Repair Speaker Series
The Humanities Research Center's 2026-2028 theme explores repair in all its complexity: the repair of historical damage (slavery, displacement, loss of Indigenous land, environmental harm), the healing of communities (through reparations, restorative justice, and cultural memory), and the evolving relationship between universities and the cities they inhabit — including questions of accountability, trust, and shared purpose. Through rigorous scholarship, community partnerships, global conversation, and interdisciplinary collaboration, we ask: How do we reckon with harm? What comes after monuments are removed? How do we heal from historical trauma? And what responsibilities do universities carry in repair work — toward the communities, histories, and futures they help shape?
Making Worlds, Repairing Worlds: What We Do with the Humanities
Date: Tuesday, Sep 8, 2026
Black Freedom: Public Celebration and Commemoration as Practices of Remembrance and Repair
Date: Thursday, Sep 10, 2026
Violence and the Impossibility of Repair
Date: Monday, Oct 26, 2026
Reform and Repair: Removing Blood Quantum from Tribal Citizenship Requirements
Date: Monday, Nov 2, 2026
Technology Speaker Series Events, 2025-26
Wendy Chun
Humanities and AI: Large Language Models and the Returns of Critical Theory
The speaker for this event was Wendy Chun, Ph.D., Director of the Digital Democracies Institute at Simon Fraser University.
Technology Speaker Series Events, 2024-25
Margaret Hu
Public Interest Technology in the Age of AI
The speaker of this event was Margaret Hu, Ph.D., the Taylor Reveley Research Professor and Professor of Law, and Director of the Digital Democracy Lab, at William & Mary (W&M) Law School.
Damien Pfister and Caddie Alford
Beyond "Always On" Culture
The speakers for this event were Damien Smith Pfister, PhD, is Associate Professor of Communication at the University of Maryland, College Park, Director of the Design Cultures + Creativity program, and co-editor of the University of Alabama book series “Rhetoric + Digitality," and Caddie Alford, Ph.D. of Associate Professor of Rhetoric and Writing at Virginia Commonwealth University.
Mar Hicks
How the Humanities and STEM Can Find Common Ground in the History of Technology [video]
The speaker for this event was Mar Hicks, Ph.D., author and Associate Professor at The University of Virginia's School of Data Science.
Health Humanities Speaker Series, 2023-24
View all event recordings in this series
Kirsten Ostherr
AI and Health Humanities: A Critical Nexus for Race, Data, and Clinical Algorithms [video]
The speaker for this event was Kirsten Ostherr, Ph.D., MPH, Gladys Louise Fox Professor of English and Director of the Medical Humanities program at Rice University.
Karma Chavez
The Borders of AIDS and the Uses of Disease [video]
The speaker for this event was Karma Chávez, Ph.D., Bobby and Sherri Patton Professor of Mexican American and Latina/o Studies and Department Chair at UT Austin.
Rishi Goyal
Medicine, Literature and a Desire Called Utopia [video]
The speaker for this virtual event was Rishi Goyal, MD Ph.D., Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine at the Columbia University Medical Center (in Medical Humanities and Ethics and the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society) and Director of Medical Humanities at Columbia University.
Anna LaQuawn Hinton
Breathing Life into Black Wombs: Ableism, Misogynoir, and the Reproductive Injustice within the Medical Industrial Complex [video]
The speaker for this virtual event was Anna LaQuawn Hinton, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Disability Studies and Black Literature & Culture in the English Department at the University of North Texas.
Jennifer Bickham Mendez
The speaker for this virtual event was Jennifer Bickham Mendez, Ph.D., Professor and Chair of Sociology at William & Mary.
Environmental Humanities Speaker Series, 2022-23
View all event recordings in this series
Thinking at the End of the World: The Work of the Environmental Humanities [video]
The speaker for this virtual event was Stephanie Foote, PhD, Jackson and Nichols Chair and Professor of English at West Virginia University.
