The Mudd Center

Erica Lord with group

The Roger Mudd Center for Ethics advances dialogue, teaching, and research about issues of public and professional ethics across all three of the University’s schools - the College, the Williams School, and the School of Law.

Yearly Ethics Theme

How We Live & Die banner

How We Live and Die: Stories, Values, and Communities

The layered and productive relationships of ethics, medicine, and narrative are at the heart of this year’s examination of the four pillars of western medical ethics: autonomy, beneficence, non-maleficence, and justice. With an emphasis on narrative and testimony, the series will offer a multidisciplinary inquiry-from the fields of anthropology, art, ethics, law, medicine, and religion-into poignant questions and dilemmas related to medical research, care, and access. For instance, what happens when the harms of a medical experiment are not conveyed to its subjects? What does it mean to die with dignity? What are the conflicting social values and personal beliefs around such a practice? Why do specific diseases disproportionately affect indigenous populations in the Americas? Who has the moral responsibility to respond to such endemic disease and how? Is there a social obligation to provide healthcare to all? These questions and others bear directly on how we conceive of notions of autonomy, beneficence, non-harm, and justice, which in turn affect how we live and die.

Upcoming Public Events

Sep 09 - 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm

Mudd Center Speaker: TBD

Mudd Center Speaker: TBD

Sep 11 - 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm

Mudd Center Speaker: TBD

Mudd Center Speaker: TBD

Sep 23 - 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm

Mudd Center Speaker: TBD

Mudd Center Speaker: TBD

Sep 29 - 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm

Mudd Center Speaker: TBD

Mudd Center Speaker

Oct 28 - 5:00 pm - 6:00 pm

Mudd Center Speaker: TBD

Mudd Center Speaker: TBD

Mudd Center News


Melissa Kerin Quoted in ProPublica Article

The professor of art history and director of the Mudd Center for Ethics offered her opinion on the nuances of the return of a Buddha sculpture by the Art Institute of Chicago to the Government of Nepal.

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W&L’s Mudd Center Announces Leadership Lab Initiative

The public lecture series kicks off May 7 with an inaugural talk by Kenneth Ruscio ’76.

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Connecting a Global Movement

Students in W&L’s Bonner Program spent the last year creating a digital map of health care networks for people experiencing homelessness worldwide.

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Jim Withers is the Next Speaker in the Mudd Lecture Series

Withers, founder of the Street Medicine Institute, will give a lecture on March 26 at 5 p.m. in Stackhouse Theater on W&L’s campus.

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W&L Presents an Evening with Playwright and Actor Christine Toy Johnson

Johnson will present excerpts of her recent musical and give a public talk on March 24 at 7 p.m. in Johnson Theater.

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Mudd Lecture Series to Examine the Ethics of Medical Aid in Dying

The virtual panel discussion will take place on Feb. 11 at 4 p.m.

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Erica Lord is the Next Speaker in the Mudd Lecture Series

Lord, a multimedia artist at the Institute of American Indian Arts, will give a lecture on Jan. 14 at 5:30 p.m. in Wilson Concert Hall.

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W&L’s Staniar Gallery Presents Erica Lord’s ‘The Codes We Carry: Beads as DNA Data’

The solo exhibition will open Jan. 9 with an artist’s talk slated for Jan. 14.

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Carl Elliott is the Next Speaker in the Mudd Lecture Series

Elliott, a bioethicist at the University of Minnesota, will give a lecture on Nov. 14 at 5 p.m. in Northen Auditorium.

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Lawyer and Historian Paul Lombardo to Deliver Lecture on Buck v. Priddy Court Case

The Nov. 18 lecture is open to the public and marks the centenary of the case argued in Amherst County, Virginia.

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‘W&L After Class’ Podcast Releases New Episode Featuring Melissa Kerin

In this month’s episode, Kerin, professor of art history, discusses how following her curiosity of the ways in which people tell stories opened her to opportunities to study remote Buddhist shrines in the Himalayas and examine how we live and die as the director of the Roger Mudd Center for Ethics.

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Ricardo Nuila is the Next Speaker in the Mudd Lecture Series

Nuila, associate professor of medicine, medical ethics and health policy at Baylor College of Medicine, will give a lecture on Oct. 22 at 5 p.m. in Northen Auditorium.

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