What does it take to spark a new Renaissance?
In February 2025, Ralston College hosted a landmark symposium in Savannah, Georgia, bringing together leading thinkers, artists, educators, and students for a searching conversation about the renewal of our shared culture.
Over the course of a wide-ranging roundtable, speakers explored the collapse of higher education, the need for sacred space, the conditions for reawakening beauty and truth, the integral importance of literature, music and architecture, and the crucial role of the young in rebuilding a meaningful culture that can inspire and endure.
This conversation is not an academic exercise in abstraction. It is the practical work of preservation—of remembering what the world has forgotten, and of laying foundations for what must come next.
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The roster of speakers is as follows:
- Stephen Blackwood: Why we are on the verge of renaissance
- James Orr: Why America is ready for change
- David Butterfield: Why colleges are the institutions to build
- James Hankins: Why the Italian Renaissance emerged
- Joseph Conlon: Why learning languages is essential
- Gregg Hurwitz: Why literature must resonate outside academia
- Jonathan Pageau: Why renewal requires in-person, communal remembrance
- Samuel Andreyev: Why music needs to know its tradition to thrive
- Christian Sottile: Why we need beautiful architecture
- Mari Otsu: Why Ralston College was the place that changed my life