Phoebe Wagner
Gathering Futures: Speculative Fiction as Transformative Possibility During the Climate Crisis [video]
The speaker for this event was Phoebe Wagner, writer, editor, and academic working at the intersection of climate change and speculative fiction, and assistant professor at Lycoming College.
Kelsey Leonard
WAMPUM Framework: Indigenous Climate Change Adaptation Strategies [video]
The speaker for this virtual event was Kelsey Leonard, Ph.D., Assistant Professor and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Waters, Climate, and Sustainability at the University of Waterloo.
Bethany Hughes
Water and Land: Indigenous Performance as Invitation to Action [video]
The speaker for this event was Bethany Hughes, Ph.D., Assistant Professor in the Department of American Culture and a core faculty member in the Native American Studies Program at the University of Michigan.
Diane Wilson (Photo credit: Sarah Whiting)
Claiming Space in the “Birthplace of America:” Latin American Immigrants and Struggles for Belonging in Williamsburg, Virginia
The speaker for this event was Diane Wilson, writer, speaker, educator, and author of "The Seed Keeper" (Milkweed, 2021).
Malik Yakini
Growing Kale, Shifting Power and Building Food Sovereignty [video]
The speaker for this event was Malik Yakini, co-founder and Executive Director of the Detroit Black Community Food Security Network.
Heather Davis
Petro-Time [video]
The speaker for this event was Heather Davis, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Culture and Media at The New School in New York.
Bathsheba Demuth
Do Whales Judge Us?: Interspecies History and Ethics [video]
The speaker for this event was Bathsheba Demuth, Ph.D., Dean’s Associate Professor of History and Environment and Society at Brown University.
Daphne A. Brooks, Ph.D.
Liner Notes for the Revolution: The Intellectual Life of Black Feminist Sound [video]
The speaker for this event was Daphne A. Brooks, Ph.D., William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of African American Studies and professor of theater studies, American studies, and women’s, gender and sexuality studies at Yale University. This event is part of the HRC Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice Speaker Series.
Christopher González, Ph.D.
Latinx Precarity, Permissibility, and Persistence [video]
The speaker for this virtual event was Christopher González, Ph.D., professor of English, founder and director of the Latinx Cultural Center, and associate dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Utah State University. This event is part of the HRC Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice Speaker Series.
Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Ph.D.
Not a Nation of Immigrants: Settler Colonialism, White Supremacy, and a History of Erasure and Exclusion
The speaker for this virtual event was Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, Ph.D., American historian, writer and activist, and a professor emerita of Ethnic Studies at California State University, East Bay. This event is part of the HRC Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice (On Native Ground) Speaker Series.
LeAnne Howe
Savage Conversations [video]
The speaker for this event was LeAnne Howe, Eidson Distinguished Professor in American Literature at the University of Georgia. This event is part of the HRC Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice Speaker Series.
Kyle Mays, Ph.D.
The speaker for this virtual event was Kyle T. Mays, Ph.D., assistant professor of history at UCLA. This event is part of the HRC Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice Speaker Series.
Adin Lears, Ph.D., and Holly Crocker, Ph.D.
Margery Kempe, Intimate Affect, and the Triumph of the (Feminist) Subject [video]
The speakers for this virtual event were Holly Crocker, Ph.D., founding director of the Humanities Directive at the University of South Carolina, and Adin Lears, Ph.D., assistant professor of English at VCU. This event is part of the HRC Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice Speaker Series.
Jennifer Ho, Ph.D.
Combating Racism through a Public Humanities Perspective [video]
The speaker for this virtual event was Jennifer Ho, Ph.D., Eaton Professor of Humanities and the Arts and professor of ethnic studies at the University of Colorado - Boulder. This event is part of the HRC Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice Speaker Series.
Elizabeth Outka, Ph.D.
Contagion Aesthetics: Modernist Literature and the Influenza Pandemic
The speaker for this event was Elizabeth Outka, Ph.D., professor of English at the University of Richmond. This event was part of the HRC Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice Speaker Series.
