Past Events

Spring 2012

Friday, April 27, 2012: Reading with Poet Rafael Campo

Poet/physician Campo will do a reading at 6:30 p.m. in the Garfield Meeting House, along with the winners of the William Carlos Williams Poetry contest.

Tuesday, April 24, 2012: "The Creation of Lisa's Story"

Tom Batiuk, Author of Funky Winkerbean and Lisa's Story will be on campus to discuss the topic at 6:30 p.m. in the Kennedy Center Ballroom. A reception will follow honoring the winners of the Graphic Medicine contest.

Monday, March 26, 2012: "Gross and Gruesome:  The Graphic in Medical Representation"

Catherine Belling, Assistant Professor of Medical Humanities & Bioethics. will be on campus to discuss "Gross and Gruesome:  The Graphic in Medical Representation" at 6:30 p.m. in the Kennedy Center Ballroom

March 1-11, 2012: An Exploration of Disease or Disorder by Performance: Autism

Hiram College students will tour a performance piece called "It's Okay" about autism they created during the Fall 2011 12-week during their Spring Break, March 5 – 11, 2012 to area high schools, colleges, libraries, and other places as appropriate.  For more information or to have them perform at your organization or school, contact Brittany Jackson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

Wednesday, February 29, 2012: "The Republican War on Science"

Chris Mooney, Author of Author of The Republican War on Science and Senior Correspondent for The American Prospect Magazine will be on campus to discuss "The Republican War on Science." This event is co-sponsored by the Center for Engaged Ethics and the Center for Deciphering Life's Languages, and will take place at 7 p.m. in the Kennedy Center Ballroom.

Monday, February 27, 2012:  "Molding Ourselves Free: 8 Autists  Break Their Silence"

DJ Savarese, an autist, memoirist, poet, and playwright will be on campus to discuss "Molding Ourselves Free: 8 Autists  Break Their Silence" at 6:30 p.m. in the Garfield Meeting House.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012: "Bullying Prevention: A Matter of Life and Death."

The 2012 Margaret Clark Morgan Scholar, Dr. Lisa Pescara-Kovach, Associate Professor of Educational Psychology in the Department of Educational Foundations and Leadership in the Judith Herb College of Education at the University of Toledo and Author of School Shootings and Suicides: Why We Must Stop the Bullies, will be on campus to discuss "Bullying Prevention:  A Matter of Life and Death." This event is co-sponsored by the Margaret Clark Morgan Foundation.

Thursday, January 19, 2012: "Graphic Medicine: The Sequential Art of Illness."

Michael Green, Professor of Humanities and Medicine at the Penn State Hershey College of Medicine, will be on campus to discuss "Graphic Medicine: The Sequential Art of Illness."

Fall 2011

November 8, 2011: Author of Atypical: My Life with Asperger's in 20 1/3 Chapters, Jesse Saperstein was on campus giving a lecture at 6:30 p.m. in the Garfield Meeting House.

October 27, 2011: Author, Tom Lutz will visit campus  at 7 p.m. in the Pritchard Room and speak on "Reading and the Electronic Marketplace."  This event is co-sponsored by the Lindsay-Crane Center for Writing and Literature.

2010-2011

July 11 - 15, 2011:  "What is Human" A humanities institute for high school teachers

June 7 - 11, 2011: On Healers and Healing Seminar

April 25, 2011: 7 p.m., Alumni Heritage Room, Teachout Price, Dr. Amy Wolfson will discuss "Take Back Sleep:  Getting through the College Years"

February 10, 2011: Margaret Clark Morgan Scholar, Dr. Edgardo Padin-Rivera will be on campus to discuss post traumatic stress disorder.

January 27, 2011: Priscilla Wald, Professor of English and Women's Studies at Duke University will be on campus to discuss "Clones, Chimeras, and Other Creatures of the Biotechnological Revolution: Or, What We Can Learn From Our Monsters" at 7 p.m. in Garfield Meeting House.

December 8, 2010: "9,000 Needles" movie screening with Director Doug Dearth on campus to answer questions in the Kennedy Center Ballroom at 7 p.m.

October 25 - 29, 2010: "The Space Between You and Me," a video installation project relating to Tourette's Syndrome in the Former Miller Dining Hall.

2009-2010

July 16-17, 2010: Summer Symposium and 20th Anniversary Celebration of the Center, "The Role of Narrative in Science and Medicine:  1990 - 2010"

Alumni Weekend, June 18-20, 2010: "The Machine Stops" course will be offered.  See a performance and have a lively discussion following!

April 27, 2010: Danielle Ofri will be holding a book signing for her book Medicine in Translation: Journeys with my Patients at Joseph-Beth Booksellers in Lyndhurst, OH

April 28, 2010: Danielle Ofri, author of Medicine in Translation: Journeys with my Patients will be on campus to work with the Narrative Bioethics class and will lecture on her experiences that evening at 7 p.m. in the Kennedy Center Ballroom

March 15, 2010: 7 p.m., Kennedy Center Ballroom - Rebecca Skloot, author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks will be on campus to discuss her book

March 1 - 5, 2010: "The Machine Stops" performance, performed by four Hiram students, will tour to northeast Ohio high schools

January 19, 2010: Margaret Clark Morgan Scholar Rabbi Dr. Abraham Twerski to discuss "Addictive Thinking"

October 30, 2009 at 9 p.m.: Fortitude, will be re-broadcast on WCPN.

