SPIRITED MINDS, SPECTACULAR SETTING: THE 2009 ASPEN IDEAS FESTIVAL
ASPEN, COLORADO
JUNE 29 – JULY 5, 2009
Inspiring. Thought-provoking. Invigorating. Life-changing.
These are just a few of the words we’ve heard used to describe the Aspen Ideas Festival, the action-packed, weeklong exploration of some of the most important ideas and pressing issues we face presented by the Aspen Institute and The Atlantic magazine.
Why an Ideas Festival?
For nearly 60 years the Aspen Institute has been the nation’s premier place for leaders from around the globe to explore timeless ideas and the toughest challenges of their day. Since 1857, The Atlantic magazine has shaped the national debate on the defining issues of our times. Together, we’re working to touch as many people as we can to create a “public commons” for the 21st century, where a diverse group of intellectually curious people can gather to talk, listen, debate, question, and learn what they can do to make our world — and our children’s world — a better place.
Divided into two overlapping four-day sessions, the Aspen Ideas Festival offers a breathtaking array of lectures, presentations, debates, and panel discussions by leading thinkers who span a vast range of critical topics, from the economy to the environment, from science to the arts.
Who Will Be There?
From early in the morning until late at night, you’ll hear from inspired and provocative writers, public officials, artists, scientists, business executives, scholars, economists, foreign policy specialists, entrepreneurs, and leaders of all kinds — drawn from myriad fields, from across the country and from around the world — all gathered in a single place. And in the audience, on the footpath, over lunch, or at the coffee bar, you will meet other concerned and curious participants — people who have stepped out of their day-to-day routines to challenge themselves and learn about their world and the ideas that are shaping it.
We’re hard at work planning the details of this year’s Festival.
ASPEN IDEAS FESTIVAL 2009: IDEAS THAT WORK
The Aspen Ideas Festival will present substantive conversation across a variety of types of sessions – panels, debates, individual presentations, and roundtable discussions. What’s new? For our fifth anniversary, we will create sessions that focus specifically on “ideas that work” – collecting interesting thinkers and doers to describe and discuss proven, innovative solutions to challenging problems. Presenters will contribute provocative perspectives from their fields, and discuss the world with a sophisticated audience highly motivated to engage in dialogue.
Daily forums throughout the week will include:
- Plenary sessions offered three times a day: panels, one-on-one interviews, and presentations;
- Multiple, concurrent tutorial sessions twice daily, where attendees pick and choose from a menu of discussions across the programming spectrum;
- Casual conversations, book signings, and “action”-oriented discussions on campus between attendees and speakers, offering further opportunities for exchange;
- Evening Exchanges and in-town events in venues around Aspen that will bring Aspen Institute moderators and Atlantic editors and other of the nation’s prominent journalists together with presenters for substantive conversation. Films, performances, and presentations will also take place.
The Festival is designed around a series of “program tracks," each of which offers discussions relevant to a certain topic area. These tracks offer participants the opportunity to focus on a particular area of interest during their time with us, but most attendees choose to sample from many tracks over the course of the Festival.
Four program tracks will span the length of the Festival, June 29 – July 5
- World Affairs and the Global Economy
- Arts and Culture
- Life in America
- Managing Planet Earth
In addition, a number of four-day program tracks will cover more specific topics:
June 29 – July 2
- Media Crack-Up
- Darwin’s Legacy
- Justice and Society
- Rebuilding the American Economy
July 2 – July 5
- The Science of Being Human
- Innovations in Education
- Living Digitally
- The Middle East
