The LAS Dean’s Distinguished Lecture series provides an opportunity for members of the LAS and broader campus communities to hear from some of the college’s most distinguished faculty. Talks are appropriate for people of all backgrounds, so previous knowledge in a specific topic is not required. Talks are open to the public.
2026 LAS Dean’s Distinguished Lecture
Presented by Kara Federmeier
Professor in the Department of psychology
4 p.m. Wednesday, March 4
Alice Campbell Alumni Center
Register by February 24, 2026
Register for the event.
If you cannot attend in person, register for the webinar.
What’s in a word? Finding meaning in the brain
In this presentation, Professor Kara Federmeier describes how non-invasive recordings of brain electrical activity can be used to study how the brain figures out what words and sentences mean. This approach makes it possible to trace how the human brain understands language as it unfolds, moment by moment – and often in ways that defy our intuitions. The talk explores how the brain makes predictions during language comprehension, how language processing changes across adulthood into older age, and how the brain’s left and right hemispheres, which both process language but do so differently, work together to support understanding. Taken together, these findings reshape our understanding of when and how meaning is constructed in the brain.
About the speaker
Kara Federmeier is a professor in the Department of Psychology, an affiliate of the Departments of Linguistics, Health & Kinesiology, and the Neuroscience Program, and a faculty member at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology, where she co-leads the Illinois Language and Literacy Initiative. Her research interests include language processing, semantic memory, aging, and hemispheric differences. Her Cognition and Brain Lab has received research funding from the National Institute on Aging, the Institute of Education Sciences, and the James S. McDonnell Foundation. She received the Award for Distinguished Early Career Contributions to Psychophysiology from the Society for Psychophysiology in 2006 and the Cognitive Neuroscience Society Young Investigator Award in 2010. In 2012, she was named a University Scholar and in 2013 a College of Liberal Arts & Sciences Centennial Scholar. She is a fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, the Psychonomic Society, the Society for Psychophysiological Research, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She was president of the Society for Psychophysiology (2017-2019). She received her PhD in cognitive science from the University of California, San Diego in 2000 and her bachelor’s in biology from the University of Illinois.
Prior lectures
Hercules: Western Masculinity Unchained
Presented by Jon Solomon, professor in the Department of Classics, on March 4, 2025.
In this presentation, Professor Jon Solomon surveys the origins and reception of Hercules, one of the oldest figures in the Western tradition, who originated in the neolithic Mediterranean basin as an opposite gender hypostasis of the Great Goddess, was then embraced by male-dominant Indo-European cultures in the Bronze Age, filtered through ancient Greek religious and artistic structures as “Heracles (“Glory of Hera”), promoted as a symbol of the fading pagan institutions in late antiquity, championed virtue over vice in the medieval period, sang as a principal in the high-profile opera celebrating the marriage of Louis XIV, and re-emerged in the 20th century as a muscular icon of popular culture played by Arnold Schwarzenegger and Dwayne Johnson.
Bringing a cell to life on a computer and in Minecraft
Presented by Zaida (Zan) Luthey-Schulten, professor in the Department of Chemistry, on March 6, 2024.
In this presentation, Professor Zaida (Zan) Luthey-Schulten describes her pioneering research into constructing 4D models of a living minimal cell. The 4D simulations integrate data from -omics, cryo-electron tomograms, DNA maps, fluorescent imaging, and kinetic experiments to initialize a realistic cell state as well as validate the states as they progress in time. Fundamental behaviors emerge from these simulations that reveal how the cell balances the demands of its metabolism, genetic information processes, and growth, offering insight into the principles of life. Validation by coarse-grained atomistic molecular dynamics simulations and experiments are critical steps in building functioning models for bacterial and eukaryotic cells. As part of the Science and Technology Center’s education and knowledge transfer goals, Professor Luthey-Schulten’s team plans to bring these simulations to Minecraft, enabling players to explore a full living cell in this immersive 3D environment.
Ancestral Maya Sustainability, Climate Change, and Insights for Today
Presented by Lisa J. Lucero, professor in the Department of Anthropology, on February 22, 2023.
In this presentation, Lisa J. Lucero describes how the ancestral Maya (c. 250-900 CE) landscape was a mosaic of cities, farmsteads, forests, seasonal wetlands (bajos), and sacred places. Each city had its own king who attracted subjects via dry-season urban reservoirs. When droughts struck between c. 800-900 CE, reservoir levels plummeted and crops failed. Subjects did not revolt or resort to violence. Instead, Maya farmers/subjects deserted kings and southern lowland cities to find more stable water supplies and to take care of their families. Maya kings disappeared. Farmers adapted and moved on. Yet Maya kings and cities lasted 1,000 years, a feat that has implications and insights for today.
The Centrality of Media Stereotyping and How it Impacts Us
Presented by Travis L. Dixon, professor and director of graduate studies for the Department of Communication, on March 23, 2022.
In this presentation, Travis L. Dixon provides evidence for the power of media stereotypes and stereotyping over our collective consciousness. Specifically, he argues that news and race imagery drive political polarization and distort our notions of social reality. His talk focuses on the relationship between stereotypical portrayals in the media, crime policy, and political decision-making. The presentation highlights two decades of research findings that build a compelling case regarding the importance of assessing racial considerations when trying to assess political opinion.
Slavery, Science, and the Eugenic Impulse: Re-Examining Charles B. Davenport’s Race-Crossing Studies
Presented by Rana Hogarth, associate professor in the Department of History, on April 29, 2021.
Race mixing—particularly between Blacks and whites—alarmed American eugenicists in the early 20th century. Charles B. Davenport, one of the nation’s leading eugenicists, was so preoccupied by race mixing that he published two studies on people of Black and white ancestry—a class of people he concluded was “badly put together” and “ineffective.” These two studies serve as points of entry for examining early 20th-century efforts to define people of African descent as inherently unfit.
During this presentation, Rana Hogarth, associate professor in the Department of History, draws attention to the ways anti-Blackness and slavery-era ideas about race informed scientific knowledge production. She demonstrates how early 20th century attempts to measure, objectify, and pathologize mixed race individuals with Black and white ancestry rendered Blackness an unfavorable trait in white eugenic discourses and beyond.
Earth BioGenome Project: Sequencing Life for the Future of Life
Presented by Gene E. Robinson, Director of the Woese Institute for Genomic Biology and Swanlund Chair of Entomology and Neuroscience, on October 29, 2019.
Increasing our understanding of Earth's biodiversity and responsibly stewarding its resources are among the most crucial scientific and societal challenges of the new millennium. These challenges require fundamental new knowledge of the organization, evolution, functions, and interactions among the entire planet's organisms.
This lecture describes the Earth BioGenome Project (EBP), a moonshot for biology that aims to sequence, catalog, and characterize the genomes of all of Earth's eukaryotic biodiversity over a period of 10 years.