The National Endowment for the Humanities has selected documentary filmmaker Ken Burns to give its annual Jefferson Lecture in the Humanities. This is the highest honor the federal government confers for distinguished intellectual achievement in the humanities. Burns received an honorary degree from Bowdoin in 1991.
Burns will deliver the lecture on May 9 at the John. F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts at 7:30 p.m. The lecture is a free public event and will also stream live online. Burns will talk about race in America, a topic he has illuminated and confronted in many of his historical documentaries.