November 6, 2009: The Center for Literature and Medicine celebrates the 100th anniversary of E.M. Forster's The Machine Stops and kicks off the Center's 20th anniversary year long celebrations.

October 22, 2009 at 7 p.m.: Verb Ballets to do a performance of Jeanne Bryner's play about nursing, Lift-Breathe-Carry to perform at Hiram's Dedication of the Nursing Suite.

October 19, 2009 at 7:30 p.m.: Holly Hughes and Tess Gallagher, authors of Beyond Forgetting, the latest book in the Literature and Medicine Series from KSU Press will be on campus for discussions.

September 10, 2009: Tracy Kidder, Author of Mountains Beyond Mountains Convocation, Co-Sponsored with the Center for Ethics and Values.

2008-2009

June 13, 2009: Bill W. and Dr. Bob performs at Stan Hywet in Akron, Ohio to honor Founders Day and the Anniversary of Alcoholics Anonymous

May 28-30, 2009: Performances of Jeanne Bryner's play, Lift-Breathe-Carry based on her book, Tenderly Lift Me and Cortney Davis performing readings from her latest book, The Heart's Truth will take their show on the road to Cleveland, Akron, and Pittsburgh.

April 24, 2009: Reading by the Winners of the William Carlows Williams Poetry Contest and Nationally-Known Physician-Poet Audrey Shafer at 4:00 p.m. in the Gerstacker Coleman Room.

Spring 2009: Senior Biomedical Humanities majors, Brittany Cowden, Deandra Gant, Don Tomas Leonhardt, Eddie Gisemba, Emmy Lou Dickinson, Heidi Gipson, Kay Bruss, Kristin Hom, Leah Schaffer, Melissa Wheaton, Michele Muirhead, Nicole Trainer, Raisa Janke, and Scott Simmons present their senior capstones.

February 5, 2009: Margaret Clark Morgan Visiting Scholar, John Cacioppo, Ph.D. talks about "Loneliness:  Effects on Mental and Physical Health.  What do Human Beings Need?" at 7:00 p.m. in the Kennedy Center Ballroom.

October 24, 2008: A production of Kurt Vonnegut's Fortitude is being reformatted as a radio play and will be broadcast live on the local NPR-affiliate, WCPN-FM.

October 22-23, 2008: Symposium, Return to The House of God, with world-wide, best-selling author Stephen Bergman. This event is co-sponsored by the Cleveland Clinic Foundation and is being coordinated with a Cleveland conference sponsored by the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities that begins on October 24.

October 1, 2008: Return to The House of God will be released from the Kent State University Press, series in Literature and Medicine.

2007-2008

June 2008: Three 2007 books in the Kent State University Press, series in Literature and Medicine received recognition at this year's Book Expo of America.

• Jay Baruch's short stories Fourteen Stories received Honorable Mention in the Short Stories category of the ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year Awards.
• Tom Batiuk received a bronze medal in the Most Life Changing category of the Independent Publisher Book Awards (IPPY's) and was a silver medalist in the Nautilus Book Awards; finalist in the Popular Culture category of ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year Awards for his book Lisa's Story: the other shoe.
• Sayantani DasGupta and Marsha Hurst were silver medalists in the Women's Issues category of the IPPY's; finalist in the same category of the ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year Awards for their book Stories of Illness and Healing: Women Write Their Bodies.

June 2008: Samuel Shem's The Spirit of the Place and Angela Belli's Bodies and Barriers: Dramas of Dis-ease were released from the Kent State University Press, series in Literature and Medicine.

April 24, 2008: Dr. Elissa Ely, a nationally known psychiatrist and writer specializing in the severely mentally ill and homeless population, will deliver the lecture, "Living homeless, treating homelessness." Ely works at the Massachusetts Mental Health Center, and her works have frequently appeared in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and on National Public Radio.

Spring 2008: Senior Biomedical Humanities majors Cheryl Diroll, Robert Gavazzi, Emily Hagan, Britney Koepf, Shannon Mariner, Ryan McGee, Nora Plisga, Kayleigh Sopko, Jen Strater, Erin Telepak, and Erik Wallin give their capstone presentations.

Fall 2007: Stages: Cancer and the Arts: A fall 2007 series of presentations and discussions about cancer as it is portrayed in plays, literature, comic strips and art.

November 16, 2007: A production of E.M. Forester's The Machine Stops is being reformatted as a radio play and will be broadcast on the local NPR-affiliate, WCPN-FM in the fall of 2007.

2006-2007

June 21-24, 2007: 2007 Summer Symposium on The Ethics, Politics, and Economics of Global Poverty and Health Care: an international symposium held on campus.

May 1, 2007: Convocation: a convocation by Jay Baruch, M.D.,: Doctors, Patients, and Other Strangers.

April 3, 2007:  Margaret Clark Morgan Convocation: Dr. Phillip Resnik, MD and Professor of Psychiatry at Case Western Reserve University presents a concovation entitled, The Andrea Yates Case: Insanity on Trial.

March 2007: Jay Baruch's Fourteen Stories: Doctors, Patients and Other Strangers was released from the Kent State University Press series in Literature and Medicine.

Spring 2007: Senior Biomedical Humanities majors Kevin Barnett, Alana Christlieb, Shelly Kantner, Molly Macejko, Ginny Mateo, Adam McQuaid, Sanjur Purirani and Kristin Tomblin give their capstone presentations.

November 8, 2006: NEH Challenge Grant Celebration, Introduction of new faculty member Lynn Underwood and performance of Luis by Verb Ballets, Hayden Auditorium.