A Letter From Roger Berkowitz

Dear friend,

Hannah Arendt insisted that her overriding goal was simple. It was “to think what we are doing.” Amidst the crisis of totalitarianism, the threatened eradication of the human condition, the crisis in education, and the disappearance of truth in politics, Arendt insisted that thinking itself, the human activity of imagining the world from the perspectives of others and challenging one’s deepest convictions, was the first and necessary response.

[caption id="attachment_13705" align="alignleft" width="180"] Roger Berkowitz[/caption]

At a time when democracy is in crisis around the world, the earth is threatened with catastrophic changes, and the petrified order of the cold-war détente is threatening to unravel, we need to follow Arendt’s path. The Hannah Arendt Center for Politics and Humanities at Bard College offers a marriage of non-partisan politics and the humanities. It serves as an intellectual incubator for engaged thinking and public discussion that is the bedrock of our democracy. ?? In the spirit of Hannah Arendt, the Center’s mission is to encourage people, in Arendt's words,  “to think what we are doing.”?

Volume 2 of HA: The Journal of the Hannah Arendt Center at Bard College was just mailed to our Arendt Supporter Members. The journal includes a special section with essays by Jeffrey Tulis, Tracy Strong, Ann Norton, and Roger Berkowitz from our Conference “Does the President Matter.” There are also a number of excellent essays by Philippe Nonet, Jennifer M. Hudson, Grace Hunt, and Bill Dixon.

We are thrilled about our 7^th Annual Conference “The Unmaking of Americans: Are There Still American Values Worth Fighting For?” which takes place on Thursday and Friday, Oct. 9-10. The topic this year, as the title suggests, calls upon Americans to confront the weakening of our collective vision of freedom and equality. With speakers including George Packer, Lawrence Lessig, Charles Murray, Norman Rush, Jerome Kohn, Kendall Thomas, Zephyr Teachout, David Bromwich, Kennan Ferguson, Joan Richardson, Ann Lauterbach, Jim Sleeper, Roberto Unger, and more—this is an event not to be missed! You can register here.

2014-2015 will be packed with many new activities. In April of 2015, we will welcome Senior Fellow Wilmot James of the Democratic Alliance in South Africa, who will work with the HAC to organize a Spring conference on the conflict with modernity and traditionalism in South African law and politics. This fall, we will inaugurate a new program, “The Courage to Be: A Philosophical and Religious Exploration of Moral and Spiritual Courage as a Response to Evil in the Global Community.” And we will be holding our third annual Berlin conference in May of 2015 in conjunction with Bard College Berlin.

Also joining us are three new post-doctoral fellows (Michiel Bot, Angela Maione, and Charles Snyder) and two visiting scholars. Angela Maione will be the first ever Klemens von Klemperer Hannah Arendt Center Fellow. For a complete list of Arendt Center fellows and visiting scholars, click here.

Lastly, the Arendt Center welcomes a handful of new staff members. Tina Stanton is our new Program Associate, who will assist with managing all the Center’s exciting programs, events, and daily operations. David Bisson, our new Media Coordinator, will supervise our blog, social media and journal. Lastly, Josh Kopin and Anna Hadfield are Editorial Assistants and will be assisting with both Amor Mundi and the HA Journal.

I founded the Arendt Center for Politics and Humanities and turned to Hannah Arendt because no other American thinker so engages (and, yes, sometimes enrages) citizens and students from all political persuasions, resisting all attempts at categorization on the right or the left, and all the while insisting on human dignity. Arendt's writings attract the minds and hearts of individuals who wish to think for themselves. The Arendt Center engages citizens in Arendt-like thinking: relentless examination of issues from multiple points of view, with an emphasis on unimagined and unintended consequences --"thinking without banisters" is the phrase most closely associated with Arendt's methods.

Today we launch a 100/10 member challenge: 100 new members in 10 days. Please click here and become a member of the Hannah Arendt Center. If you are already a member, we would ask you to renew your membership now. The Arendt Center relies on your support. Learn more about membership here.

We thank you in advance and look forward to seeing you at our future events.

Roger Berkowitz