Wayne Flynt, professor emeritus in the department of history at Auburn University, is the author of eleven books, and one of the most recognized and honored scholars of Southern history, politics, and religion. His latest, published in 2017, is Mockingbird Songs: My Friendship with Harper Lee. He has also published his memoir Keeping the Faith: Ordinary People, Extraordinary Lives, in which he writes about his experiences in the Civil Rights movement.

Friday evening, Irish poet Paul Muldoon will give a free public reading and musical performance at the 40 Watt Club to close the year-long 30th anniversary celebration of the UGA Willson Center for Humanities and Arts.

Earlier in the day, the Hargrett Library will host a display of books of poetry from its private press collection including Encheiresin Naturae, an edition of Paul Muldoon’s crown of sonnets written to accompany the wood engravings by Barry Moser.

Muldoon, who has been called “the most significant English-language poet born since the second World War” by The Times Literary Supplement, will drop in to the event around 2 p.m. He has published more than 30 collections of poetry and has been awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the T. S. Eliot Prize. He held the post of Oxford Professor of Poetry from 1999 to 2004.

This one-day exhibit June 2 will highlight some of the more fragile and rare items held by the Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library. Some of the items include: Babylonian clay tablets, 17th-century Persian manuscript of the Mathnawi, Reed Creek collection of Dahlonega gold coins, original Constitution of the Confederate States of America, list of Georgia settlers recorded by the Trustees for Establishing the Colony, and a 1489 edition of St. Augustine's De civitate dei.

The materials will be in the Hargrett Galleries 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.

Also, enjoy a “sneak-peek” of the upcoming exhibitions War of Words a look at propaganda posters from the First World War.

Parking is available in the Hull Street Deck.

Is America better served by a free trade agenda or protectionist measures? Author C. Donald Johnson will examine the history of trade politics, the focus of his new book from Oxford University Press, in a lecture on Tuesday, April 17 at 4 p.m. in the large event space of the Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries.

Can the American Congress be ethical in an age of intense partisan warfare? Princeton University professor and CNN political analyst Julian E. Zelizer will take up the topic of ethics in Congress on Thursday, April 5 at 4 p.m. in the auditorium of the Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries.

Rodney Mills and Michele Caplinger share observations of the changing face of the Georgia Music scene with the director of the UGA Music Business Program, David Barbe.

The April 12 program will begin at 4 p.m. in the auditorium of the Russell Special Collections Libraries, followed by a small reception with a display of artifacts from the Georgia Music Hall of Fame collection.

Mills served as chief engineer at Lefevre Sound Studios, engineered and produced at Atlanta’s Studio One before forming his own recording company. He has earned over 50 gold and platinum records for engineering, producing, and mastering and was inducted into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame in 1996.

What do the U.S. Navy, the National School Lunch Program, and the former Soviet Union have in common? Why, peanuts of course!

Local chefs will once again take on the School Lunch Challenge March 24, creating tasty dishes that meet USDA requirements for the National School Lunch Program. Attendees will have a chance to sample the creations at the cooking competition from 12-1:30 p.m. in the cafeteria of Whitehead Road Elementary School.  

The 2018 UGA Women's History Month keynote address will be presented by Andrea J. Ritchie. Her talk is co-sponsored by the Lucy Hargrett Draper Center and Archives for the Study of the Rights of Women in History and Law.

Andrea Ritchie is a black lesbian immigrant and police misconduct attorney and organizer who has engaged in extensive research, writing, and advocacy around criminalization of women and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people of color over the past two decades. She recently published Invisible No More: Police Violence Against Black Women and Women of Color now available from Beacon Press.

Ritchie is a nationally recognized expert and sought after commentator on policing issues. 

She will speak March 1 beginning at 6:30 p.m. in the auditorium of the Russell Special Collections Libraries. It is open free to the public.

“Open Doors: 100 Years of Family and Consumer Sciences at UGA” an exhibit on the college’s centennial, also focuses on the admission of women to public higher education, UGA’s role as a land-grant institution, and how the field has grown and adapted over the decades.

The exhibit, at the Richard B. Russell Building Special Collections Libraries, will be on display through June and includes publications, manuscripts, period clothing from the Historic Clothing and Textile Collection, and photographs of the first women admitted to UGA, food preservation classes, needlework demonstrations, WWII military on the UGA campus and other moments from the past 100 years.