Northern Arizona University | Cline Lecture Series
This spring marks 42 years for the Cline Lecture Series. The Cline Community Lecture in the Humanities, established and endowed by Platt Cline, Flagstaff and NAU Historian and newspaper editor, bring speakers of international stature to Flagstaff. Previous Cline Lecturers include Luis Urrea, Juan Felipe Herrera, Rebecca Solnit, Sherman Alexie, Sarah Vowell, and T.C. Boyle. Cline Lecturers are asked to answer the broadly conceived question of “what is the social usefulness of the humanities? Or “why are the humanities important?”
This Year, the Department of Comparative Cultural Studies is hosting esteemed humanist thinker, writer, activist, winner of the 2016 Pulitzer Prize, MacArthur and Guggenheim fellow, the Aerol Arnold chair of English, and Professor of English and American Studies and Ethnicity at University of Southern California, Dr. Viet Thanh Nguyen.
Dr. Nguyen will be delivering the Spring 2026 Cline Lecture on Tuesday, February 17, 2026 at 7 PM in the Cline Library Assembly Hall.