North Carolina Conversations Summer-Fall 2008.pdf

Caldwell LaureatesWe can perhaps agree on somethingwhile respecting our diversity. Wecan agree that to be great we mustalso be good.Finally, in a year when our nationand our state confront the challengesof both a war and a national election,the humanities might remindus that we are a nation in large partcreated by scholars named Franklin,Jefferson, Rush, and Madison. In atime when there will be an inevitableclash of ideas, we might rememberthat it was the idea of liberty thatinspired them. Osama Bin Ladenmade one bad calculation in his evildesign. He thought that buildingslike the Pentagon, the Twin Towers,and the Capitol were the symbolsof our democracy and that bringingthem down would destroy us. Yet theidea was here long before the buildingsand will be here long after thesymbols are gone.In the horror just after 9/11 at agathering in another place in NorthCarolina, one of the great riches ofour state and a great friend of thehumanities, Betty McCain, told thestory of Sir Richard Shirley, who inEngland centuries ago built a cathedralin a time of pestilence and war.Many of those around him wereoutraged at such an act. Yet thewords that you would find tonightengraved on the wall of that greatchurch should inspire all of us. Theyread, “In the worst of times, do thebest of things.”The Humanities Council is aboutletting people in North Carolina standfor something in their own places,in their own times, through theirown dreams; it is about our workingtogether — even in the worst of times— to do the best of things. It is aboutour being as good as we are great.The John Tyler Caldwell Award for the Humanities,the Council’s highest honor, has been presented annually since itsinauguration in 1990. Named for its first recipient, the late Dr. JohnTyler Caldwell, former chancellor of North Carolina State Universityfrom 1959–1975 and a founding member of the Council, the awardpays tribute to individuals whose life and work illuminate one ormore of the multiple dimensions of human life where the humanitiescome into play: civic, personal, intellectual, and moral.1990 - John Tyler Caldwell †1991 - John Hope Franklin1992 - Doris Waugh Betts1993 - Samuel Talmadge Ragan †1994 - Anne Firor Scott1995 - John Marsden Ehle1996 - William W. Finlator †1997 - Charles Bishop Kuralt †1998 - Dorothy Spruill Redford1999 - William C. Friday2000 - Thomas J. Lassiter, Jr. †2001 - Houston Gwynne (H.G.) Jones2002 - Reynolds Price2003 - Wilma Dykeman † & Hugh Morton †2004 - Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans2005 - Louis D. Rubin, Jr.2006 - Benjamin Eagles Fountain, Jr.2007 - Emily Herring Wilson† deceasedA n I n v i tat i o n t o H o n o r t h e2008 Caldwell LaureateDr. Walt Wolfram, WilliamC. Friday DistinguishedProfessor of EnglishLinguistics, North CarolinaState UniversityThe North Carolina Humanities Council board has chosen pioneeringsociolinguist Walt Wolfram as the recipient of the 2008 John Tyler CaldwellAward, one of the state’s oldest and most prestigious public humanitieshonors. The award ceremony is scheduled for Thursday, October 23,at 7 p.m. in the Stewart Theatre of North Carolina State Universityin Raleigh, NC. Wolfram will premier The Carolina Brogue, one of thenewest films produced by the North Carolina Language and Life Project.Chancellor James L. Oblinger will offer welcoming remarks, and PresidentWilliam C. Friday will deliver the annual Caldwell Lecture in the Humanities.The event is free and open to the public. For more information, contactDonovan McKnight at (336) 334-4770 or dmcknight@nchumanities.org.NC Conversations • Summer 2008 • 5