Lecture

Jane Goodall
categories: Lecture, Speeches
UN Messenger of Peace Dr. Jane Goodall Addresses the Climate Assembly – Aug. 14, 2023
August 14, 2023
Hello, this is Jane Goodall, and I really wish I could be with you all. I’m speaking from the house where I was brought up in the UK. I was brought up as a Christian. My grandfather was a congregational minister. We went to church and worshiped God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost. But my wise mother told me that if I’d been born to a Jewish family, I’d worship Jehovah, to a Muslim family, Allah, to a Native American family, the Creator, and so […]
Sarah Parker Remond
categories: Lecture, Speeches
American Slavery and its Influence on Great Britain – Aug. 14-21, 1861
August 14, 1861
The Influence of nation upon nation can scarcely be over-estimated since steam has brought the inhabitants of distant countries into more intimate relations with each other. No two countries separated by the same distance have been more closely connected through many channels than the States of North America and Great Britain, and the influence of national character becomes a matter of serious importance. Chattel slavery as it exists in the Southern States of North America is the colossal evil, the prolific source which has corrupted the public opinion throughout the […]
Sarah Parker Remond
categories: Lecture, Speeches
Why Slavery is Still Rampant in the Land – Sept. 14, 1859
September 14, 1859
An open public lecture delivered by Sarah Parker Remond on September 14, 1859, at the Manchester Athenaeum in Manchester, England. Although the anti-slavery enterprise was begun some thirty years ago, the evil is still rampant in the land. As there are some young people present — and I am glad to see them here for, it is important that they shall understand this subject — I shall briefly explain that there are thirty-two states, sixteen of which are free and sixteen slave-states. The free states are in the north. The political […]
Audre Lorde
categories: Lecture, Speeches
The Transformation of Silence into Language and Action – Dec. 28, 1977
December 28, 1977
Audre Lorde first delivered this speech on December 28, 1977, during the Lesbian and Literature panel at the Modern Language association conference in Chicago. I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood. That the speaking profits me, beyond any other effect. I am standing here as a black lesbian poet, and the meaning of all that waits upon the fact that I am still alive, […]
Audre Lorde
categories: Lecture, Speeches, Written Works
The Master's Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master's House - Oct. 29, 1979
October 29, 1979
Delivered at the Second Sex Conference in New York, Lorde critiques the presences of racism and homophobia within feminism and argues that true liberation cannot be achieved using patriarchal frameworks. I agreed to take part in a New York University Institute for the Humanities conference a year ago, with the understanding that I would be commenting upon papers dealing with the role of difference within the lives of American women: difference of race, sexuality, class, and age. The absence of these considerations weakens any feminist discussion of the personal and […]
Ida B Wells-Barnett
categories: Lecture, Speeches
The Requisites of True Leadership – Dec. 29, 1891
December 29, 1891
Mr. President: — I do not know how the subject which has been given me is to harmonize with aims of this Association, unless it be that it recognizes that the race whose youth we are engaged in teaching Is without the one great essential of elevation and progress — True Leadership — and that from the schools and colleges here represented must come the true leaders of the people. Humanity in all ages has been a disorganized mass of power until driven by some great molecular force into cohesion […]
Monica Lewinsky
categories: Lecture, Speeches
The Price of Shame - March 19, 2015
March 19, 2015
You're looking at a woman who was publicly silent for a decade. Obviously, that's changed, but only recently. It was several months ago that I gave my very first major public talk at the Forbes 30 Under 30 summit: 1,500 brilliant people, all under the age of 30. That meant that in 1998, the oldest among the group were only 14, and the youngest, just four. I joked with them that some might only have heard of me from rap songs. Yes, I'm in rap songs. Almost 40 rap songs. […]
Cecile Richards
categories: Lecture, Speeches
The Political Progress Women Have Made and What's Next - Nov. 30, 2018
November 30, 2018
Nearly 100 years ago, almost today, most women in the United States finally won the right to vote. Now, it would take decades more for women of color to earn that right, and we've come a long way since, but I would argue not nearly far enough. I think what women want today, not just only in the United States but around the globe, is to no longer be an afterthought. We don't want to continue to try to, like, look at the next 100 years and be granted, grudgingly, […]
Winona LaDuke
categories: Lecture, Speeches
Seed Sovereignty: Who Owns the Seeds of the World - Feb. 9, 2022
February 9, 2022
[Greeting in Native language] Hello my relatives. Can you hear me okay there? Someone give me like a thumbs up. [Audience Member] We can hear you. [LaDuke] Okay. Thank you. I'm honored to be with you tonight. I'm pretty much due north of you – the deep north, as we call it on the White Earth Reservation in Northern Minnesota. And binesi-ikwe – that's my name in Anishinaabemowin – Thunderbird woman, and I’m bear clan. I live here on Round Lake and I'm really especially honored to talk to you […]
Debra Haaland
categories: Lecture, Speeches
Who Speaks for You? - Dec. 22, 2016
December 22, 2016
I am a descendant of farmers. My ancestors followed the rivers to the pueblos of Pecos Laguna and Hamish to sing, plant, and live. Their hard work, preservice, and love have led me to here, to help diverse voices find a place in our community. But it may not have happened that way, because at one point the federal government thought it a great idea to move Indian into mainstream society. It happened in many ways. My grandpa he bought part of that argument, but he took most of assimilation […]