The Department of English and the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences at West Virginia University will host a lecture by social commentator and author Katha Pollitt on Monday, Dec. 4 at 7 p.m. in the Mountainlair Student Union’s Gold Ballroom.
Pollitt will speak on “Abortion: Truth and Post-Truth.” Given the prevalence and power of false information driving policy and opinions of abortion, Pollitt ponders what hope exists for science, scholarship and the truth.
A poet, essayist and critic “known for her wit and her keen sense of both the ridiculous and the sublime,” Pollitt focuses on political and social issues from a left-leaning perspective, including abortion rights, racism, welfare reform, feminism and poverty.
Pollitt is best known for award-winning her bimonthly column “Subject to Debate” in The Nation magazine. Her writing is also featured in The New Yorker, Harper’s, Ms., The New York Times, The Atlantic, The New Republic, Glamour, Mother Jones and the London Review of Books. She has published four essay collections and two books of poetry. Her poems have appeared in many anthologies and magazines, including The New Yorker and The Oxford Book of American Poetry. Pollitt has appeared on NPR’s Fresh Air and All Things Considered, Charlie Rose, The McLaughlin Group, CNN, Dateline NBC and the BBC.
Pollitt is a staunch advocate of contemporary feminism and other issues of social justice. Her essays respond to commentary from across the political spectrum and address the media, U.S. foreign policy, the politics of poverty (especially welfare reform) and human rights movements around the world.
