Wednesday, April 4th, 2012
Talk: “American Nation-Building: Past, Present, and Future” by Dr. Jeremi Suri The World Affairs Council of Dallas and Fort Worth.
The Department of History at the University of Texas at Austin, and www.NotEvenPast.org invite you to a talk in Dallas, Texas, by:
Jeremi Suri, Ph.D.
Mack Brown Distinguished Professor for Global Leadership, History, and Public Policy,
The University of Texas at Austin
“American Nation-Building: Past, Present, and Future”
Wednesday, April 4th, 2012
6:30 PM – 8:00 PM
Rosewood Crescent Hotel
400 Crescent Ct.
Dallas, TX 75201
UT History guests qualify for special $20 member price. Registration Required: http://www.dfwworld.org
Dr. Jeremi Suri has spent his life researching the complex events and power dynamics that have regularly restructured our world—for example, wars, migrations, and major societal shifts. From this background, he brings us his newest book, Liberty’s Surest Guardian. In it, he examines how America’s interventionist tendencies have transformed the world’s history, with hopes of helping people understand the global implications of our country’s actions.
Far from being a dry, irrelevant history text, Liberty’s Surest Guardian’s exploration of our past efforts in nation-building offers us insights that are deeply applicable to our present and future challenges as we continually struggle with the extent and nature of our involvement in foreign affairs. Though our fundamental aim has been to spread our vision of democracy and bring about friendly governments ruled by free peoples, such ambitions carry the inherent dilemmas of applying our will in foreign countries. Suri analyzes each societal reconstruction we have undergone after major eras of our history, tracing the links from the American Revolution to our recent involvement in the Middle East.
Drawing on the lessons of both our successes and failures, Suri describes the important components of nation-building with the 5 “P’s”: working with Partners, sticking to a Process, practicing Problem-solving, having a Purpose, and focusing on People. He concludes by projecting how this is crucially relevant to the questions looming before us. What are our next steps in places where we have recently intervened, like Afghanistan, Yemen and Libya? How will our efforts affect our relationships with our allies and our alliance forces, such as NATO or the UN? And the greatest question, what will all this mean for our future in nation-building?
The author of five books and many more articles, editorials, and blogs, Dr. Suri has received numerous awards for his work and was named one of America’s “Top Young Innovators” by Smithsonian Magazine in 2007. Suri earned his B.A. from Stanford University, his M.A. from Ohio University, and his Ph.D. from Yale University.
More about Professor Suri:
http://jeremisuri.net/
http://www.utexas.edu/cola/depts/history/faculty/js33338
More information about this event:
http://www.dfwworld.org/page.aspx?pid=193&cid=5&ceid=1323&cerid=0&cdt=4%2f4%2f2012
Sponsored by: World Affairs Council of Dallas and Fort Worth, the History Dept., and www.NotEvenPast.org
Select Sundays in February, March, and April, 2:30 p.m. at the Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum
Civil War 150: Texas and Texans in the Civil War: A four-part lecture series celebrating the sesquicentennial of the Civil War in Texas.
Civil War 150: Texas and Texans in the Civil War
Select Sundays in February, March, and April, 2:30 p.m.
Texas Spirit Theater
FREE program
This year, the Museum will commemorate the sesquicentennial of the Civil War with a multi-part lecture series, Civil War 150: Texas and Texans in the Civil War, that will bring together leading Civil War scholars from across the state to discuss the variety of roles Texas played throughout the war, as well as examine the importance of Texas and Texans in this defining moment in American history from the perspective of women, African Americans, Tejanos, and American Indians.
Each lecture will be followed by a moderated discussion that places Texas’s participation in the war efforts both at home and on the battlefield into the larger context of one of the most pivotal events in the country’s history.
April 1: Juneteenth in Texas, Dwight Watson, Texas State University
Each speaker has provided a list of recommended readings for their topic. Learn more about these selections by visiting TheStoryofTexas.com.
The program is free, but seating is limited. Call (512) 936-4649 for reservations.
Download a flyer about this program.
Wednesday, April 25, 2012
Austin History Center Association: Love Story: The Letters of Terrell Maverick and Walter Prescott Webb
7:00 PM
Austin Woman’s Club, 708 San Antonio Street (free parking in lot behind club)
In 1961, when Walter Prescott Webb fell in love with Terrell Maverick, she was 60 years old, the widow of U.S. congressman and San Antonio mayor Maury Maverick Sr. and a prominent and popular San Antonian in her own right. He was a distinguished 73-year-old professor of history at the University of Texas who was well-known for such books as The Texas Rangers and The Great Plains.
The Austin History Center Association invites you to follow the progress of their relationship through a selection of their letters, read by communication consultant Barbara Miller and retired Court of Appeals judge Bob Shannon.
Tickets: $10 at the door. To reserve tickets, call or email Austin History Center Association executive director Jeff Cohen, 974-7499, jcohen@austinhistory.net.