Video Lectures

This lecture was part of the Institute for Advanced Study’s celebration of its eightieth anniversary, and took place during the events related to the Schools of Historical Studies and Social Science.

In this talk, Danielle S. Allen, UPS Foundation Professor in the School of Social Science, and Angelos Chaniotis, Professor in the School of Historical Studies, present arguments from two perspectives for the continued relevance of antiquity to...

Archaeologists working in China often correlate archaeological finds with ancient ethnic groups, thereby attempting to define the latter through material traits. In this lecture, Lothar von Falkenhausen, Professor of the History of Art at the...

The basic problem of all pictures is grounded in their bipolar existence. They are created objects, but nonetheless present themselves as physical beings. This paradoxical double-structure is exemplified in the “ME FECIT” of numberless inscriptions...

In the aftermath of several great imperial expansions, especially those of the Arabs and the Europeans, one sees the phenomenon of the native who has accepted the religion and/or culture of the hegemonic foreigners, only to rediscover his native...

Ancient Egyptian artworks were typically made by people of unknown name, for extremely small audiences. The only form that had wide visibility was large-scale architecture, but it often presented a message of exclusion. The production of aesthetic...

Is the Qur’an an exclusively Islamic text? In this talk, Angelika Neuwirth, a Professor at the Freie Universität Berlin and a Member (2009) in the School of Historical Studies, contends that it is both Islamic and late antique. Before the Qur’an...

Peter Paret, Professor Emeritus in the School of Historical Studies, will discuss aspects of the work of the sculptor and dramatist Ernst Barlach, a major figure in German modernism. As independent in his politics as in his art, he opposed National...

Albert Einstein is credited with the warning: "Beware of rotten compromises." In this talk, Avishai Margalit, George F. Kennan Professor in the School of Historical Studies, attempts to explain and support this principle. Professor Margalit...

Jonathan Israel, Professor, School of Historical Studies. In the 1660s and onward, the Radical Enlightenment pushed for full freedom of thought, religious freedom, and personal liberty together with democracy and the principle of equality. In this...