The Freethought Society (FS) is pleased to host Professor Christopher Cameron on Saturday, August 1, 2020 at 3:00 PM (EDT)/Noon (PDT) for an online Zoom presentation entitled “Black Freethought from Slavery to Civil Rights.” His talk is based on his book, Black Freethinkers: A History of African American Secularism.
Learn how you can obtain the Zoom link by registering as a member of the FS Meetup.
Cameron’s talk will explore the origins of black freethought among 19th century slaves, many of whom could not reconcile notions of a loving God with their condition on Earth. The talk will then examine freethought in the 20thcentury as well as cultural and political movements such as the Harlem Renaissance, radical leftist politics, and the Black Power movement. Cameron argues that religious skepticism was prevalent among some of the most prominent voices in African American history, including Frederick Douglass, Richard Wright, James Baldwin, Lorraine Hansberry, Huey Newton, and Alice Walker.
Cameron is a history professor at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte with research and teaching interests in African American and early American history, including slavery, the antislavery movement, religious and intellectual history. His first book, To Plead Our Own Cause: African Americans in Massachusetts and the Making of the Antislavery Movement, explored the relationship between Puritan theology and the rise of black abolitionism, arguing throughout the work that African Americans were central to the development of the antislavery movement in America.
The Freethought Society is pleased to host University of Pennsylvania Professor Marci Hamilton as the Thursday, April 11, 2019 speaker. Her speech, “The War Against Child Sex Abuse: Where We Are and What We Must Do,” takes place 7:00 PM at the Ludington Library located at 5 South Bryn Mawr Avenue, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania. Free and open to the public
Hamilton is the nation’s foremost expert on clergy sex abuse against children and child sex abuse statutes of limitation. She has been invited to testify and advise legislators in every state in the country where significant statutes of limitation reform have occurred. Her presentation will recount her battles in Pennsylvania and elsewhere with powerful forces against child safety, and she will lay out the battle plan for the future, presenting the five necessary legal reforms to prevent child sex abuse: statute of limitations reform, preservation of children’s rape kits, family court reform, public training on child sex abuse, and the invalidation of nondisclosure agreements.
Hamilton is the Robert A. Fox Leadership Program Professor of Practice at the University of Pennsylvania. She is also a Fox Family Pavilion Resident Senior Fellow in the Program for Research on Religion at the University of Pennsylvania. Hamilton is also the Founder, CEO, and Academic Director of CHILD USA, which is an academic think tank at the University of Pennsylvania dedicated to interdisciplinary, legal and evidence-based research to improve laws and public policy to end child abuse and neglect. Before moving to the University of Pennsylvania, Professor Hamilton held the Paul R. Verkuil Chair in Public Law at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University.
Hamilton is the author of Justice Denied: What America Must Do to Protect Its Children (Cambridge University Press). She is also the author of God vs. the Gavel: Religion and the Rule of Law and God vs. the Gavel: The Perils of Extreme Religious Liberty, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. Additionally, she is the co-author of Children and the Law. Hamilton clerked for United States Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor and Judge Edward R. Becker of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.
Hamilton is a graduate of Vanderbilt University summa cum laude, having earned a bachelor’s degree. She graduated with high honors from Pennsylvania State University, where she earned a master’s degree in English, fiction writing, and philosophy. Hamilton earned her Jurisprudence Degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Law. She graduated magna cum laude. At the University of Pennsylvania, Marci served as Editor-in-Chief of The University of Pennsylvania Law Review.
“Cold, Hard Science: The 2016-2017 Antarctic Paleontological Expedition”
PENNSYLVANIA — The Freethought Society is pleased to host Dr. Ted Daeschler as a speaker at the Ludington Library (5 South Bryn Mawr Avenue, Bryn Mawr) on Wednesday, May 23, 2018. This event is free and open-to-the-public. The meeting starts at 7:00 PM.
Dr. Daeschler’s presentation “Cold, Hard Science: The 2016-2017 Antarctic Paleontological Expedition,” will highlight the Devonian Period (420-360 million-years-ago). Fossils bear witnessed of profound diversification of the form and function of aquatic vertebrates, including the origin of limbed forms. Previous discoveries from fossil sites in the northern hemisphere motivated questions about biotic evolution within the southern landmasses from the same timeframe.
Working out of McMurdo Station, Dr. Daeschler’s team spent three weeks at two sites in the Transantarctic Mountains of Southern Victoria Land, Antarctica. These areas have had little paleontological exploration and this fieldwork revealed productive Middle Devonian sites with a wide variety of fossil vertebrates from ancient freshwater ecosystems. A powerful slide show will take you into the camp and the surrounding areas.
About Dr. Ted Daeschler:
Dr. Daeschler is curator of Vertebrate Zoology, Academy of Natural Sciences Professor, Department of Biodiversity, Earth and Environmental Science, Drexel University. He has been at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia since 1987. His research interests center on Late Devonian-age fossils and the origin of limbed vertebrates. Daeschler’s responsibilities at the Academy of Natural Sciences focus on research, teaching, collections curation, and public programs within the museum. Since 2011, Dr. Daeschler has had a joint appointment as a Professor in the Department of Biodiversity, Earth and Environmental Science at Drexel.
The Freethought Society (FS) is pleased to host Professor Christopher Cameron on Saturday, August 1, 2020 at 3:00 PM (EDT)/Noon (PDT) for an online Zoom presentation entitled “Black Freethought from Slavery to Civil Rights.” His talk is based on his book, Black Freethinkers: A History of African American Secularism.
