The Turn of the Millennia

The Liberal Arts Forum continued to bring high-quality speakers to Elon throughout the 1990s, despite no longer hosting a spring symposium, to discuss controversial issues. The Forum became the scene of a debate in 1999 when it was said that the Forum failed to adequately serve the majority conservative and libertarian student population by not bringing enough like-minded speakers to campus. Students and faculty with both viewpoints published articles in the Pendulum.

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In a Pendulum article, a student critiques the Liberal Arts forum for not properly representing the Conservative and Libertarian perspectives in their choice of speakers.

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In this Pendulum article from November 4, 1999, one week after the previous article, another student defends the Liberal Arts Forum and instead places the blame for the lack of Conservative and Libertarian speakers on the student body for not joining the Forum.

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Here, in this article also published November 4, 1999, Professor of History, Jim Brown, comments on the first article critiquing the Liberal Arts Forum. In it, he defends the Forum's choice of speakers and criticizes the authors of the article for their tone and message.

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The debate about having a balance of speakers continued on into the 2000s, with this article being written in The Pendulum in 2003.

Another issue arose in 1997 and again in 1999. Multiple articles were published in the Pendulum describing a recurring problem with students disrupting the lectures and being rude to the guest speakers by leaving early, sleeping, or talking. The articles asked students to show better manners when attending guest lectures.

Here the Liberal Arts Forum asks students to have better manners when attending lectures and to be courteous and thoughtful for the guest speakers.

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In this Pendulum article, a student addresses the way that the student body acted at one of the recent lectures, being rude to the guest speaker. He encourages the students to be more polite in the future.

Despite the setbacks of these and other minor issues, the Liberal Arts Forum continued bringing guest speakers to campus to discuss complex and controversial issues.

This Pendulum article discusses a recent debate hosted by the Liberal Arts Forum.