Sunday Cherry Blossoms Walk #3: In Search of Peace

Join Prof. Joel Swerdlow ’74 for a series of walks and lectures about DC.

Meet near the east end of the Vietnam Memorial on Sunday, April 25 for a walk through the Vietnam, Korea, World Wars I and II Memorials to the “Peace Statue” and the site of the future Disabled Veterans Memorial.

Thanks in large part to the success of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, war memorials now dominate a large and growing portion of the nation’s most respected landscape. How and why this has happened teaches us much about how our democracy works.  We will discuss how Maya Lin’s undergraduate sketches became one of Washington, D.C.’s most popular sites; why Americans still do not want to know the full story of Iwo Jima; whether the road to peace lies in promoting democracy, and more. At the conclusion of this, the final walk, we will weave all three weeks together in a discussion that seeks ideas and insights.