Carl Suddler, Ph.D.
Presumed Criminal: Black Youth and the Justice System in Postwar New York [video]
The speaker for this event was Carl Suddler, Ph.D., assistant professor of history at Emory University, in conversation with Michael Dickinson, Ph.D., assistant professor of history in the VCU Department of History. This event was part of the HRC Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice Speaker Series.
Cathleen D. Cahill, Ph.D. (photo by Michael T. Davis)
Recasting the Vote: How Women of Color Transformed the Suffrage Movement [video*]
The speaker for this event was Cathleen D. Cahill, Ph.D., associate professor of history at Penn State. This event was part of the HRC Race, Ethnicity and Social Justice Speaker Series.
* VCU authentication required to watch video
Leisy Abrego, Ph.D.
Communists, Criminals and Caravans: The Social Construction of Central Americans
The speaker for this event was Leisy Abrego, Ph.D., professor of chicana/o studies at UCLA. Her research and teaching interests—inspired in great part by her family’s experiences—are in Central American immigration, Latina/o families, the inequalities created by gender and the production of “illegality” through U.S. immigration laws.
Richard Bell, Ph.D.
Stolen: Five Free Boys Kidnapped into Slavery and their Astonishing Odyssey Home
The speaker for this event was Richard Bell, Ph.D., associate professor in the Department of History at the University of Maryland, and author of the book “Stolen: Five Free Boys Kidnapped into Slavery and their Astonishing Odyssey Home.” Bell’s research interests focus on American history between 1750 and 1877. His book was the recipient of a 2017 NEH Public Scholar Award.
Alok Vaid-Menon
Femme in Public
What feminine part of yourself did you have to destroy in order to survive in this world? At what point does femininity become synonymous with apology? Who hurt the people who hurt you? Alok Vaid-Menon is trying to figure it out. Their work has been featured by HBO, CNN, BBC, NBC, The New York Times, The Guardian and more.
Clifford Edwards, Ph.D.
Van Gogh’s Second Gift
The speaker for this event was Clifford Edwards, Ph.D., professor in the School of World Studies at VCU. This talk investigated Van Gogh’s spiritual search as revealed in his private letters. Dr. Edwards showed how the New Testament, which is largely a series of letters, had a significant influence on the artist, who was himself a preacher’s son and “failed” evangelist. Careful viewing of Van Gogh’s letters actually changes the way we see some of his paintings, including his most famous work, “Starry Night.”
Christina Sharpe, Ph.D.
Wake. Seed. Soil.
The speaker for this event was Christina Sharpe, Ph.D., professor of English at Tufts University. This event was part of the Virginia's Past, Present and Future Speaker Series.
Elizabeth Stordeur Pryor, Ph.D
The N-Word: History, Race and the College Classroom
The n-word, a word prevalent in both racist and anti-racist documents, art, literature and politics, is wreaking havoc across U.S. classrooms. With personal, pedagogical and historical perspective - framed in part by her experience as a biracial woman who is also the daughter of iconic comedian Richard Pryor - Dr. Pryor reflects on why the n-word is hard to talk about.
Michael Guasco, Ph.D.
1619: Rethinking the History of Africans and Slavery in Early America
Michael Guasco, Associate Professor of History, Davidson College, and author of "Slaves and Englishmen: Human Bondage in the Early Modern Atlantic World" (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014) was the speaker. This event was presented in partnership with American Evolution: Virginia to America, 1619-2019, and was co-sponsored by the Department of History at VCU. It was part of the "Virginia’s Past, Present and Future" lecture series.
Rebecca Goetz, Ph.D.
Race and Christianity in Early Virginia
Rebecca Goetz, Ph.D., Associate Professor of History at New York University, and author of "The Baptism of Early Virginia: How Christianity Created Race" (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012), was the speaker. This event was presented in partnership with American Evolution: Virginia to America, 1619-2019, and was co-sponsored by the Department of History at VCU. It was part of the "Virginia’s Past, Present and Future" lecture series.
