Military historian and provocative social critic Victor Davis Hanson will speak at UC Santa Cruz on Monday, May 3, at 7 p.m. in the Media Theater, Room M110. A prolific author, classical scholar, and UCSC alumnus who is often featured on National Public Radio and the PBS NewsHour, Hanson will speak on the topic: "Warfare and Democracy in the Ancient and Contemporary Middle East." This event is free and open to the public.
Hanson is the author of nearly 200 essays, editorials, and reviews for such publications as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, International Herald Tribune, New York Post, National Review, American Heritage, Weekly Standard, Commentary, Daily Telegraph, and Washington Times.
He has written or edited 13 books, including Warfare and Agriculture in Classical Greece (1983), the Western Way of War (1989), and Mexifornia: A State of Becoming (2003). Hanson's recent books, particularly Autumn of War (Anchor 2002), have attracted the attention of Vice President Dick Cheney, who read Hanson's work after September 11 and had him to dinner. Hanson's latest book, Ripples of Battle, was published by Doubleday last year.
Currently a professor of classics at California State University, Fresno, Hanson is also a senior research fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution. His work offers a distinct perspective on a variety of topics--ranging from the demise of the family farm, to the impact of Mexican immigration on California, to the role of the United States in global statesmanship and defense.
Hanson received his B.A. from UCSC in 1975 and earned his Ph.D. in classics from Stanford in 1980. He was a National Endowment for the Humanities fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford (1992-93), a visiting professor of classics at Stanford (1991-92), a recipient of the Eric Breindel Award for Opinion Journalism (2002), and winner of the UCSC Alumni Association's Alumni Achievement Award in 2001. He also served as the visiting Shifrin Chair of Military History at the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland (2002-03).
Hanson's lecture is presented by the UCSC Jewish Studies Research Colloquium and sponsored by the Koret Foundation in honor of its 25th anniversary. Murray Baumgarten, director of Jewish Studies at UCSC, noted that Hanson will bring to the campus "a historical perspective on the Middle East, the birthplace of Jewish culture more than 3,500 years ago."
"Hanson will also comment on the democratic governmental form that was invented in Athens, but is now--except in modern Israel--nowhere functioning in the Middle East region," Baumgarten added.
For more information, contact Eleanor Hilberman or Cheryl Van De Veer at (831) 459-1225.
