Featured Experts

Experience UWF Downtown 2016-17 Lecture Series begins Oct. 6 with philosopher, magician

The University of West Florida College of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities will present the first installment of the 2016-17 Experience UWF Downtown lecture series on Thursday, Oct. 6. Dr. Jason Leddington, associate professor of philosophy at Bucknell University and magician, will present his lecture, “Magic: Enjoying the Impossible,” at the Museum of Commerce, located at 201 E. Zaragoza St. in downtown Pensacola. The event is free and open to the public, with a reception at 5:30 p.m. and the lecture at 6 p.m.

In “Magic: Enjoying the Impossible,” Leddington will use a philosophical approach to explore the nature of magic and the relationships between magic, technology, comedy, mystery and wonder. He will discuss why theatrical magic has held its lasting appeal.

Leddington’s studies include groundbreaking work on the philosophy of magic, supported by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, as well as perception and the nature of understanding. His essay, “The Experience of Magic,” won the 2015 John Fisher Memorial Prize from the American Society for Aesthetics. Leddington received a Bachelor of Arts in philosophy and physics from Brown University and a doctorate in philosophy from Northwestern University. Outside of academia, Leddington performs magic semi-professionally and counts some of the world’s best sleight-of-hand artists among his friends and mentors.

Dr. Jason Leddington“Magic: Enjoying the Impossible” is co-sponsored by the College of Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities; the UWF Department of Philosophy; and the Kugelman Honors Program. It is one of five lectures featured in the Experience UWF Downtown 2016-17 Lecture Series. The series promotes the value of liberal arts in contemporary life by showcasing outstanding UWF faculty and scholars of national prominence who illustrate the essential role of the liberal arts in building and sustaining contemporary culture. Experience UWF Downtown continues on Tuesday, Nov. 15, featuring Dr. Raquel Lanseros—a poet, translator and one of the most awarded and recognized voices of contemporary poetry in Spanish—as she presents, “Different Languages, Different Names: Poetry as a Universal Fact and the Power of Translation.”

For the full series schedule and more information, visit uwf.edu/downtownlectures.