Philip Francis, Ph.D.
When Art Disrupts Religion
Philip Francis, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Philosophy and Religion at the University of Maine at Farmington, was the speaker. This event was presented in partnership with the Powell-Edwards Lecture Series in Religion and the Arts.
Alan Taylor, Ph.D.
The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832
Alan Taylor, Ph.D., speaker for the event, is the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation Chair in the University of Virginia’s Corcoran Department of History, author of numerous books about the colonial period, the American Revolution, and the Early Republic, and winner of the Pulitzer Prize in 1996 and 2014. This event was part of the "Virginia’s Past, Present and Future" lecture series.
Leslie Harris, Ph.D.
Slavery and the University: Histories and Legacies
Leslie Harris, Ph.D., speaker for the event, is Professor of History at Northwestern University, author of "In the Shadow of Slavery: African Americans in New York City, 1626-1863" (University of Chicago Press, 2003), co-editor of several essay collections about the history of slavery in North America, and co-convener of the first international conference on recovering the histories of slavery at higher education institutions in the U.S. and abroad. This event was part of the "Virginia’s Past, Present and Future" lecture series.
Erica Dunbar, Ph.D
Declaring Freedom from a Founding Father: The Life of Ona Judge and Her Escape From the Washingtons
Erica Dunbar, Ph.D., speaker for the event, is Professor of History at Rutgers University.
Bob Woodward
Truth, Freedom of Expression, Democracy and the Age of the American Presidency
The HRC was proud to host a conversation with Bob Woodward, legendary Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist, author and associate editor of The Washington Post.
Clare Sears, Ph.D.
Arresting Dress: Cross-Dressing, Law and Fascination in Nineteenth-Century San Francisco
Clare Sears, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of Sociology at San Francisco State University. This event was part of the speaker series “Gender TRANSgressions, Past and Present” that began in Fall 2017.
Emily Skidmore, Ph.D.
True Sex: The Lives of Trans Men at the Turn of the Twentieth Century
Emily Skidmore, Ph.D., is Associate Professor of History at Texas Tech University. This event was part of the speaker series “Gender TRANSgressions, Past and Present” that began in fall 2017.
Fariba Enteshari, Ph.D.
Rumi’s Poetry and His Vision of Love Among Faith Traditions
Fariba Enteshari, Ph.D., is Founder and Executive Director of the Rumi Educational Center. This event was presented in partnership with the program in religious studies and the Powell-Edwards Lecture Series in Religion and the Arts.
Julia Capó Jr., Ph.D.
Making Fairyland in Twentieth-Century Miami: Gender, Sexual and Racial Transgressions
Julia Capó Jr., Ph.D., is Associate Professor of History at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. This event was part of the speaker series “Gender TRANSgressions, Past and Present” that began in fall 2017.
Aren Aizura, Ph.D.
Transgender Vlogs on Thailand: Transnational Imaginaries of Gender Reassignment Surgery
Aren Aizura, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor of Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies at the University of Minnesota.
Frankenstein Dissected: 21st Century Legacies of a Nineteenth-Century Classic
A roundtable with preliminary comments by three guests, followed by conversation with the audience, featuring:
- Susan Lederer, Ph.D., Robert Turell Professor of Medical History and Bioethics in the Department of Medical History and Bioethics at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health and author of “Franken-Fears: The Ethical Legacy of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein”
- Ed Finn, Ph.D., Director of the Center for Science and the Imagination and assistant professor in the School of Arts, Media and Engineering, assistant professor of English at Arizona State University, and author of “Frankenstein and the Scientific Imagination“
- Catherine Ingrassia, Ph.D., professor of English at Virginia Commonwealth University and author of "'A Devout But Nearly Silent Listener’: Frankenstein, Women, and Narrative Silence”
Liz Covart, Ph.D.
