Signature Event Archive: Audio

Search the Signature Event Archive to discover past Library events. Watch videos, hear speaker interviews, and listen to audio recordings of previous presentations. Search by keyword (event title, subject, or presenter name), location or by date range.
Signature Event Video Video Signature Event Audio Audio Signature Event Interview Interviews
E.g., 2018-07-22
E.g., 2018-07-22

Rendezvous With Oblivion

Thomas Frank is a liberal by conviction but an equal-opportunity critic of America’s foundering political system. In a discussion of his new book Rendezvous With Oblivion: Reports From a Sinking Society, a selection of Frank’s essays from 2011 to 2018, he looks at a country divided and in disrepair, undone by folly and exploitation.

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Tuesday, July 17, 2018
Program: 
6:30 pm
Plaza Branch
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Event Audio

Lucile Bluford: Her National Closeup

Sheila Brooks, a Kansas City native and former TV personality who now heads the Washington, D.C.-based SRB Communications, discusses her new book Lucile H. Bluford and the Kansas City Call: Activist Voice for Social Justice – written to acquaint a national audience with the iconic KC journalist and activist.
 
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Sheila Brooks, a Kansas City native and former TV personality who now heads the Washington, D.C.-based SRB Communications, discusses her new book Lucile H. Bluford and the Kansas City Call: Activist Voice for Social Justice – written to acquaint a national audience with the iconic KC journalist and activist.
Wednesday, July 11, 2018
Reception: 
6 pm
Program: 
6:30 pm
Central Library
Event Audio

Uncovering Shakespeare's 'Inspiration'

It appears to be the find of a lifetime. Shakespeareans worldwide were electrified earlier this year by the announced discovery of a previously unknown source—or inspiration—for many of the works of William Shakespeare. Researcher Dennis McCarthy and colleague June Schlueter made the case that the Bard drew repeatedly from a manuscript written in the late 1500s by a courtier of Elizabeth I. Using plagiarism-detecting software, they identified unique storylines and ideas in both the earlier document and Shakespeare’s works.

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Researcher Dennis McCarthy discusses this year’s discovery of a lifetime by him and an academic colleague – that Shakespeare apparently drew repeatedly in his works from an unpublished, late-1500s manuscript. The literary sleuths employed plagiarism-detecting software.
Tuesday, June 26, 2018
Reception: 
6 pm
Program: 
6:30 pm
Plaza Branch
Event Audio

The Ordinance Project: KC's LGBT Landmark

City council member Katheryn Shields and other panelists take a 25-year look back at Kansas City’s landmark decision to expand its Civil Rights Ordinance in June 1993, barring discrimination against lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and people with HIV/AIDS. Filmmaker Austin Williams weaves in footage of his upcoming documentary The Ordinance Project.
 
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City council member Katheryn Shields and other panelists take a 25-year look back at Kansas City’s landmark decision to expand its Civil Rights Ordinance in June 1993, barring discrimination against lesbians, gays, bisexuals, and people with HIV/AIDS. Filmmaker Austin Williams weaves in footage of his upcoming documentary The Ordinance Project.
Wednesday, June 6, 2018
Reception: 
6 pm
Program: 
6:30 pm
Plaza Branch
Event Audio

Breaking the News: KC’s Changing Mediascape

Representatives of the Kansas City area’s journalism community examine a local media landscape buffeted by dwindling revenues, cost-saving cuts in staff and resources, and increasingly splintered audiences, assessing what lies ahead for journalism in the region. KMBZ Radio’s Dana Wright moderates the discussion.
 
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Representatives of the Kansas City area’s journalism community examine a local media landscape buffeted by dwindling revenues, cost-saving cuts in staff and resources, and increasingly splintered audiences, assessing what lies ahead for journalism in the region. KMBZ Radio’s Dana Wright moderates the discussion.
Thursday, May 24, 2018
Program: 
6:30 pm
Plaza Branch
Event Audio

An Evening with Tracy K. Smith

U.S. Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith discusses her life and poetry and reads from her works on the heels of the release of her latest book, Wade in the Water.
 
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U.S. Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith discusses her life and poetry and reads from her works on the heels of the release of her latest book, Wade in the Water.
Friday, May 11, 2018
Reception: 
6 pm
Program: 
6:30 pm
Central Library
Event Audio

Forgiving and Forgetting: Shakespeare and Power

McMeel Family Shakespeare Series

The University of Notre Dame’s Peter Holland, one of the world’s foremost authorities on Shakespeare, examines the great playwright’s skill at subtly raising questions that resonate to this day. What does it mean, for example, to “forgive and forget?” Why do we (and did King Lear) say it?
 

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The University of Notre Dame’s Peter Holland, one of the world’s foremost authorities on Shakespeare, examines the great playwright’s skill at subtly raising questions that resonate to this day. What does it mean, for example, to “forgive and forget?” Why do we (and did King Lear) say it?
Tuesday, April 24, 2018
Reception: 
6 pm
Program: 
6:30 pm
Plaza Branch
Event Audio

Break Beats in the Bronx: Rediscovering Hip-Hop's Early Years

Hip-hop is now America’s most popular music genre, supplanting rock. In a discussion of his new book, Davidson College sociologist Joseph Ewoodzie examines its roots, going back to hip-hop’s creation by Clive Campbell – DJ Kool Herc – at a birthday party in New York’s West Bronx in 1973.

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Hip-hop is now America’s most popular music genre, supplanting rock. In a discussion of his new book, Davidson College sociologist Joseph Ewoodzie examines its roots, going back to hip-hop’s creation by Clive Campbell – DJ Kool Herc – at a birthday party in New York’s West Bronx in 1973.
Tuesday, March 27, 2018
Program: 
6:30 pm
Central Library
Event Audio

The Smart Math of Urban Development

Making a Great City
Urban planner Joe Minicozzi looks at the “math” of effective city building – the financial implications of land use decisions in municipalities like Kansas City – in the second installment of the Making a Great City series. Needed: development patterns that create the most valuable and resilient revenue sources.
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Urban planner Joe Minicozzi looks at the “math” of effective city building – the financial implications of land use decisions in municipalities like Kansas City – in the second installment of the Making a Great City series. Needed: development patterns that create the most valuable and resilient revenue sources.
Thursday, March 8, 2018
Program: 
6:30 pm
Plaza Branch
Event Audio

Freedom, Inc. and Black Political Empowerment

Missouri Valley Sundays

Micah W. Kubic, who heads the American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas, discusses his book about Freedom, Inc., and its more than half-century history of raising the visibility of issues impacting Kansas City’s black community and helping to elect African-Americans to political office.

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Micah W. Kubic, who heads the American Civil Liberties Union of Kansas, discusses his book about Freedom, Inc., and its more than half-century history of raising the visibility of issues impacting Kansas City’s black community and helping to elect African-Americans to political office.
Sunday, March 4, 2018
Program: 
2:00 pm
Central Library
Event Audio

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