April 23, 2018 Columnist Anne Applebaum Kicks Off a Busy May at Library's Kluge Center

From a timely look at the impact of “fake news” with Anne Applebaum to an exploration of the formation of Italian-American heritage as told by the spread of opera, the John W. Kluge Center at the Library of Congress has an extraordinary line-up of public events scheduled for May. The major theme with these events is American democracy. All of the following events are free and open to the public. Tickets are not required. Members of the press looking to attend any of these events should contact the press contacts above for a seat reservation. 

Discussion with Anne Applebaum: Disinformation and the Threat to Democracy
Wednesday, May 9, Noon
Coolidge Auditorium, Thomas Jefferson Building
In this special discussion, acclaimed Washington Post columnist and Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Anne Applebaum will address the rise of the disinformation and other assaults on the foundations of American democracy. A visiting professor at the London School of Economics, Applebaum runs Arena, a program dedicated to using high-quality research, analysis and evaluation to create effective best practices for overcoming the challenges of disinformation and 21^st-Century propaganda. Kluge Center director John Haskell will lead the discussion. Book sales and signing will follow in the Whittall Pavilion.

Symposium: The Future of Political Parties
Monday, May 21, 4 p.m.
Montpelier Room, James Madison Building
The United States has a growing number of citizens who do not identify with any political party. The Kluge Center will host an afternoon symposium to explore the potential impacts that this phenomenon will have on the future of political parties and American politics in general. For this discussion, Kluge director John Haskell will moderate a bipartisan panel that includes political scientist and incoming Kluge chair on American Law and Governance Seth Masket, National Affairseditor Yuval Levin and Brookings senior fellow Elaine Kamarck. The symposium is co-hosted by the University of Denver.

Conversation with Dr. Bruce Jentleson on “The Peacemakers”
Tuesday, May 22, 4 p.m.
LJ-119, Thomas Jefferson Building
Bruce Jentleson, a former Henry A. Kissinger chair at the Kluge Center, will discuss and sign his new book “The Peacemakers: Leadership Lessons from 20^thStatesmanship”(W.W. Norton, 2018).  Based on extensive research conducted at the Library of Congress, “The Peacemakers”explores how a variety of 20^thleaders rewrote the scripts they were handed to make breakthroughs on issues long thought intractable. This event is co-sponsored by the Library’s Center for the Book as part of its Books and Beyond series.

 Defining Italian-American Identity Through Opera
Wednesday, May 30, 4 p.m.
LJ-119, Thomas Jefferson Building
As part of the European Union Month of Culture, Kluge Center director John Haskell will interview Kluge Fellow Davide Ceriani about his research into the formation of a distinct Italian cultural identity in American urban centers between the 1860s and 1940s. Ceriani’s interdisciplinary and multilingual research uses the arts, particularly opera, to track the growth of Italian-American culture.  The event will include a small display of related Library treasures in LJ-113.

The John W. Kluge Center at the Library of Congress exists to help address the challenges facing democracies in the twenty-first century by bridging the gap between scholarship and policymakers. It does this by hosting top thinkers from around the world to conduct research in the Library’s vast collections and engage with national leaders. For more information about the Kluge Center, visit loc.gov/kluge/.

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