The Ben Franklin’s World Project: Podcasting and the Future of Digital History
Liz Covart, Ph.D., is Digital Projects Editor at the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture, and host of the award-winning Ben Franklin’s World History Podcast.
Su’ad Abdul Khabeer, Ph.D.
Muslim Cool: Race, Religion, and Hip-Hop in the United States
Su’ad Abdul Khabeer, Ph.D., is associate professor of American culture and Arab and Muslim American studies at the University of Michigan. This event was sponsored by the Powell-Edwards Lecture Series in Religion and the Arts.
Stefano Adamo, Ph.D.
The Humanities Respond! Literary and Cinematic Depictions of the 2007 Financial Crisis
Stefano Adamo, Ph.D., is assistant professor of Italian culture at the University of Banja Luka in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Junot Díaz
A Public Reading by Junot Díaz
Junot Díaz is winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and Rudge and Nancy Allen Professor of Writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. was born in the Dominican Republic and raised in New Jersey. He is the author of "Drown; The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao," which won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award; and "This Is How You Lose Her," a New York Times bestseller and National Book Award finalist. He is the recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, PEN/Malamud Award, Dayton Literary Peace Prize, Guggenheim Fellowship, and PEN/O. Henry Award. A graduate of Rutgers College, Díaz is currently the fiction editor at Boston Review and the Rudge and Nancy Allen Professor of Writing at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Diane Apostolos-Cappadona, Ph.D
Fruit of Pleasure, Source of Sustenance, Object of Shame: The Naked Breasts of Eve and of Mary
Diane Apostolos-Cappadona, Ph.D., is professor emerita of religious art and cultural history and Haub Director of the Catholic Studies Program at Georgetown University. This event was sponsored by the Powell-Edwards Lecture Series in Religion and the Arts.
The Balfour Declaration Centennial: How a 1917 Proclamation Shaped Israel and Palestine
Guest speakers were Noura Erakat, J.D., assistant professor of legal studies and social justice/human rights at George Mason University, and Hillel Gruenberg, Ph.D., director of Israel engagement at the New York campus of the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of religion and the Jewish Theological Seminary.
Gavin Grimm
Screening of "Gender Revolution" and panel discussion featuring Gavin Grimm
Gender and sexuality can be fluid, and today transgender issues are altering the nature of day-to-day interactions. Newscasting legend Katie Couric takes us on a journey to discover the dynamics of gender in our world, and promotes understanding the personal and the political issues behind the headlines. "Gender Revolution" includes interviews with activists, doctors, families and individuals, and highlights Virginia native Gavin Grimm, a transgender student whose case is currently in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Post-film conversation with special guests Gavin Grimm and Bill Farrar, director of public policy and communications at the ACLU of Virginia, and moderated by Bethany Coston, Ph.D., assistant professor of gender, sexuality and women’s studies at VCU.
This event was presented in partnership with the Southern Film Festival.
Dean Spade, Ph.D.
Trans Politics and Criminal Punishment Reform
Dean Spade, Ph.D., is associate professor of law at the Seattle University School of Law and asked the question, "Can we survive mainstreaming?"
Cary Costello, Ph.D.
The Fight for Intersex Human Rights in the 21st Century
Cary Costello, Ph.D., is associate professor of sociology and coordinator of the LGBT program at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee.
Billie Jean King
A Conversation with Billie Jean King
If through her words and deeds one woman can truly make a difference for thousands of others in change-making ways, then that singular individual would be Billie Jean King. Named one of the “100 Most Important Americans of the 20th Century” by Life and a 2009 recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom, King is a pioneer for equality, and the advancement of women and LGBTQ people.
“I don’t think there’s any question that the two most significant cultural athletic figures of the twentieth century are Jackie Robinson and Billie Jean King.” — Frank Deford, American sportswriter
King, who has won an astounding 39 Grand Slam titles during her career, blazed trails for women everywhere in 1970 when she became one of nine players to break away from the tennis establishment and accept a one dollar contract from tennis promoter Gladys Heldman to compete in the newly created Virginia Slims Series. The revolt led to the birth of women’s pro tennis and the formation of the Women’s Tennis Association.
