Lisa Margonelli, “Small Termites and Big Ideas” (Poynter Fellowship)

A book talk and conversation about termites and technology with nationally bestselling author and science journalist Lisa Margonelli, Yale College ’90. Margonelli is the author of the new book Underbug: An Obsessive Tale of Termites and Technology (recently featured in The Times and The New Yorker) and the national bestseller Oil on the Brain: Petroleum’s Long, Strange Trip to Your Tank. A dazzlingly original thinker and compelling speaker, Margonelli has also has written for The Atlantic, Wired, Scientific American, Pacific Standard, The New York Times, and other publications. The New York Times called her investigation into termites and the scientists who study them “mesmerizing”:  “This isn’t just a brilliant book about bugs. For almost a decade, Margonelli scrutinized the scientists and their work with the same forensic gaze they themselves applied to the insects. The result is a rare longitudinal insight into the slippery nature of scientific progress.”

 

This event is co-sponsored by the Environmental Humanities Initiative, the Franke Program in Science and Humanities, SAGE Magazine, the Poynter Fellowship in Journalism and the Yale Animal Law Speaker Series.