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Provost's Lecture Series 2006-07

The Provost announces the second year of an annual series of related lectures on a topic of major campus and broader societal importance. The lecture series will bring the University's research and teaching mission to bear on some timely societal issues. It will have the campus community as its core audience, but will be directed as well to the Durham, national and international audiences. The substance of the lecture series will be developed with input from an appropriate committee of faculty and will generally draw its presenters from outside speakers. In addition to giving a public lecture, speakers will be invited to meet with students and faculty in smaller group activities.

This year's series will address the topic of privacy on which we intend to bring multiple perspectives, historical, technological, ethical and in terms of critical policy choices about the appropriate balance to be struck between protecting the privacy of individuals in terms of their personal information and communications and the "demands" of national security.

The series is intended to provide the background required for those on our campus and in the broader community to better engage in the debate currently underway in American society regarding the issue of privacy in a variety of contexts.

The Provost wishes to thank the following Faculty Advisors for their work in helping to design this year's series: James Boyle (Law School), Christopher Cramer (Office of Information Technology), Jeffrey Glass (Electrical and Computer Engineering), Allan Lind (Fuqua School of Business), Kristen Neuschel (Department of History), Noah Pickus (Kenan Institute for Ethics), Jerry Reiter (Institute of Statistics & Decision Sciences), and Ken Rogerson (Sanford Institute of Public Policy Studies)

 

  • Monday, March 26, 2007
    5:00 p.m., Love Auditorium, Levine Science Research Center

    Documentary Film and Privacy: An analysis of the legal and ethical issues in documentary film

    Frederick Wiseman, Independent Filmmaker and General Manager, Zipporah Films, Inc.

    Mr. Wiseman will use sequences from several of his films to examine some of the legal and ethical issues in documentary film.

    Mr. Wiseman is a highly acclaimed documentary filmmaker whose career has spanned nearly 40 years. He has created a body of work consisting of 36 films focusing on American institutions including prisons, schools, the military, and even the world of high fashion. Among his numerous awards are the George Polk Career Award (2006), the American Society of Cinematographers Distinguished Achievement Award (2006), and the Peabody Award for Significant and Meritorious Achievement (1990). He is an active member of many boards and committees and serves as an Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and as a Fellow with the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

    In anticipation of Mr. Wiseman’s presentation, a retrospective of his films will be shown in the Nasher Museum of Art sponsored by the Office of the Provost, the Center for Documentary Studies, the Film/Video/Digital Program, and the Nasher Museum of Art. These films are free of charge and open to the public and can be viewed independently or in addition to his lecture.

  • For more information, click here.

  • A related event is the Full Frame Documentary Film Festival's presentation of a special program of short films followed by a panel discussion. For more information, click here.

  • Thursday, February 22, 2007
    5:00 p.m. - Love Auditorium, Levine Science Research Center

    "From Myspace to Homeland Security: Privacy and the Totalitarian Urge"

    Cory Doctorow, Co-editor of the weblog Boing Boing (boinboing.net) Fulbright Chair, Annenberg Center for Public Diplomacy, University of
    Southern California

    Students spend a lot of their time being admonished to protect their privacy on Myspace and Facebook, lest nude pictures and drunken boasts prevent them from one day becoming bank managers and college presidents. But as award-winning science fiction author and Boing-Boing blogger Cory Doctorow will reveal in this talk, the reality of privacy, surveillance and social networks is very different. And much scarier.

    Cory Doctorow (craphound.com) is a science fiction novelist, blogger and technology activist. He is the co-editor of the popular weblog Boing Boing (boingboing.net), and a contributor to Wired, Popular Science, Make, the New York Times, and many other newspapers, magazines and websites. He was formerly Director of European Affairs for the Electronic Frontier Foundation (eff.org), a non-profit civil liberties group that defends freedom in technology law, policy, standards and treaties. In that capacity, he worked to balance international treaties, polices and standards on copyright and related rights, advocating in the halls of governments, the United Nations, standards bodies, corporations, universities and non-profit. Presently, he serves as the Fulbright Chair at the Annenberg Center for Public Diplomacy at the University of Southern California. His novels are published by Tor Books and simultaneously released on the Internet under Creative Commons licenses that encourage their re-use and sharing, a move that increases his sales by enlisting his readers to help promote his work. He has won the Locus and Sunburst Awards, and been nominated for the Hugo, Nebula and British Science Fiction Awards. He co-founded the open source peer-to-peer software company OpenCola, sold to OpenText, Inc in 2003, and presently serves on the boards and advisory boards of the Participatory Culture Foundation, the MetaBrainz Foundation, Technorati, Inc, Stikkit, Annenberg Center for the Study of Online Communities, SiteShuffle, and Onion Networks, Inc. His latest novel is Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town.

  • Download the talk from the Duke iTunes site.

  • Wednesday, September 27, 2006
    5:00 p.m., Love Auditorium, Levine Science Research Center

    "Five Years After 9-11: National Security and Civil Liberties"
    Marc Rotenberg Executive Director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center

  • The Patriot Act. A national ID card. Total Information Awareness. National Security Letters. Profiling of airline passengers. RFID chips in passports. Census data on Arab-Americans disclosed to the Department of Homeland Security. In the last several years, the United States has deployed new technologies and new laws to expand surveillance of the American public. Are we safer? Are we more secure? What has been the impact on privacy? And what will happen next?

    Marc Rotenberg is Executive Director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC.ORG) in Washington, DC. He is the coauthor of "Information Privacy Law" (Aspen Press) and "Technology and Privacy: The New Landscape" (MIT Press). He frequently testifies before Congress on emerging civil liberties issues, and is often interviewed on CNN and NPR.

  • View Video here
  • Download the talk from Duke iTunes U. To receive a podcast of the Provost's Lecture Series, click on the 'subscribe' button.
  • Wednesday, November 15, 2006
    5:00 p.m., Love Auditorium, Levine Science Research Center
  • "A Vision for Countering Terrorism Through Information and Privacy Protection Technologies for the 21st Century"

    John Poindexter, former National Security Advisor, will speak on the topic of privacy as it relates to national security.
  • The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 transformed America like no other event since Pearl Harbor. Advanced and emerging information technologies offer key assets in confronting a secretive, asymmetric, and networked enemy. Yet, in a free and open society, policies must ensure and assure that these powerful technologies are used responsibly, and that Americans' privacy and civil liberties remain protected. Some believe the dual objectives of greater security and greater privacy present competing needs and a dichotomous choice requiring a trade off - some do not. (read more)
  • Dr. Poindexter, now a private consultant, most recently served as Director of the Information Awareness Office at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. IAO developed and demonstrated information technologies and systems to counter asymmetric threats by achieving total information awareness useful for preemption, national security warning and national security decision-making. He now serves on the Board of Directors of Saffron Technology. He served as National Security Advisor and Deputy National Security Advisor for President Reagan from 1983-1986, as Military Assistant in the White House prior to that, and served 29 years active duty in the U.S. Navy, rising to the rank of Vice Admiral. (read more)

View Video Here