03/04/2026
Join us as The University of Oxford’s Nandini Das presents ‘On Belonging’. Belonging is commonly understood as a matter of identity, attachment, or legal recognition. The 2025-26 Alexander Lecture approaches it instead as a precarious public condition: the capacity to appear, act, and be judged within a shared world. Drawing on sixteenth and early seventeenth-century England, a society simultaneously obsessed with borders and shaped by movement, ‘On Belonging’ argues that belonging was neither natural nor secure, and examines literature as a site where it was tested under pressure. The figures and texts at its center reveal belonging as a reversible position, shaped by language, faith, usefulness, and narrative continuity, and always vulnerable to withdrawal.
📅 When:
Tuesday, March 31st, 2026
4:30-6:00 p.m. ET
📍Where:
Paul Cadario Conference Centre at Croft Chapter House
University College
15 King’s College Circle, Toronto, ON,
M5S 3H3
Featuring Nandini Das, Professor, Early Modern English Literature and Culture
Exeter College, University of Oxford
The Alexander Lecture is being held in person at University College with live online streaming for home viewers. Faculty, students, staff, and the public are cordially invited to this hybrid lecture.
💡The event is free and all are welcome, though registration is required and seating is limited for in-person attendance.
Please let us know if you require accessibility accommodations upon registration. For more information, contact [email protected]
Learn more & register on the UC website via our Instagram story link or through the event post QR code.