In 1973, King produced one of the greatest moments in sports history when she defeated Bobby Riggs in the Battle of the Sexes. In 2008, she authored "Pressure is a Privilege: Lessons I’ve Learned from Life and the Battle of the Sexes" to commemorate the 35th anniversary of that historic match.
In 1974, she co-founded World Team Tennis, the revolutionary co-ed professional tennis league, and the Women’s Sports Foundation. In 2006, the National Tennis Center, home of the US Open, was renamed the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center in honor of her accomplishments on and off the court.
King was outed in 1981 and lost all of her endorsements and sponsorships overnight. Over her career she has been a tireless advocate for LGBTQ people as well as for women in sports and society. King has created new inroads for women and LGBTQ people in and out of sports throughout her legendary career, and she continues to make her mark today as her enduring accomplishments reverberate far beyond the tennis courts.
This event was part of the "Celebrating Forty Years of LGBTQ Activism at VCU" lecture series.
Marc Stein, Ph.D.
Students, Sodomy and the State: LGBT Campus Struggles in the 1970s
Marc Stein, Ph.D., is the Jamie and Phyllis Pasker Professor of History at San Francisco State University. This event was part of the "Celebrating Forty Years of LGBTQ Activism at VCU" lecture series.
Trials and Triumphs, 1974-76: The Struggle for Recognition of VCU’s First Gay Student Group
VCU faculty and students who have been exploring this dramatic episode will tell the story of what prompted the lawsuit against VCU’s Board of Visitors, and the twists and turns leading to eventual victory in 1976. A panel of alumni, including the first two spokespersons for GAS, will then share their memories of that struggle and of life for LGBTQ students in the 70s. This event was part of the "Celebrating Forty Years of LGBTQ Activism at VCU" lecture series.
Clint Carroll, Ph.D.
Landscapes of Renewal: Cherokee Adaptation and Environmental Governance
Clint Carroll, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder. This event was part of the "Native American Knowledge and the Environment" lecture series.
Deborah McGregor, Ph.D.
Applying Indigenous Legal Traditions to Conceptualizing Water Justice
Deborah McGregor, Ph.D., is Associate Professor and Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Environmental Justice at the Osgoode Hall Law School at York University. This event was part of the "Native American Knowledge and the Environment" lecture series.
Daniel Wildcat, Ph.D
Exercising Indigenuity: The Role of Indigenous Knowledges in Healing the Planet
Daniel Wildcat, Ph.D., is Professor and Director of the Haskell Environmental Research Studies Center at Haskell Indian Nations University. This event was part of the "Native American Knowledge and the Environment" lecture series.
Devoney Looser, Ph.D.
Jane Austen Then and Now: Reinventing a Literary Legend
Devoney Looser, Ph.D., is Professor of English at Arizona State University. This event was part of the "What the ‘Literary Greats’ Have to Say to Us Today" lecture series.
Joseph Valente, Ph.D.
From Whiteboys to White Nationalism: A Joycean Prophecy of the Trump Phenomenon
Joseph Valente, Ph.D., is Distinguished Professor of English and Disability Studies at State University of New York at Buffalo. This event was part of the "What the ‘Literary Greats’ Have to Say to Us Today" lecture series.
Emma Smith, Ph.D.
What’s It Worth? Shakespeare’s Value Then and Now
Emma Smith, Ph.D., is Professor of Shakespeare Studies at Hertford College, Oxford University. This event was part of the "What the ‘Literary Greats’ Have to Say to Us Today" lecture series.
Ayanna Thompson, Ph.D.
Is Shakespeare Beyond Race?
Ayanna Thompson, Ph.D., is Professor of English at George Washington University. This event was part of the "What the ‘Literary Greats’ Have to Say to Us Today" lecture series.