Special Reports & Events
The 2009 Nora and Edward Ryerson Lecture
The 2009 Nora and Edward Ryerson Lecture took place on Wednesday, May 13, 2009 at 5:00 p.m. in Max Palevsky Cinema of Ida Noyes Hall. This year's lecture, "Connected Minds," was presented by John Cacioppo, Tiffany and Margaret Blake Distinguished Service Professor, Department of Psychology. The 2009 Ryerson Lecture is available on video.
The 2009 Nora and Edward Ryerson Lectureship Committee, which selected John Cacioppo, was chaired by Anne Robertson. W. Clark Gilpin, Milton Harris, Kathryn Levine, and Olufunmilayo Olopade served on the Committee.
History
The Ryerson Lectures grew out of a 1972 bequest to the University by Nora and Edward L. Ryerson, a former Chairman of the Board. It has become a "hallmark of the University," said Hugo Sonnenschein, President Emeritus and the Adam Smith Distinguished Service Professor in Economics and the College, because of its "rich tradition in celebrating the work of our faculty." It honors excellence in academic pursuits and the "high aspirations we hold for ourselves as a community of scholars."
The faculty selects each Ryerson Lecturer based on a consensus that a particular scholar has made research contributions of lasting significance. In return, the Ryerson Lecturer is asked to reflect on his or her intellectual life and work.
Since the Trustees established the lectures in 1973, they have become important events for the University and have been disseminated widely outside the institution. The continued success of the Ryerson Lectures depends on the quality of the nominations received, and it is the hope of the committee that every member of the faculty will give careful consideration to this matter.
Previous Ryerson Lecturers
| John Hope Franklin | 1974 | Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar | 1975 | |
| Philip B. Kurland | 1976 | Robert E. Streeter | 1977 | |
| Albert Dorfman | 1978 | Stephen Toulmin | 1979 | |
| Erica Reiner | 1980 | James M. Gustafson | 1981 | |
| Saunders MacLane | 1982 | George J. Stigler | 1983 | |
| Karl J. Weintraub | 1984 | James S. Coleman | 1985 | |
| John A. Simpson | 1986 | Wayne C. Booth | 1987 | |
| Janet D. Rowley | 1988 | Gary S. Becker | 1989 | |
| James W. Cronin | 1990 | Stuart M. Tave | 1991 | |
| Marshall D. Sahlins | 1992 | Philip Gossett | 1993 | |
| William Julius Wilson | 1994 | Wendy Doniger | 1995 | |
| Cass R. Sunstein | 1996 | Eugene N. Parker | 1997 | |
| Bernard Roizman | 1998 | David Bevington | 1999 | |
| Leo Kadanoff | 2000 | Martha McClintock | 2001 | |
| Susanne Hoeber Rudolph | 2002 | Lloyd I. Rudolph | 2002 | |
| Stephen M. Stigler | 2003 | Robert Pippin | 2004 | |
| Robert J. Richards | 2005 | Tanya M. Luhrmann | 2006 | |
| Mark Siegler | 2007 | Martha Nussbaum | 2008 | |
| John Cacioppo | 2009 |
