Nearly 250 years ago our constitutional founders dared to create an experiment in popular government. Did it work? This talk examines the challenges facing American democracy, asking whether it has failed, why, and what needs to be done to fix it.

David Schultz, Distinguished Professor of Political Science, Legal Studies, and Environmental Studies, Hamline University

David Schultz is Hamline University Distinguished Professor of Political Science, Legal Studies, and Environmental Studies and a Professor at the Lithuanian Military Academy. A four-time Fulbright scholar, David is the author of more than 45 books and 200+ articles on various aspects on American politics and law.

In the years between the turn of the twentieth century and World War Two, where did Native people belong? Scholars and the popular media have portrayed indigenous communities as trapped on reservations and isolated from the currents of industrialization and modernization that swept the United States during the early twentieth century. But between 1905 and 1940, labor programs operated by the Bureau of Indian Affairs and administered by Native bureaucrats sent thousands of American Indian people to live and work away from their home communities in cities such as Phoenix, Los Angeles, and Salt Lake City.

This presentation addresses a key question: How did Native people attempt to use and reshape labor programs designed to assimilate them? Using letters, photographs, and labor inspection records from federal archives, I argue that federal labor programs became a key point of entry into urban spaces for Native people well ahead of the relocation programs of the 1950s to 1970s, and that the experiences of the Native people who administered and worked in these programs can reframe our understandings of Indigenous struggles for sovereignty in the decades before World War II.

Kevin Whalen, Associate Professor of History and Native American and Indigenous Studies, University of Minnesota, Morris

Kevin Whalen is an associate professor of history and Native American and Indigenous studies at the University of Minnesota, Morris. He is the author of Native Students at Work: American Indian Labor and Sherman Institute’s Outing Program, 1900-1945. He has held fellowships and grants from the Mellon Foundation and the American Council of Learned Societies, the American Philosophical Society, the Bancroft Library at the University of California, Berkeley, and the Humanities Without Walls consortium.

What roles, if any, should cryptocurrencies play in the American economy? We will explore this topic by looking at the origins of cryptocurrencies, how they work, and why they have grown in value as a financial asset throughout the world.

Louis Johnston, Professor of Economics and the Liberal Arts, College of Saint Benedict and Saint John’s University

Louis Johnston is the William E. and Virginia Clemens Professor of Economics and the Liberal Arts at the College of Saint Benedict and Saint John's University, where he has taught since 1997. Johnston specializes in macroeconomics, economic history, and the connections between economic policy and economic history. His most recent projects focus on analyzing the evolution of Minnesota’s economy and how Minnesota became “above average” since World War II.

Johnston writes columns on economics and economic history for MinnPost and is a guest on Minnesota Public Radio, WCCO Radio, and Twin Cities Public Television. He has been interviewed and quoted by the St. Cloud Times, Minnesota Star Tribune, St. Paul Pioneer Press, Bloomberg News, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, Marketplace, CNN, Minnesota News Network, and other media.

The Fibonacci sequence generates an infinite set of numbers whereby each of the number, except the first two, is obtained by adding both of its predecessors. It turns out that even though the Fibonacci numbers grow exponentially, the ratio of two consecutive Fibonacci numbers tends to converge towards a special number called the “Golden Ratio.” This talk will show the mathematics behind both the Fibonacci sequence and the Golden Ratio, and we will discuss the interesting phenomena or applications of these numbers in art, architecture, nature, the stock market, and music.

Peh Ng, Chair of Science and Mathematics Division and Professor of Mathematics, University of Minnesota, Morris

Dr. Peh Ng is currently the Chair of the Science and Mathematics Division and a Professor of Mathematics at the University of Minnesota Morris (UMN Morris). She has been part of the UMN Morris faculty for thirty years, and she enjoys teaching mathematics classes including Discrete & Combinatorial Mathematics, Linear Algebra, and Mathematical Modeling. She earned a bachelor of science in Mathematics and Physics with Honors at Adrian College, Michigan, then a master of science and doctorate at Purdue University, with a specialization in Operations Research and Combinatorial Optimization. Ng is a 2021 recipient of the UMN President’s Award for Outstanding Service, a 2000 recipient of the Horace T. Morse Award for Outstanding Contributions to Undergraduate Education, and a 1998 recipient of the University of Minnesota, Morris Alumni Association Teaching Award. She has collaborated and mentored at least twenty five undergraduate students in research projects supported by the UMN Undergraduate Research Programs.

