But fences are more than functional objects. They are powerful symbols. The way we define ourselves as individuals and as a nation becomes concrete in how we build fences.

Through an examination of boundaries, place, and space, Between Fences will explore how neighbors and nations divide, protect, offend, and defend through the boundaries they build.

This exhibit runs from January 17, 2009 - March 1, 2009

The Meaning of Service (MoS) is a reading and discussion program for Americorps volunteers featuring discussions that use short philosophical and literary texts on the nature of justice, service, and related themes. Meaning of Service presents participants with the opportunity to examine, refine, and regenerate the beliefs underlying their work.

A Road Scholar Program by Bucky Halker

During the 1930s, the Depression and the Dustbowl ravaged America's economy and left millions of Americans unemployed and homeless. Even those who didn't lose their jobs or farms often experienced the hardship of reduced incomes. Not surprisingly, music became an important method for expressing dissatisfaction with the status quo. Indeed, protest songs emerged as the collective voice of this army of migrants and downtrodden and the era produced a great outpouring of protest songwriting, including the songs of Woody Guthrie. Join Bucky Halker for a program that combines performance and commentary, as he reviews working-class protest songs from the Dustbowl and Great Depression. Bucky Halker is a performer, songwriter, and recording artist, as well as a PhD in American History. He has lectured and performed throughout the USA, Canada, and Europe and is the author of For Democracy, Workers, and God: Labor Protest and Labor Song-Poems. Bucky produced the Illinois Humanities Council's celebrated CD series, Folksongs of Illinois, vols. 1-3 (2007).

Literature & Medicine: Humanities at the Heart of Healthcare is a discussion-based program that brings hospital staff together monthly to reflect on the larger mission of medicine through facilitated conversations about literature.

A Road Scholar Program by Stephanie Shonekan

This program takes the audience on an audio-visual expedition of the history and music of African American women through clips from their music and excerpts of their life stories. This provides the audience with a rare and fascinating portrayal of the lives and musical contributions of Black women across genres (popular and classical music.) This approach allows these women musicians to speak for themselves and to reveal the various influences and expressions that shape their lives and musical expressions. The audience will explore the varied journeys of these women with a view to understanding the threads that bind the lives and music of Black women in American history.

Facebook, the social-networking phenomenon with 150 million friends, turned five last week. Happy Birthday, old friend!

What started on the Harvard University campus by a student "who grew impatient with the creation of an official universal Harvard facebook" has become a global social media revolution. Its claim to notoriety, of course, is its ability to connect friends with friends.

On its February 4^th birthday, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg wrote on his blog: "Facebook was founded in 2004 to give people the tools to engage and understand the world around them. We are glad and humbled that so many people are using Facebook in this way."

Yes, millions of people are using Facebook. Some would say they're using it to push the boundaries of friend far beyond the logical-and practical-notion of friendship (millions of users have thousands of friends). They're using it to network for work and school- posting news links and event notices and sending invitations to every kind of party, rally, conference, and meeting you can imagine. At least once a day, 15 million users update their status. In a month, 850 million photos are uploaded to the site and shared with friends.