HESBURGH LECTURE SERIES 2013 Program - Alumni Association ...

Mark W. Roche, Ph.D.
Rev. Edmund P. Joyce, C.S.C., Professor, German Language and
Literature; Concurrent Professor, Philosophy; Fellow, Nanovic
Institute for European Studies
Biography
Mark W. Roche is the Rev. Edmund P. Joyce, C.S.C., professor of German language and
literature and concurrent professor of philosophy. He served as the I. A. O’Shaughnessy Dean
of the College of Arts and Letters from 1997 to 2008.
Categories
Lectures
Art/Architecture, Education,
Spirituality
Faith, Doubt, and Reason
Why do so many educated persons lose their faith? What arguments seem to speak against religion, and how are these arguments
to be weighed? The presentation considers these issues along with the questions, “what paths to religion exist for the educated
person?” and, “which seem to be the most promising?”
What Are We to Make of the Ugly in Art?
Within modern art, the concept opposite the beautiful, the ugly, has gained a strange prestige–what are we to make of this
fascination with the ugly? What is its greatness and what are its limits? What has been the special role of Christianity in this
development? How can a work that portrays physical or moral ugliness, whose form is distorted, and whose parts seem to be at
odds with one another be considered great art? In evaluating controversial art, how can we distinguish between great art that
integrates the ugly and bad art? The lecture includes images from both Christian and modern art.
“What’s So Funny About a Joke?”
This entertaining presentation interlaces a number of jokes with an analysis of the greatness and limits of Freud’s theory of
jokes. For Freud, erotic and aggressive jokes are the most interesting, insofar as they express our unconscious impulses. It then
supplements Freud with reflections on the ways in which jokes play with various kinds of paradoxes.
Why Choose the Liberal Arts?
This presentation considers three partly overlapping grounds of a liberal arts education: first, its intrinsic value, or the distinction
of learning for its own sake, the sheer joy associated with exploring the life of the mind, and asking the great questions that give
meaning to life; second, the cultivation of those intellectual virtues that are requisite for success beyond the academy, a liberal arts
education as preparation for a career; and third, character formation and the development of a sense of vocation, the connection
to a higher purpose or calling.
The Hesburgh Lecture Series, 2013 Program 87