The Cooper Series returns for the 2020-21 academic year with two virtual events beginning on Sept. 22. Additional events are planned for the spring, with details coming later in the semester.

The series opens on Tuesday, Sept. 22, at 7:30 p.m. EDT with acclaimed poet Layli Long Soldier, an enrolled member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe. Reading from her book Whereas, Long Soldier uses the historical language of legal treaties with America’s Indigenous populations, namely the assertion of dominance implicit in these documents’ proliferating “whereas” clauses, as a starting point for considering “the systemic violence against and cultural erasure of native tribes.” Whereas won the 2017 National Book Critics Circle Award in Poetry and the PEN/Jean Stein Book Award, and was a finalist for the National Book Award for Poetry. This event is also sponsored by the Department of English Literature. 

Register for the reading.

Register for an informal Q&A on Tuesday, Sept. 22, at 5 p.m. EDT.

The fall slate of events concludes with The Gathering, a workshop series organized by New York-based sculptor and installation artist Caroline Woolard. Through three workshops, Woolard hopes to lead participants into exploring how material objects can interrupt the unavoidable antagonisms of collaboration. The first, on Sept. 25, will be a discussion about the role that object-making can play in conflict transformation. In the next workshop, on Oct. 2, participants will respond in material form to the methods they discussed by creating sculptural objects for use in group communication. Finally, on Oct. 23, Woolard will train participants on how to use the created objects to enable embodied, organic, and tactile knowledge that does not emerge in purely verbal facilitation methods.

Workshop 1: Friday, Sept. 25, noon-2 p.m.

Workshop 2: Friday, Oct. 2, noon-2 p.m.

Workshop 3: Friday, Oct. 23, noon-2 p.m. 

Spaces are limited due to the participatory nature. Preregistration is required. Please email lcohen2@swarthmore.edu to register and receive a meeting invitation. 

The William J. Cooper Foundation provides a varied program of lectures, performances, and exhibitions that enrich the academic life of the College. The foundation was established by William J. Cooper, who specified that the income from his gift should be used “in bringing to the College eminent citizens of this and other countries who are leaders in statesmanship, education, the arts, sciences, learned professions, and business.”