadership (2008), Read My Pins: Stories from a Diplomat’s Jewel Box (2009), Prague Winter: A Personal Story of Remembrance and War, 1937-1948 (2012) and Fascism: A Warning (2018).