Leighton played host to yet another extremely well-attended event over common time on Thursday, April 9th. The Humanities Center’s annual Dialogos, this year entitled “In Search of the Secular,” was presented by History Professors Adeeb Khalid and David Tompkins and English Professor Peter Balaam. Balaam presented first, reading his paper about Ralph Waldo Emerson and Emerson’s complicated relationship with religion and secularism. Adeeb Khalid presented next and talked about the fascinating and surprising overlap between the internal clerical purification of Islam and Soviet antireligious campaigns of the 1920s in Central Asia. He showed cartoons made by both Islamic reformers and Bolshevik atheists. Finally, David Tompkins discussed the complex views towards Jews throughout the Cold War in Eastern Europe. After the talks, the presenters took several questions from the audience.
Box lunches were available for the first forty people at the talk, and they ran out fast. The desks in the room were quickly filled, leaving only standing and sitting room. This reporter wonders what will happen if attendance at future Leighton events continues to be this good.