No matter your age, creativity can be taught and grown.

Paul Johnson, Owner of Paul Johnson Design, and Retired Communication Design Instructor, Alexandria Technical and Community College

Paul Johnson of Pelican Rapids, MN has owned and operated Paul Johnson Design & Illustration LLC for 25 years, and was an instructor and advisor in the Communication Design program at Alexandria Technical & Community College for 23 years. He has been the featured muralist for the annual Concordia College (Moorhead) Christmas concert for the past 16 years.

The Federal Government is facing a clear constitutional crisis in terms of which branch holds power and whether they can place checks and balances on one another. Despite this crisis the U.S. Supreme Court has set standards for how the branches interact. This talk considers these standards and then discusses what they mean for the current crisis in the United States.

Timothy R. Johnson, Horace T. Morse Distinguished Professor of Political Science and Law, University of Minnesota

Timothy R. Johnson is Horace T. Morse Distinguished Professor of Political Science and Law at the University of Minnesota. He has published more than 45 articles or chapters about the U.S. Supreme Court and five books including SCOTUS and COVID: How the Media Reacted to the Livestreaming of Supreme Court Oral Arguments (2023), Oral Arguments and Coalition Formation on the U.S. Supreme Court (2012), A Good Quarrel (2009), and Oral Arguments and Decision Making on the U.S. Supreme Court (2001). Findings from his research, along with his legal and political commentary, have been covered by media outlets including The Economist, The Guardian, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, and National Public Radio (NPR).

Johnson is also passionate about teaching and advising students. Outside of the classroom he has mentored 15 graduate students and more than 200 undergraduate research projects. In 2018 he was named a semi-finalist for the prestigious Robert F. Cherry Award for Great Teaching and was awarded the American Political Science Association's Distinguished Teaching Award.

In the late 1930s, Charlie Chaplin set out to risk his reputation, his fortune and even his life on making a satire on the rising threats of fascism and Adolf Hitler. This talk will recount Chaplin’s making of The Great Dictator and explore the personal, political and artistic fallout from his comic masterpiece.

Michael Tisserand, Author

Minnesota writer Michael Tisserand is the author of the 2017 Eisner Award-winning book Krazy: George Herriman, A Life in Black and White, which explored the art and life of the creator of the comic strip “Krazy Kat.” The New York Times included Krazy in its one hundred notable books for 2017.

Tisserand wrote about Louisiana music in his first book, The Kingdom of Zydeco (1998), which received the ASCAP-Deems Taylor award for music writing. In 2006, Tisserand told his own Hurricane Katrina story in his second book, Sugarcane Academy. Most recently, he launched his quarantine project, My Father When Young— a self-published collection of 1950s-era Kodachrome slides he discovered while sifting through his late father’s things. Current projects include a history of Charlie Chaplin and the making of The Great Dictator for Oxford University Press; books on the cartoonists Bunny Matthews and Jimmy Swinnerton; and a Louisiana music-themed children's book.

Nearly 40% of the land area of the U.S. is public, most of it owned by the American people and managed by a range of federal agencies. These lands include the familiar National Parks and National Forests—including sites here in Minnesota—as well as many other resource categories that are less well known. This presentation will examine the history, use, diversity, and locations of our federal lands with an eye toward the future: Where are these lands? How are they being managed today? What challenges do they face in the 21st century? Of course how, where, and when to visit these shared resources will also be explored.

Derek Larson, Professor of Environmental Studies and History, College of Saint Benedict and Saint John’s University

Derek Larson is Professor of Environmental Studies and History at The College of St. Benedict & St. John’s University in Collegeville. An environmental historian by training, he has led the environmental studies department there for 25 years, teaching courses on history, natural resources, environmental literature, and sustainability. His recent work includes the book Keeping Oregon Green: Livability, Stewardship, and the Challenges of Growth, 1960–1980 published by Oregon State University Press.