Personally Speaking

Personally Speaking Series Features Range of Topics

Discover the stories behind the books, as the popular Personally Speaking Published Series continues in 2013-14 with four authors from the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences. J. Murrey Atkins Library partners with the college on the events, which are free and open to the public. The talks further connect the community and the university with the college's faculty and their research, in an informal, inviting atmosphere.

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. Each lecture is at 6:30 p.m. and is followed by a reception. Reservations are requested, to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or 704-687-0082 or 704-687-0085. Please note which talk you plan to attend.

Parking is complimentary for each event. For events at Atkins Library, parking is available in campus decks, including the nearby Cone Deck. Parking tokens will be provided. At UNC Charlotte Center City, parking is in the UNC Charlotte lot at 707 North Brevard Street, at the corner of 11th and Brevard streets. From I-277, take Exit 3A onto 11th Street. Turn right on Brevard and make an immediate right into the first parking lot. An attendant will direct guests to the parking.

The talks for the 2013-2014 season are:

• Jonathan Marks, Why I Am Not a Scientist: Anthropology and Modern Knowledge, September 24, UNC Charlotte Center City
• Aimee Parkison, The Innocent Party, November 13, J. Murrey Atkins Library
• Allison Stedman, Rococo Fiction in France, 1600-1715: Seditious Frivolity, February 13, 2014, J. Murrey Atkins Library
• Martha Kropf, Helping America Vote: The Limits of Election Reform, March 20, 2014, UNC Charlotte Center City

Jonathan Marks, Why I Am Not a Scientist: Anthropology and Modern Knowledge

This lively and provocative book casts an anthropological eye on the field of science in a wide-ranging and innovative discussion that integrates philosophy, history, sociology, and auto-ethnography. Jonathan Marks examines biological anthropology, the history of the life sciences, and the literature of science studies while upending common understandings of science and culture with a mixture of anthropology, common sense, and disarming humor. Applying his considerable insight, energy, and wit, Marks sheds new light on the evolution of science, its role in modern culture, and its challenges for the twenty-first century.

Aimee Parkison, The Innocent Party

Winner of the Kurt Vonnegut Fiction Prize, Aimee Parkison’s characters struggle to understand what happens when the innocent party becomes the guilty party. With magical realist flair, secrets are aired with dirty laundry, but the stains never come clean. Carol Anshaw writes, “Aimee Parkison offers a distinct new voice to contemporary fiction. Her seductive stories explore childhood as a realm of sorrows, and reveal the afflictions of adults who emerge from this private geography.”

Allison Stedman, Rococo Fiction in France, 1600-1715: Seditious Frivolity

Rococo Fiction in France reconfigures the history of the “long eighteenth century” by revealing the rococo as a literary phenomenon that characterized a range of experimental texts from the end of the French Renaissance to the eve of the French Revolution. Tracing the literary rococo’s evolution from the late 1500s to the early 1700s, and exploring its radicalization during the 1670s, 80s, and 90s, Allison Stedman unearths the seventeenth century rococo’s counter-vision for the trajectory of the French monarchy and the dawn of the French Enlightenment.

Martha Kropf, Helping America Vote: The Limits of Election Reform

A repeat of the Florida debacle in the 2000 presidential election is the fear of every election administrator. Despite the relatively complication-free 2008 election, we are working with fairly new federal legislation designed to ease election administration problems. The implementation of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 (HAVA) raises the question, how effective have reforms been? Could another Florida happen? Helping America Vote is focused on the conflict between values of access and integrity in U.S. election administration.