The Society of Fellows has selected Pedagogy of the Deed as the theme for the spring 2026 edition of the Thursday Lecture Series.

Spring 2026 Thursday Lecture Series: Pedagogy of the Deed
Comment from the Fellows:

Drawing on Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1968) alongside the anarchist principle of “propaganda by the deed,” the 2026 Thursday Lecture Series invites reflections on the relationship between education and action. Two theoretical paradigms undergird this theme— both invested with renewed urgency in the context of ongoing political crises. The first is the inherently political nature of pedagogy, as manifest in Freire’s vision of the co-intentional and mutually humanizing act of reality formation enacted together by students and teachers. The second is the pedagogic and affective force of deeds themselves—spectacular actions that announce their intention to inform, to educate, and to inspire.

Bearing these paradigms in mind, the series aims to think through theory and praxis concurrently and to broaden the sites of education and analysis beyond the academy. We will ask how political actions (seek to) educate and how we, as humanities scholars and educators, are implicated in their interpretation and narration. We will ask how the humanities classroom operates as a site for acts of interpretation attuned to contradicting viewpoints, positions, and modes of being. We will ask how students and teachers—as well as activists and academics— engage in the co-production of knowledge and collaborate in processes aimed at mutual humanization. In short, Pedagogy of the Deed aims to interrogate the pedagogic valences of action and the political value of pedagogy—not merely as topics for abstract reflection, but as modes through which humanities education might be reconstituted in the context of political crisis.

Full Spring TLS Lineup
All events take place in the Heyman Center, Second Floor Common Room.

February 5
Elizabeth Key and the Slippery Slope of Indenture: Slavery and Servitude in 17th c. Virginia
Speaker: Jennifer Morgan
SOF Fellow: Eli Cumings

February 12
Pedagogy of the Desert: Architecture, Action, and Critical Scholarship amid Ecological Crisis
Speaker: Iheb Guermazi
SOF Fellow: Pamela Karimi

February 19
Lines of Flight: François Truffaut, Fernand Deligny, and the Pedagogy of the Deed
Speaker: Anne-Gaëlle Saliot
SOF Fellow: Alexis Stanley

March 5
Academics and Activists: The International Defense of Brazilian Democracy and the Presidential Elections of 2026
Speaker: James N. Green
SOF Fellow: Daniela Traldi

March 12
When Action Teaches: Documentary Practice and the Pedagogy of the Deed
Speaker: Angela J. Aguayo
SOF Fellow: Anastasia Kostina

March 26
Toward a Negative Zoology: More-than-Secular, More-than-Human Worlds
Speaker: Mayanthi Fernando
SOF Fellow: Aamer Ibraheem

April 2
Technofeudal Fever Dreams: Silicon Fiefdoms, Doom Loop Dystopics, and the Urban Anxieties of Empire
Speaker: Erin McElroy
SOF Fellow: Irina Kalinka

April 9
The Tale of the Chocolate Man: Friendship, Xenophilia, and the Consumption of Race
Speaker: Lilith Mahmud
SOF Fellow: Aamer Ibraheem

April 16
How to Conduct an Didactic Dismantlement: A Catalogue of Pedagogic Deeds
Speaker: Shannon Mattern
SOF Fellow: Irina Kalinka

April 30
Activist Readings of Capital
Speaker: Colleen Lye
SOF Fellow: Chris Cañete Rodriguez Kelly