Join the English Department for the Katherine Min Memorial Reading, featuring a live performance by the Black Mountain–based podcast Palimpsest Productions. Palimpsest is a single-voiced audio drama exploring memory, identity, and the things that haunt us.

“Southern Indigenous Waters” is the first event in the “Rising Waters: Writing Place and Environment” Thomas Howerton lecture series, a series that puts humanities scholars in conversation with natural sciences scholars about issues affecting us all. On October 30, 2025, Duke hydrologist Ryan Emanuel and East Carolina University literary scholar Kirstin Squint will discuss the centrality of place and water for southern Indigenous people.

Diverse ways of thinking can drive extraordinary innovation. In this special lecture, Keivan Stassun, Ph.D., Founding Director of the Frist Center for Autism and Innovation at Vanderbilt University’s School of Engineering, explores how embracing neurodiversity—recognizing and valuing neurological differences such as autism—can accelerate scientific discovery.

Ken Wagener, Butler Chaired Professor Emeritus at the University of Florida, will deliver UNC Asheville’s 27th S. Dexter Squibb Distinguished Lecture. A renowned polymer chemist, Wagener will explore the complex role of plastics in modern life—from their everyday benefits to their environmental challenges—inviting audience discussion on their future in society.