By Andrew Fefer, Reporter/Editor
Topics such as racial issues in society, loss of personal privacy and free speech will be part of an upcoming event in Menomonie designed to stimulate debate and learning among attendees.
The Civil Liberties Symposium, sponsored by the Center for the Study of Institutions and Innovation at the University of Wisconsin-Stout, is scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday at several locations on campus. It is aimed at encouraging people to discuss potentially-sensitive subjects they might otherwise shy away from.
Center director Tim Shiell said in a statement from the university that the event is designed to show how important it is to debate these issues with civility.
“People can decide for themselves what they want to believe,” he said. “But to have real learning and engagement, you need to know different sides of the story. We wanted to pick topics people should talk about but may be afraid to talk about.”
The event is free and open to the public. Shiell said he hopes it will grow over time and become a nationally-recognized seminar. This week is the first time the event will be held at UW-Stout.
Keynote addresses
The symposium includes three keynote speeches; the first is on Wednesday and the other two are Thursday.
Jeffrey Lockwood, University of Wyoming professor of natural sciences and humanities, is scheduled to present “Behind the Carbon Curtain: The Energy Industry, Political Censorship and Free Speech” from 7 to 8:30 p.m. in room 290 of Micheels Hall. The university cited Lockwood’s website in describing the presentation as “…an exploration of how corporate wealth and power are being used to censor the free expression of ideas in America.”
On Thursday afternoon, Reggie Jackson, head oral historian at America’s Black Holocaust Museum, will speak about “African Americans and Civil Liberty.” The university’s statement said that Jackson will discuss history and how civil liberties are denied to African-Americans in places like Milwaukee, where the museum is located. His talk is scheduled from 2:30 to 3:45 p.m. in room 110 of the Jarvis Hall Science Wing.
That evening, “Debating Religious Liberty and Discrimination” will be discussed by John Corvino of Wayne State University and Sherif Girgis, who holds a J.D. degree from the Yale University Law School and is a doctoral candidate at Princeton University. From 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. in Micheels Hall, room 290, the pair will speak about the subject matter of a book they co-authored with Ryan T. Anderson, a writer and researcher on religious liberty and other topics.
The book has been promoted as presenting multiple views on how to navigate issues that come up at the intersection of religious liberty and apparent discrimination. Corvino is an advocate of LGBT rights, while Girgis and Anderson are considered social conservatives.
Paul Wagner, a UW-Eau Claire computer science professor emeritus, will discuss the topic of personal privacy at a Friday session running from 10:10 to 11:05 a.m. Elizabeth Buchanan, holder of an endowed chair and director of the UW-Stout Center for Applied Ethics, will respond. The session is from 10:10 to 11:05 a.m. April 5.
Dates, times and locations of other Symposium sessions can be found here.
The Center for the Study of Institutions and Innovation
A Charles Koch Foundation award helped to create UW-Stout’s Center for the Study of Institutions and Innovation (CSII) in the fall of 2017. The center’s website said the award totaled $1.7 million over four years. The center’s goal is to encourage study and dialogue about civil liberties guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution. According to its website, it does this through “scholarly inquiry, educational activities and community outreach.”
The CSII is part of the university’s College of Arts, Communication, Humanities and Social Science. It has an eight-member staff, including Shiell, who receives guidance from a Board of Advisors.