Christopher J. Fettweis is a professor of political science at Tulane University. His most recent book is The Pursuit of Dominance: 2000 Years of Superpower Grand Strategy (Oxford UP, 2022).   Download the event flyer. Join us via Zoom. Originally published at ondisc.nd.edu.

"The Vanquished, The Office for the Dead," by Vasily Vereshchagin (1842-1904). Tretyakov Gallery. Image from artlib.ru via Wikimedia Commons.Save the date for the fifth annual Mathews Byzantine Lecture with Prof. Zachary Chitwood of The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. Prof. Chitwood will be speaking on "The Invention of Prayer for the Dead in the Byzantine Tradition." About the Talk Far from being a primitive Christian practice, prayer for the dead and, just as importantly, the belief that such prayer could better the postmortal fate of the deceased, was not uncontested, and attracted critique as early as Late Antiquity. This story of the development of the commemoration of the dead in Byzantium is one full of surprising twists and turns. Studying the development of commemorative prayer in Byzantium not only allows us to glimpse a truly medieval innovation, it also offers a way of examining Byzantine history via a particular concept and its manifold interactions with politics, religion, law and culture, very much in the sense of a Maussian “total social phenomenon.” About the Speaker Zachary Chitwood is professor of Byzantine studies at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich. His research interests include Roman and Byzantine law, the history of monasticism (especially Mount Athos) and the use of digital humanities (databases and AI-assisted text recognition). He is editor of the journals Byzantinische Zeitschrift and Endowment Studies. About the Series The Mathews Byzantine Lectures, begun in the 2021–22 academic year, bring a distinguished scholar of Byzantine studies to campus each year to deliver a talk, supported by the Rev. Constantine Mathews Endowment for Excellence in Byzantine Christianity in the Medieval Institute. Originally published at medieval.nd.edu.

Learning Beyond the Classics: Voicing Intergenerational Trauma in Postwar Korea and Japan through Contemporary Cinema Directed by Hyun kyung Kim Not Rated, 84 minutesIn English and Korean with English subtitles Director Hyun kyung Kim scheduled to appear live! This documentary explores the lasting impact of the Korean War while revealing the weight it still exerts to this day on several generations of the filmmaker's family. South Korean filmmaker Hyun kyung Kim grew up with the inherited burden of the Korean War, a conflict that left an indelible mark on her family and country. Her mother compulsively fills the house with items she finds on the streets of Seoul while her veteran father devours books about the war. The filmmaker's encounter with a North Korean defector mirrors the story of her grandfather, who likely stayed in the North when the country became divided, never to be seen again by his family. Defectors confronts the impact of a brutal war on several generations of the filmmaker's family. GET TICKETS *Free for ND, SMC, HC, and IUSB students. **Co-presented by the David A. Heskin and Marilou Brill Endowment for Excellence, Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies, Franco Family Institute for Liberal Arts and the Public Good, East Asian Languages and Cultures, Navari Family Center for Digital Scholarship/Hesburgh Libraries.

Polish-born organist Ilona Kubiaczyk-Adler brings expressive power and technical brilliance to the Basilica of the Sacred Heart's majestic Murdy Family Organ. Her recital, Music from Eastern Europe and the Americas, presents music spanning the 16th through the 21st centuries. Works from Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Ukraine, Brazil, Mexico, and the U.S. will stand alongside pieces by J.S. Bach. Through lesser-known yet brilliant compositions, some rarely performed outside their countries of origin, Kubiaczyk-Adler hopes to expand her audiences' stylistic palette and global perspective.Enjoy hearing an international performer celebrated for her musical sensitivity and interpretive depth. At a time of day and place made for contemplation, the resonance of the organ played by a world-class musician in a historic setting makes for an unforgettable musical experience. LEARN MORE *This event is free and not ticketed.

