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Ford Hall Forum

The Ford Hall Forum is the nation's oldest continuously operating free public lecture series. Its mission is to foster an informed and effective citizenry and to promote freedom of speech through the public presentation of lectures, debates, and discussions. Forum events illuminate the key issues facing our society by bringing to its podium knowledgeable and thought-provoking speakers. These speakers are presented in person, for free, and in settings, which facilitate frank and open debate.

http://www.fordhallforum.org/

Virtual

Nicholas Nugent with The Spice Ports: Mapping the Origins of Global Sea Trade

6:00pm Tue, Jan 14, 2025

Join Ford Hall Forum at Suffolk University, in partnership with Brandeis University Press and American Ancestors for a wide-ranging discussion about a fascinating period of global history as experts from both sides of the Atlantic discuss maritime commerce--the innovation, benefits, and damages of the spice trade.

Learn how the drive of sea captains, worldwide consumers’ taste, and technical innovations—improvements in ship design, compasses, and mapping— enabled navigation across unprecedented distances, from such embarkation points as Venice, Amsterdam, Lisbon to the exotic ports of Malacca, Goa, Bombay, where they tracked down elusive spices. Such travels impacted art, literature, and science worldwide; and they were often disastrous for local populations, who were frequently exploited as slave plantation labor. This wide-ranging account of a fascinating period of global history uses original maps and contemporary artists’ views to tell the story of how each port developed individually; while also encouraging us to consider contrasting points of view of the benefits and the damages of the maritime spice trade.

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Ford Hall Forum American Ancestors
Truth in the Age of Disinformation, Misinformation, and AI

Tue, Oct 1, 2024

The 11th annual Masterman Speaker Series event presented by Suffolk University Law School, titled "Truth in the Age of Disinformation, Misinformation, and AI", explores truth in an age of rapid and ever-expanding access to extensive amounts of information from a myriad of sources of varying reliability.

This year, the Masterman Speaker Series will examine how influential members of society, including the media, lawyers, and journalists/journalism schools, are adjusting – or are trying to adjust – to this brave new world, where people are increasingly relying on sources that may have been generated by AI, that may be tainted by disinformation and/or misinformation, and that may be coming from outside the fourth estate.

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Miles Borrero with 'Beautiful Monster'

Thu, Nov 21, 2024

Ford Hall Forum at Suffolk University welcomes author Miles Borrero, upon the publication of his new book Beautiful Monster: A Becoming. The afternoon’s moderator is Pascale Florestal, director, dramaturge, and education director and associate producer of The Front Porch Arts Collective.

Nearing the age of forty, with an entire life already lived as a woman—half in Colombia, half in the US—Miles Borrero comes face to face with his father’s impending death. Suddenly realizing that he has been stalling his transition for fear of losing his family’s love, this moment catalyzes Miles’s determination to be fully known as his father’s son before it is too late.

In Beautiful Monster, Miles chronicles his unusual childhood, by turns riveting and hilarious, in ’80s and ’90s Colombia during the Pablo Escobar years, as well as his move to Salt Lake City to pursue acting and the winding trajectory that eventually lands him in the New York City yoga scene. Within these very different cultures, the realities of being queer and trans echo poignantly through the triumphs, heartbreaks, family dynamics, spiritual pursuits, and relationships that propel Miles along his path.

Sublimely nuanced and written in ravishing prose that is as unique and irresistible as its subject, Beautiful Monster is one person’s story of navigating the pressures to perform femininity while becoming a gender outlaw. Brimming with wonder, humor, and mythos, entertaining and enlightening in equal measure, this book offers a compelling case for embracing one’s true nature.

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Jehuda Reinharz with "Chaim Weizmann: A Biography"

Thu, Nov 14, 2024

Ford Hall Forum at Suffolk University and Brandeis University Press welcome
Jehuda Reinharz, PhD, upon the publication of his latest book, Chaim Weizmann: A Biography, in conversation with Alexander Kaye, PhD.

In Chaim Weizmann: A Biography, Jehuda Reinharz and Motti Golani show how Weizmann, a leader of the World Zionist Organization who became the first president of Israel, advocated for a Jewish state by gaining the support of influential politicians and statesmen as well as Jews around the world. Beginning with his childhood and concluding with his tenure as president, Reinharz and Golani describe how a Russian Jew, who immigrated to the United Kingdom in the early twentieth century, was able to advance the goals of Theodor Herzl, the founder of the Zionist Organization. Weizmann is also shown as a man of human foibles – his infatuations, political machinations and elitism – as well as a man of admirable qualities – intelligence, wit, charisma, and dedication.

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Children on the Move - The History of Stark Solutions to Address Inequality in Boston Schools

Thu, Nov 7, 2024

Susan E. Eaton, in conversation about her book, The Other Boston Busing Story: What’s Won and Lost Across the Boundary Line.

METCO, America’s longest-running voluntary school desegregation program, buses children of color from Boston’s city neighborhoods to predominantly white suburban schools. In contrast to the infamous violence and rage that greeted forced school busing within the city in the 1970s, the work of METCO has quietly and calmly promoted school integration. But how has this program affected the lives of its graduates? Would they choose to participate if they had it to do over again? Would they place their own children on the bus to suburbia? In The Other Boston Busing Story, sixty-five METCO graduates who are now adults answer those questions and more, vividly recalling their own stories and assessing the benefits and hardships of crossing racial and class lines on their way to school.

