In an Age of Algorithms, Fran Lebowitz Makes the Case for Being Yourself
Fran Lebowitz has built a career on refusing to conform, and on Oct. 6, she’ll bring her famously sharp wit and unfiltered perspectives to Duke University for “An Evening with Fran Lebowitz.” Her visit kicks off the recently announced mosaic initiative that is focused on elevating the role of the arts and humanities in undergraduate life.
The event begins at 7 p.m. in Page Auditorium on West Campus. Tickets are now available to Duke students and will be available to Duke employees on Sept. 15. A limited number of tickets may be offered to the general public, subject to availability.
The acclaimed author, humorist and cultural critic will be in conversation with Associate Professor of English Taylor Black, mosaic’s inaugural faculty director. Lebowitz will also take questions directly from the audience before ending the evening with a book signing. “The Fran Lebowitz Reader” will be available for purchase on site.
For Black, Lebowitz’s visit is about much more than bringing a famous New York personality to campus. It’s an opportunity for students to encounter someone whose voice has remained distinctly her own.
“Fran’s commitment to her own style offers students something increasingly rare,” Black shares. “Unlike the hordes of ‘influencers’ flooding social media, Fran is iconic because she is so decidedly unlike anyone else. Her voice is truly distinctive and can challenge our students to develop their own judgment, taste and sense of what makes life interesting.”
Lebowitz did not finish high school or attend college. Instead, she moved to New York at 18 and turned her sharp observations and opinions into a career as a writer, cultural commentator and public personality. Decades later, she remains remarkably uninterested in trends, social media engagement and the pressure to soften her views.
That makes her especially fitting for a moment when, Black says, students are navigating a powerful pull toward sameness. “She’s never conformed, and she keeps talking back,” he says.
Black sees students increasingly measuring themselves against conventional markers of achievement — internships, grades, careers and professional success — while spending less time on the harder-to-measure work of figuring out who they are becoming.
College, he argues, should be a place to experiment, take chances and even fail without consequences that follow you for the rest of your life.
“In that sense, Fran represents the opposite of an algorithm, which is all about averages,” he says. “Because of her charming, yet exacting, social commentary, she is difficult to flatten or predict. Her judgments are blunt, idiosyncratic and terribly funny — that’s exactly what we all need to hear right now.”
mosaic is a new college-wide initiative from Trinity College of Arts & Sciences that aims to shift the culture around the arts and humanities while connecting undergraduates with the people, ideas, scholarship and experiences already flourishing across campus. The initiative includes the mosaic Fellows Program, a year-long experience that brings undergraduates together for mentorship, immersive learning, professional exploration and engagement with the arts and humanities.
The initiative welcomes the first cohort of mosaic Fellows this month. Through a year-long experience that extends into the summer, they will meet faculty, peers and special guests; explore the arts and humanities and gain experiences that connect classroom interests with the wider world. The fellowship program also includes two summer internship opportunities: one with Duke in New York Summer - Arts & Media, offered through the Global Education Office, and one supporting the Duke University Press.
