Virtual Event | State of Our Union: Telling the American Story (Mellon Foundation & Smithsonian Inst.)

Event Details

End: January 26, 2023
Contact: events@mellon.org
More Info: https://stateofourunion.splashthat.com/MellonEvents

State of Our Union: Telling the American Story  — An Online Event Co-Presented by Mellon Foundation and the Smithsonian Institution 
Mellon Foundation President Elizabeth Alexander and Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III in Conversation
Thursday, January 26, 2023
4:00 PM ET

Two luminaries in American history and culture are coming together for a conversation about how we can better tell and share our stories. Dr. Elizabeth Alexander, President of the Mellon Foundation, will be joined by Smithsonian Secretary Lonnie G. Bunch III, the founding director of the National Museum of African American History and Culture, who created a museum that tells the American story through the lens of African American life, history, and culture. They will explore how momentum in African American studies, public history, and museums have unlocked an American story with room for all.

This conversation aims to ask: how can the arts and humanities help us better tell our stories to each other, and to future generations? What unique tools and truths do they grant as we learn to see and make sense of the complexities of the American story?
 
We hope you can join Dr. Alexander and Secretary Bunch for a “State of Our Union” discussion where they share their knowledge as builders of scholarship and institutions that have opened a fuller understanding of history and culture in the US, and how we can better craft an American story with room for all.