The Harvey Kaye State of Democracy Series with Isaac Butler

Commemorating the public engagement and broad intellectual spirit of UWGB Professor Harvey Kaye’s career, the Harvey Kaye State of Democracy series addresses some of the most urgent questions facing our democracy, including in the fields of workers’ rights, immigration, racial inequality, public health, technology, and journalism. The series is hosted by Dr. Jon Shelton, Professor and Chair of Democracy and Justice Studies at UWGB.

Our guest this evening will be Isaac Butler, a theater director, cultural critic, and historian based in Brooklyn. He is the author ofThe Perfect Moment: God, Sex, Art, and the Birth of America’s Culture Wars, forthcoming from Bloomsbury in June 2026. His previous book, The Method: How the 20th Century Learned To Act won the 2023 National Book Critics Circle Award for nonfiction, and was named a best book of the year by The New Yorker, Time, San Francisco Chronicle, Vox, Salon, and Vanity Fair. He is additionally the co-author with Dan Kois of The World Only Spins Forward: The Ascent of Angels in America, a Stonewall Honor Book. He and Dan host the friendship podcast Charm Offensive, and he previously hosted the Slate podcasts Working (about the creative process) and Lend Me Your Ears (about Shakespeare and politics). His theater work has appeared on stages across the United States and in Europe, and he currently teaches theater literature at NYU/Tisch School of the Arts.

This event is sponsored by UWGB and the Mauthe Center, and it is free and open to the public.

If you cannot join us in person, register to join virtually by webinar here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_58fV4fpxQHysspkbmjUetw