Hesston College’s annual Melva Kauffman Memorial Lecture Series will feature Dr. Mark Metzler Sawin Sept. 15 to 17.
Dr. Sawin is chair of the History Department at Eastern Mennonite University in Harrisonburg, Va. He grew up in Hesston and spent most of his early days running around the Hesston College campus while his father, Tom Sawin, worked on the college’s first computers.
Dr. Sawin attended Goshen (Ind.) College and then the University of Texas at Austin where he earned his M.A. and Ph.D. in American studies. He served as a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Zagreb, Croatia from 2009 to 2009 and was president of the Mid-Atlantic Studies Association from 2006 to 2008. His scholarship focuses largely on the religious, literary and popular culture of antebellum America in the 1850s.
The theme for Dr. Sawin’s presentations is “The Histories We Tell Ourselves.” He will be featured in chapel on Wednesday, Sept. 15, with the topic “Stories of the Movement: The Messages and Meanings of the Civil Rights Movement,” and Friday, Sept. 17, with the topic “Stories of Our Faith: The Messages and Meanings of What it Means to be Anabaptist.” Chapel begins at 11 a.m. at Hesston Mennonite Church.
Thursday evening, Sept. 16, he will present “Stories of God in America: The Messages and Meanings of a Godly Nation” beginning at 7:30 p.m. at Hesston Mennonite Church, 309 South Main Street in Hesston. The chapel and evening presentations are free and open to the public.
Melva Kauffman was a professor of English and education at Hesston College from 1944 to 1977. She was a 1936 graduate of Hesston Academy and a 1939 Hesston College graduate. Kauffman established an endowed scholarship in her name at Hesston College because of her love for students and the many meaningful years of teaching. Following her death in October 2003, Kauffman’s family established a lecture series that would continue her lifelong interests in learning and the humanities. The event was first held in the fall of 2005.
Located 30 miles North of Wichita, Hesston College is the two-year liberal arts college of Mennonite Church USA.