Virtual Reading Groups
Would you like to join interesting people and have interesting conversations based on readings from the history of liberty?
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Our Virtual Reading Groups will each focus on a particular topic, and a common set of readings will form the basis for our discussions. Each group is facilitated by a professional moderator and is conducted online powered by Zoom.
Our Timeless Reading Groups are asynchronous and open to all in the Portal platform. Liberty Fund solicits a scholar to lead a discussion of a short story and/or essays that each participant will read and discuss. This format doesn’t require participants to use Zoom or “schedule” a specific time to participate.
Participation is offered at no-cost, and there is no need to be an expert on the topic for discussion! The only requirement is that participants be eager to read and engage in conversation.
Upcoming
Buchanan's Essays: What Should Economists Do?
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Pre-registration is required.
James Buchanan’s goal in his 1964 essay ’What Should Economists Do?’ was to persuade economists to “concentrate their attention on a particular form of human activity, and upon the various institutional arrangements that arise as…
Liberty and the American Statesman: Roger Sherman
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Pre-registration is required.
This virtual reading group explores the life, ideas, and legacy of Roger Sherman, one of the most influential—yet often overlooked—Founding Fathers of the United States. A key figure in the American founding, Sherman was the…
Wealth of Nations: A Six-Part Series - Book Three
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Pre-registration is required.
Join us for a six-part monthly virtual reading group series that celebrates the 250th anniversary of Adam Smith’s An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations!
Each month, Sarah Skwire and Janet Bufton (creators…
The Lincoln-Douglas Debates of 1858
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Pre-registration is required.
The Lincoln-Douglas Debates of 1858 were a defining moment in American political history, bringing the issue of slavery’s expansion to the forefront of national debate. As Abraham Lincoln and Stephen Douglas clashed over moral…
One Fell Swoop: Reading All of Shakespeare Plays: All's Well That Ends Well
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Pre-registration is required.
All’s Well that Ends Well has defied categorization for centuries. The winning of a reluctant husband by an over-eager bride, and the subsequent bed-trick that secures their continued marriage are morally complicated in ways that…
Wealth of Nations: A Six-Part Series - Book Four
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Pre-registration is required.
Join us for a six-part monthly virtual reading group series that celebrates the 250th anniversary of Adam Smith’s An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations!
Each month, Sarah Skwire and Janet Bufton (creators…
Franz Kafka's Short Stories
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Pre-registration is required.
Except for “The Metamorphosis,” Franz Kafka’s short stories are often overshadowed by his two major novels, The Trial and The Castle, which tend to dominate discussions of his work. Yet this emphasis can obscure the remarkable…
Religion and the Founding Fathers
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Pre-registration is required.
This three-session VRG examines the complex and evolving relationship between religion and politics in the American founding era, tracing how theological ideas shaped debates over authority, liberty, and governance. The selected…
One Fell Swoop: Reading All of Shakespeare Plays: The Tempest
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Pre-registration is required.
Thought to be one of Shakespeare’s latest plays, The Tempest is haunted by magic and by images of humans at their best and their worst. Many critics read Prospero’s farewell to his books at the play’s end as conveying, in some…
Wealth of Nations: A Six-Part Series - Book Five Part One
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Pre-registration is required.
Join us for a six-part monthly virtual reading group series that celebrates the 250th anniversary of Adam Smith’s An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations!
Each month, Sarah Skwire and Janet Bufton (creators…
Wealth of Nations: A Six-Part Series - Book Five Part Two
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Pre-registration is required.
Join us for a six-part monthly virtual reading group series that celebrates the 250th anniversary of Adam Smith’s An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations!
Each month, Sarah Skwire and Janet Bufton (creators…
Past Sessions
The Mirror and the Light and the Tragedy of Politics
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The final book of Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall series winds up in a familiar Tudor place: the block. We left Thomas Cromwell at the height of his powers, his enemies annihilated, his revenge for the ignominious death of his mentor…
Liberty and Tech: Can Machines Steal Your Ideas?
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Explore how intellectual property applies to the modern world of AI. The original article defining “intellectual property” by Lysander Spooner (who also founded his own post office because he thought the USPS was…
Albert Einstein on Socialism
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Albert Einstein is often considered one of the greatest geniuses of the modern world for his work in physics. Einstein was also a socialist. He had fled the National Socialist German Workers' Party, and lived in the US during the…
Tragedy and Politics on Stage: An Encounter with Euripides
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Join us for a four-week discussion of ancient Greek tragedy. Together, we will read four plays by Euripides, the playwright Aristotle called “the most tragic poet.” We will consider how Euripides reimagines epic mythology and…
A Timeless Reading Group: James Baldwin on Black Liberty
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James Baldwin’s masterfully written The Fire Next Time is a timeless exploration of racial injustice. This reading group will discuss this revolutionary book as well as supplemental readings on slavery, civil rights,…
One Fell Swoop: Reading All of Shakespeare Plays: Two Gentlemen of Verona
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Possibly Shakespeare’s earliest, and definitely one of his least popular plays, Two Gentlemen of Verona, winds its way through young love, betrayal, violence, treachery, and even pirates before settling on a happy ending. What…
Liberty After 50: Exploring John Rawls and Robert Nozick
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Two of the great works of contemporary political philosophy – John Rawls’s A Theory of Justice and Robert Nozick’s Anarchy, State, and Utopia – have turned 50 in recent years. The aim of these two one-day VRGs is to explore…
A Timeless Reading Group: Harriet Martineau's Illustrations of Political Economy: Wine and Politics
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with Alice Temnick
This is the fourth in our series of Timeless reading groups about Harriet Martineau’s Illustrations of Political Economy. For this discussion, we will read and discuss the novella “French Wines and Politics.”…
