The below message was sent to faculty, staff, and students on January 29, 2026.
Dear Campus Community,
Bryn Mawr is honored to host a range of leading thinkers, artists, and scientists on campus this semester. We want to draw your attention to a few of these and encourage you to mark your calendars now for the ones you will not want to miss. Several of these guests will visit classes or hold faculty workshops during their campus visits.
We are pleased to launch the Presidential Speaker Series, which aims to bring influential thought leaders from various fields to campus to offer insights on important issues of our time. The first event will be held on February 24, featuring Beverly Daniel Tatum, psychologist and former president of Spelman College, at 7:00 p.m. in the Old Library Great Hall. Tim Powers (March 3), Vice President for Government Relations and Policy Development at the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, will speak on "Eye on Washington: Federal Higher Education Policy Pressures and the Path Ahead" at 11:30 a.m. in Old Library, Great Hall.
The Provost’s Office and Creative Writing Program will host a series of talks about "Bryn Mawr and the Public," featuring the following speakers:
- Arwa Mahdawi, Feb. 25: Author of the book Strong Female Lead: Lessons from Women in Power and a columnist for the Guardian, Arwa will give a public reading from 4:15 to 5:15 p.m. in the Ely Room. She will also hold a workshop for student journalists during her visit.
- Susan D’Agostino, March 4: Susan is a mathematician and writer whose book, How To Free Your Inner Mathematician, received the Mathematical Association of America's Euler Book Prize for an exceptionally well-written book with a positive impact on the public’s view of math. Her forthcoming book is How Math Will Save Your Life. She will speak from 4:15 to 5:15 p.m. in the Ely Room. She will also be holding a faculty workshop from 12 to 1 p.m. in the Dorothy Vernon Room.
- Leonard Cassuto, April 16: Leonard is a professor of English at Fordham University who writes regularly for The Chronicle about graduate education. His newest book is Academic Writing as if Readers Matter, and he co-wrote, with Robert Weisbuch, The New Ph.D.: How to Build a Better Graduate Education. He will give a public reading from 4:15 to 5:15 p.m. in the Ely Room and hold a faculty workshop from 12 to 1 p.m. in the Ely Room.
This semester's Reading Series, organized by Creative Writing, will welcome: Claire Messud (Feb. 18), novelist and the Joseph Y. Bae and Janice Lee Senior Lecturer on Fiction at Harvard University; Rachel Eliza Griffiths (March 18), author of The Flower Bearers; Safiya Sinclair (April 1) author of Cannibal and How to Say Babylon, and professor of creative writing at Arizona State University; and Rita Dove (April 13), former U.S. Poet Laureate and the Henry Hoyns Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Virginia.
The president's and provost's offices will welcome Regina Marie Mills (Feb. 4), assistant professor of Latinx and multi-ethnic literature at Texas A&M University, who will speak at 12:30 p.m in the Quita Woodward Seminar Room. Her visit is part of the Black Studies Speaker Series.
Africana Studies will be welcoming the following speakers: Daniel J. Ferman-Leon (Feb. 25), a postdoctoral fellow here at Bryn Mawr; Reena N. Goldthree (March 4), associate professor of African American studies at Princeton University; Melanie Y. White (March 18), assistant professor of Afro-Caribbean studies at Georgetown University; and Prisca Gayles (April 15), assistant professor of sociology and gender, race, and identity studies at the University of Nevada, Reno.
Several departments will host Beeta Baghoolizadeh (Feb. 2), associate research scholar at Columbia University’s Middle East Institute, for a 1 p.m. presentation on "The Color Black: Enslavement and Erasure in Iran," in Old Library.
A group of Bryn Mawr and Haverford departments will hold the Text and Textuality Symposium (March 21), meeting from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. in Old Library 225.
French and Francophone Studies will host The Self and Other in Francophone Cinema Series on March 3, March 31, and April 14.
The Russian Department will host Olga Bukhina (March 18), a translator, writer, and children's book specialist, who will discuss "The Otherness: Russian Teen Novel Now and Then," from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. in Old Library, 224.
German Studies will host Evan Torner (Feb. 23), associate professor in German studies and the Niehoff Professor of Film & Media Studies at the University of Cincinnati, who will discuss "Frictional Race Representation in Cold War German-Language Cinema" beginning at 4:10 p.m. in Carpenter Library, B21.
The math departments of Bryn Mawr and Haverford will mark Meet a Mathematician Day by hosting Rosemarie Bongers (Feb. 21), assistant teaching professor at University of California, Merced, from 9:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. in Rooms 243 and 245 of the Park Science Building.
This impressive group of visitors will surely enrich conversations across campus among faculty and students alike.
Sincerely,
Wendy Cadge
President and Professor of Sociology
Dee Matthews
Provost and Professor of Creative Writing
