Session III

In several of his dialogues, Plato contrasts the allure of poetic myth and demagogic rhetoric to the genuine beauty of speaking truthfully. What is it about speaking truly that is beautiful and why is this beauty important? We will explore Plato's thoughts about these questions with an eye to what they might show us about our own habits of civic and communal speech.

Learn Devanagari, the alphabet of Hindi, the second most spoken language in the world, in one hour. Marathi, Nepali, and Sanskrit are also written in Devanagari. Please come prepared to participate!

There are somewhere between 6,000 and 7,000 languages spoken in the world today, and linguists estimate that 50 to 90 percent of them will disappear before the end of this century. Although in some cases this loss is the result of natural disasters, disease, or warfare, it is primarily due to language shift, where one group of people abandons their native tongue in favor of another. This talk will explore the phenomenon of language endangerment and discuss the implications of this loss for societies and for scientific knowledge.

When we read fiction or watch plays, what difference does it make whether the character is unlike us (say, a king) or like us (say, a salesman)?