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Dr. Michael Lamb will be Maryville College Class of 2025’s Commencement speaker. A link to his website containing his bio, works, and CV can be found here.
Dr. Michael Lamb is the F.M. Kirby Foundation Chair of Leadership and Character as well as the executive director of the Program for Leadership and Character and associate professor of Interdisciplinary Humanities at Wake Forest University. Michael’s broader interests include virtue ethics, leadership and character development, religion and politics, ethics and public policy, and politics and literature. He has taught interdisciplinary courses in politics, ethics, and religion at Oxford, Princeton, Rhodes, and Wake Forest. For excellence in teaching, he was awarded the George Kateb Teaching Award for Best Preceptor from Princeton’s Department of Politics, a Teaching Excellence Award from Oxford’s Humanities Division, and a Teaching Award from Wake Forest’s Center for the Advancement of Teaching.
Michael’s research focuses on the ethics of citizenship and the role of virtues in public life. His book, A Commonwealth of Hope: Augustine’s Political Thought (Princeton University Press, 2022), offers a novel interpretation of Augustine’s political thought and recovers his virtue of hope to inform contemporary politics. He is also a co-editor of The Arts of Leading: Perspectives from the Humanities and the Liberal Arts (Georgetown University Press, 2024), Cultivating Virtue in the University (Oxford University Press, 2022) and Everyday Ethics: Moral Theology and the Practices of Ordinary Life (Georgetown University Press, 2019). His work has been published in a number of edited volumes and academic journals, including the American Political Science Review, Review of Politics, Journal of Religious Ethics, Journal of Moral Education, and Journal of Character Education.
Everyday Ethics by
What might we learn if the study of ethics focused less on hard cases and more on the practices of everyday life? In Everyday Ethics, Michael Lamb and Brian Williams gather some of the world's leading scholars and practitioners of moral theology (including some GUP authors) to explore that question in dialogue with anthropology and the social sciences. Inspired by the work of Michael Banner, these scholars cross disciplinary boundaries to analyze the ethics of ordinary practices--from eating, learning, and loving thy neighbor to borrowing and spending, using technology, and working in a flexible economy. Along the way, they consider the moral and methodological questions that emerge from this interdisciplinary dialogue and assess the implications for the future of moral theology.
Cultivating Virtue in the University by
Across the globe, educators are grappling with how best to prepare a new generation to engage the challenges and opportunities of the twenty-first century. Along with knowledge and skills, many are now emphasizing the importance of character. Yet, while there has been a robust movement to educate character among children and adolescents, much less attention has been given to the ethical formation of college and university students. What is the role of colleges and universities in educating the character of students? Should universities even attempt to cultivate virtue? If so, how can they do so effectively in a pluralistic context? Cultivating Virtue in the University seeks to answer these questions by gathering diverse perspectives on character education within twenty-first century universities. With essays from some of the world's leading scholars, this volume catalyzes a critical debate about the possibilities and limits of character education in the university while offering theoretical and practical perspectives on what such education could look like in increasingly global and intercultural institutions. By engaging insights from education, history, literature, philosophy, psychology, sociology, and theology, the volume encourages scholars and educators to embrace the opportunities and challenges of cultivating virtue in the university.
A Commonwealth of Hope by
A bold new interpretation of Augustine's virtue of hope and its place in political life When it comes to politics, Augustine of Hippo is renowned as one of history's great pessimists, with his sights set firmly on the heavenly city rather than the public square. Many have enlisted him to chasten political hopes, highlighting the realities of evil and encouraging citizens instead to cast their hopes on heaven. A Commonwealth of Hope challenges prevailing interpretations of Augustinian pessimism, offering a new vision of his political thought that can also help today's citizens sustain hope in the face of despair. Amid rising inequality, injustice, and political division, many citizens wonder what to hope for in politics and whether it is possible to forge common hopes in a deeply polarized society. Michael Lamb takes up this challenge, offering the first in-depth analysis of Augustine's virtue of hope and its profound implications for political life. He draws on a wide range of Augustine's writings--including neglected sermons, letters, and treatises--and integrates insights from political theory, religious studies, theology, and philosophy. Lamb shows how diverse citizens, both religious and secular, can unite around common hopes for the commonwealth. Recovering this understudied virtue and situating Augustine within his political, rhetorical, and religious contexts, A Commonwealth of Hope reveals how Augustine's virtue of hope can help us resist the politics of presumption and despair and confront the challenges of our time.
The Arts of Leading by
A deeply insightful approach to cultivating leaders of character centered on the arts and humanities What does it mean to lead? Whom do we consider to be leaders? And how might viewing leadership through the many lenses of the humanities expand our understanding of how it is imagined, represented, and enacted? Drawing on insights from eminent scholars in the classics, philosophy, religion, literature, history, art, music, and theater, The Arts of Leading reveals the power of the arts and humanities to unsettle common assumptions about leadership. Rather than instrumentalizing the arts and humanities or reducing them to mere management resources, this series of thoughtful and refreshing essays engages a litany of diverse and nuanced perspectives to uncover alternative ways of imagining and embodying leadership across different historical, moral, political, and cultural contexts. By exploring how a wide range of disciplines can illuminate and humanize complex aspects of leadership that are often obscured in a discourse hooked on reductive paradigms and quick fixes, The Arts of Leading invites leaders, scholars, and citizens to expand their practice of leadership in our ever-evolving world.
Everyday Ethics by
What might we learn if the study of ethics focused less on hard cases and more on the practices of everyday life? In Everyday Ethics, Michael Lamb and Brian Williams gather some of the world's leading scholars and practitioners of moral theology (including some GUP authors) to explore that question in dialogue with anthropology and the social sciences. Inspired by the work of Michael Banner, these scholars cross disciplinary boundaries to analyze the ethics of ordinary practices--from eating, learning, and loving thy neighbor to borrowing and spending, using technology, and working in a flexible economy. Along the way, they consider the moral and methodological questions that emerge from this interdisciplinary dialogue and assess the implications for the future of moral theology.
A Commonwealth of Hope by
A bold new interpretation of Augustine's virtue of hope and its place in political life When it comes to politics, Augustine of Hippo is renowned as one of history's great pessimists, with his sights set firmly on the heavenly city rather than the public square. Many have enlisted him to chasten political hopes, highlighting the realities of evil and encouraging citizens instead to cast their hopes on heaven. A Commonwealth of Hope challenges prevailing interpretations of Augustinian pessimism, offering a new vision of his political thought that can also help today's citizens sustain hope in the face of despair. Amid rising inequality, injustice, and political division, many citizens wonder what to hope for in politics and whether it is possible to forge common hopes in a deeply polarized society. Michael Lamb takes up this challenge, offering the first in-depth analysis of Augustine's virtue of hope and its profound implications for political life. He draws on a wide range of Augustine's writings--including neglected sermons, letters, and treatises--and integrates insights from political theory, religious studies, theology, and philosophy. Lamb shows how diverse citizens, both religious and secular, can unite around common hopes for the commonwealth. Recovering this understudied virtue and situating Augustine within his political, rhetorical, and religious contexts, A Commonwealth of Hope reveals how Augustine's virtue of hope can help us resist the politics of presumption and despair and confront the challenges of our time.
Here is a selection of articles written by or list Michael Lamb among the authors, more can be found using MCQuest.
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