Aurora Forum to host broadcast of Biden-Palin debate before its first-of-the-year event

By the time political theorist Danielle Allen takes the stage Thursday in Kresge Auditorium for this year's inaugural Aurora Forum, the crowd should be all warmed up.

The broadcast of the much-anticipated debate between vice presidential candidates Joe Biden and Sarah Palin will be shown in the auditorium before Allen's talk, titled "Stranger, Neighbor, Friend: What is Citizenship in the 21st Century?"

The Aurora Forum, a public conversation series at Stanford featuring individuals "who turn vision into action for positive social change," has arranged to broadcast the debate from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Doors will open at 5:30 p.m.

Immediately following the televised debate, Allen, the UPS Foundation Professor at the Institute of Advanced Study in Princeton, N.J., will suggest ways people in colleges and universities are prepared to effect social and political transformation by "daring to imagine and act in accordance with democratic ideals." The entire evening is free and open to the public.

Allen's talk is the first of a new yearlong Aurora Forum series titled "Education for Citizenship: Exploring Virtues and Vices." She is the author of Talking to Strangers: Anxieties of Citizenship since Brown v. Board of Education (Chicago, 2004). Josiah Ober, professor of political science at Stanford, will provide a response and start a discussion on stage, then open it to the audience for questions and answers.

The "Education for Citizenship" series is presented by the Aurora Forum in partnership with Stanford's Bowen H. McCoy Family Center for Ethics in Society. More information, including the full schedule of events, is available at http://auroraforum.stanford.edu.

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