On September 26, The Murphy Institute’s Center for Ethics hosted 2024-2025’s first Public Lecture featuring Nicholas Buccola, Professor of Government at Claremont McKenna College. Prof. Buccola’s research on American political thought, particularly autobiographical reflections on race and American identity.
In his lecture, Buccola explained how love is a central concept to James Baldwin; love is pervasive in his fiction and nonfiction writing and was central to his career as an activist. Buccola explored how love, for Baldwin, at once demands radical empathy and radical confrontation—directed toward ourselves and others.
To understand how this complicated understanding of love informs Baldwin’s thoughts about patriotism—what it means to love a country, what it means to love place, what it means to love ‘home’—Buccola discussed how this notion of love emerges in Baldwin’s relationship through two lenses: through his relationship with his father and during his journey to the South, prompted by the events in the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board of Education decision.
Professor Buccola has published numerous books and articles investigating themes at the intersection of political science, philosophy, race, identity, and literary criticism. The Center for Ethics public lectures are free and open to the public.
He is the author of The Fire Is Upon Us: James Baldwin, William F. Buckley Jr., and the Debate over Race in America (Princeton University, 2019) and The Political Thought of Frederick Douglass: In Pursuit of American Liberty (New York University Press, 2012).
In addition, he is the editor of The Essential Douglass: Writings and Speeches (Hackett, 2016) and Abraham Lincoln and Liberal Democracy (University Press of Kansas, 2016).
Buccola’s next book, One Man's Freedom: Goldwater, King, and the Battle over an American Ideal will be published by Princeton University Press in 2025.
This event was co-sponsored by Baldwin & Co. Coffee and Books.
The Public Lecture Series: A Platform for Thought Leadership
The Public Lecture Series, hosted by The Murphy Institute’s Center for Ethics, serves as a vital platform for intellectual exchange. It brings together scholars and practitioners from a broad range of intellectual and professional disciplines and concerned citizens to engage with pressing ethical questions. The Center for Ethics public lectures are free and open to the public.
