Guest lecture with Dr. Finbarr Curtis on  I Don’t Think about Things I Don’t Think About:  The Scopes Trial as  Secular Myth

March 13 at 3:30 in Tate, 202

Most conventional wisdom about the 1925 Scopes Trial, in which William Jennings Bryan and Clarence Darrow debated whether evolution should be taught in public schools, has been shaped by the 1950s play Inherit the Wind.  In retelling events from the trial to craft a story of popular support for scientific progress, however, the play acts as a kind of secular mythology of an American public sphere that harmonizes respect for science with a free marketplace of ideas.