A staged reading of Rear Symphony by Daryna Gladun (ND MFA '26).This reading is part of Peter Holland and Romana Huk’s course, Drama and Poetry in Ukraine at War: Representations of Injustice and Resilience in Ukraine, 2014-2024.Set in Atomohrad, Ukraine, Rear Symphony explores the lives of four Ukrainians seeking to survive the war. Gladun wrote this powerful play in a Spring 2025 Playwriting course.The staged reading of this one-act play, directed by Susan E. Bowen, a Chicago-based director, will be followed by a conversation with Gladun, moderated by Kellogg Faculty Fellow Anne García Romero.The cast includes five remarkable Chicago actors:Olga, 30s, widowed mother: Lucy CarapetyanKateryna, 40s, displaced person: Mary WilliamsonValera, 40s, displaced person: Sam PearsonSlava, 60s, widower: Jonathan WeirStage Directions: Timothy Merkle (FTT '23)The reading is co-sponsored by the McMeel Family Endowment, and at Notre Dame by the Department of Film, Television and Theatre, the Kellogg Institute for International Studies, and the Nanovic Institute for European Studies. Originally published at nanovic.nd.edu.

THE THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 6 EVENT WITH GEORGE WILL HAS BEEN POSTPONED. WE APOLOGIZE FOR THE INCONVENIENCE AND HOPE TO SHARE A RESCHEDULED DATE SOON.Explore James Madison’s foundational concern: the greatest threat to democracy is tyranny—specifically, tyranny of the majority. His solution was a vast republic with diverse factions to prevent stable majorities from seizing unchecked power. Yet Madison misjudged where power would concentrate. Rather than Congress dominating, today's legislature has ceded authority to an expansive executive, enabled by a dormant nondelegation doctrine. This shift leaves the nation ill-equipped to confront predictable crises—most notably, the mounting national debt. Despite partisan rancor, the political class is increasingly unified by shared self-interest in re-election, not divided by ideology.George F. Will's newspaper column has been syndicated by The Washington Post since 1974. Today it appears twice weekly in more than 300 newspapers. In 1976 he became a regular contributing editor of Newsweek magazine, for which he provided a bimonthly essay until 2011. In 1977 he won a Pulitzer Prize for commentary in his newspaper columns.In June 2019, Mr. Will released The Conservative Sensibility. Altogether nine collections of Mr. Will's Newsweek and Washington Post columns have been published, the most recent being his 16 th book, American Happiness and Discontents: The Unruly Torrent, 2008-2020, published in 2021. Mr. Will has also published two other books on political theory, Statecraft as Soulcraft: What Government Does (1983) and Restoration: Congress, Term Limits and The Recovery of Deliberative Democracy (1992). In 1990, Mr. Will published Men At Work: The Craft of Baseball, which topped The New York Times bestseller list for two months. In 1998, Scribner published Bunts: Curt Flood, Camden Yards, Pete Rose and Other Reflections on Baseball, a best-selling collection of new and previously published writings by Mr. Will on baseball. Mr. Will's most recent book on baseball is A Nice Little Place on the North Side: Wrigley Field at One Hundred (2014). Mr. Will was a member of Major League Baseball's Blue Ribbon Panel, examining baseball economics, 1999-2000. In 1981, Mr. Will became a founding panel member on ABC television’s "This Week" and spent over three decades providing regular commentary. Then followed three years with Fox News where he appeared regularly on "Special Report" and "Fox News Sunday," and four years with NBC/MSNBC. Since 2022, he has been with NewsNation. Mr. Will was born in Champaign, Illinois, educated at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, Oxford University and Princeton University, where he earned his Ph.D. and he later served as a trustee. He has taught political philosophy at Michigan State University, the University of Toronto, Harvard University, and Princeton. Mr. Will served as a staff member in the United States Senate from 1970 to 1972. From 1973 through 1976, he was the Washington editor of National Review magazine. Today, Mr. Will lives and works in the Washington, D.C., area. Originally published at constudies.nd.edu.