Susan Eaton will be in conversation with Stephanie Leydon, executive producer of digital video at GBH News.

The book talk will be preceded by the screening of the GBH News documentary Never Cried: Boston's Busing Legacy and a talkback with the filmmaker Emily Judem.

More about the film here.

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Busing Crisis in Boston, Boston Busing at 50

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We Can Get Through This: Navigating a Divided Country in a Time of Great Uncertainty

Mon, Oct 28, 2024

How do Americans navigate an election with so much at stake including the very future of democracy? Half the country will view the outcome as an existential threat to their identities, values, and concept of what it is to be an American. How do we stay true to our values while keeping our country together no matter the outcome? How do we build and maintain relationships of respect and dignity anchored in democratic values and norms?

Join Monica McWilliams, founder of the Northern Ireland Women’s Coalition and key negotiator in the Northern Ireland peace process and Donna Hicks, of the Weatherhead Center at Harvard University and the author of the acclaimed book, Leading with Dignity: How to Create a Culture That Brings Out the Best in People as they discuss the state of our country on the eve of the November election. The moderator is Tim Phillips, founder and CEO of Beyond Conflict, who has worked globally to promote peace and reconciliation through the model of Shared Human Experience.

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Arlie Russell Hochschild with Stolen Pride

Sat, Oct 26, 2024

Suffolk University's Ford Hall Forum presents author Arlie Russell Hochschild, Ph.D., one of the most influential scholars of her generation upon the publication of her latest book, Stolen Pride: Loss, Shame, and the Rise of the Right in conversation with award-winning author James Carroll.

In her first book since the widely acclaimed Strangers in Their Own Land, National Book Award finalist and bestselling author Arlie Russell Hochschild now ventures to Appalachia, uncovering the “pride paradox” that has given the right’s appeals such resonance. For all the attempts to understand the state of American politics and the blue/red divide, we’ve ignored what economic and cultural loss can do to pride. What happens, Arlie Russell Hochschild asks, when a proud people in a hard-hit region suffer the deep loss of pride and are confronted with a powerful political appeal that makes it feel “stolen”?

Hochschild’s research drew her to Pikeville, Kentucky, in the heart of Appalachia, within the whitest and second-poorest congressional district in the nation, where the city was reeling: coal jobs had left, crushing poverty persisted, and a deadly drug crisis struck the region.

In Stolen Pride, Hochschild focuses on a group swept up in the shifting political landscape: blue-collar men. In small churches, hillside hollers, roadside diners, trailer parks, and Narcotics Anonymous meetings, Hochschild introduces us to unforgettable people, and offers an original lens through which to see them and the wider world. In Stolen Pride, Hochschild incisively explores our dangerous times, even as she also points a way forward.

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Edward O’Keefe with 'The Loves of Theodore Roosevelt', the Women Who Created a President

Mon, Oct 21, 2024

In this evening focused on women’s and family history, Edward F. O’Keefe shines light on the women who “created” President Roosevelt—the impact and influence of, among others, his mother, sisters, and his wives.
The Loves of Theodore Roosevelt is based on dozens of interviews with descendants, thousands of archives, and new discoveries at Harvard University and Roosevelt’s home.
Following an illustrated presentation comprised of new and exclusive photographs, O’Keefe is in conversation with the Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Debby Applegate.

Presented by American Ancestors’ American Inspiration series in partnership with Ford Hall Forum at Suffolk University and GBH Forum Network.

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Countdown to November 5: America’s Next Most Unprecedented Presidential Election

Fri, Oct 18, 2024

The 2024 presidential election cycle has been an almost literal rollercoaster ride. Join renowned pollster David Paleologos of Suffolk University's Political Research Center who will discuss the most recent Suffolk University survey results, the crucial issues motivating voters, and the key demographics that could make-or-break this next most unprecedented presidential election.

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Diane Dimond with 'We're Here to Help: When Guardianship Goes Wrong'

Thu, Oct 10, 2024

The state-run guardianship system, called conservatorship in some states, is largely unregulated, ill-understood, and increasingly populated by financially motivated predators. Just how guardianship works and its real-life effects remained a mystery to most until the very public case of pop star Britney Spears. It suddenly became clear that those conscripted into the system lose all their civil rights in the process. Currently, there are an estimated 1.5 to 2 million Americans under court control, but no one can say for sure how many are affected because no government entity keeps track of citizens who have lost the right to determine their own fate.

Established in the late 1800s, the guardianship system was designed to assist the most vulnerable citizens: the elderly and the physically or intellectually disabled. While guardianship has been beneficial to many “wards of the court,” this little-understood process can be a judicial rollercoaster from which there is seldom an escape, and which often leads to financial devastation for the ward. Each year, fifty billion dollars belonging to wards are placed under the control of court appointees, tempting bad actors. As investigative journalist Diane Dimond discovers, the number of exploitive and abusive guardianship cases nationwide demands our urgent attention.

Explosive and compelling, We're Here to Help tells the human stories behind the headlines and shows how to avoid the risks of voluntary or involuntary guardianship.

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