第1篇 哈佛大学校长德鲁·福斯特在哈佛大学2022年毕业典礼英语演讲稿
thank you all and good afternoon alumni, graduates, families, friends, honored guests. for seven years now, it has been my assignment and my privilege to deliver an annual report to our alumni, and to serve as the warm-up act for our distinguished speaker.
whether this is your first opportunity to be a part of these e_ercises or your fiftieth, it is worthtaking a minute to soak in this place—its sheltering trees, its familiar buildings, its enduringvoices. in 1936, this part of harvard’s yard was named tercentenary theatre, in recognition ofharvard’s three hundredth birthday. it is a place where giants have stood, and history has beenmade.
we were reminded this morning of george washington’s adventures here. and from this stagein 1943, winston churchill addressed an overflow crowd that included 6,000 uniformedharvard students heading off to war. he said he hoped the young recruits would come toregard the british soldiers and sailors they would soon fight alongside as their “brothers inarms,” and he assured the audience that “we shall never tire, nor weaken, but march withyou … to establish the reign of justice and of law.”
four years later, from this same place, george marshall introduced a plan that aidedreconstruction across war-stricken europe, and ended his speech by asking: “what is needed?what can best be done? what must be done?”
here, in 1998, nelson mandela addressed an audience of 25,000 and spoke of our sharedfuture. “the greatest single challenge facing our globalized world,” he said, “is to combat anderadicate its disparities.” ellen johnson sirleaf, the first female head of state in africa, stoodhere 13 years later and encouraged graduates to resist cynicism and to be fearless.
here, on the terrible afternoon of september 11, 2022, we gathered under a cloudless sky toshare our sadness, our horror, and our disbelief.
and here, just three years ago, we marked harvard’s 375th anniversary dancing in the mud of atorrential downpour. here, president franklin delano roosevelt had celebrated harvard’s threecenturies of accomplishment in a comparably soaking rain.
here, j.k. rowling encouraged graduates to “think themselves into other people’s places.” andconan o’brien told them that “every failure was freeing.”
here, honorary degrees have been presented to carl jung and jean piaget, ellsworth kelly andgeorgia o’keefe, helen keller and martha graham, ravi shankar and leonard bernstein, joandidion and philip roth, eric kandel and elizabeth blackburn, bill gates and tim berners-lee.
i remember feeling awed by that history when i spoke here at my installation as harvard’s28th president, and when i reflected on what has always seemed to me the essence of auniversity: that among society’s institutions, it is uniquely accountable to the past and to thefuture.
our accountability to the past is all around us: behind me stands memorial church, amonument to harvardians who gave their lives at the somme and ypres and verdun duringworld war one. dedicated on armistice day in 1932, it represents harvard’s long tradition ofcommitment to service.
in front of me is widener library, a gift from a bereaved mother, named in honor of her sonharry, who perished aboard the titanic. a library built to advance the learning and discoveryenabled by one of the most diverse and broad collections in the world. widener’s twelvemajestic columns safeguard te_ts and manuscripts—some centuries old—that are deployedevery day by scholars to help us interpret—and reinterpret—the past.
but this afternoon i would like to spend a few minutes considering our accountability to thefuture, because these obligations must be “our compass to steer by,” our common purpose andour shared commitment.
what does harvard—what do universities—owe the future?
first, we owe the world answers.
discovery is at the heart of what universities do. universities engage faculty and studentsacross a range of disciplines in seeking solutions to problems that may have seemedunsolvable, endeavoring to answer questions that threaten to elude us. the scientific researchundertaken today at harvard, and tomorrow by the students we educate, has a capacity toimprove human lives in ways virtually unimaginable even a generation ago. in this past yearalone, harvard researchers have solved riddles related to the treatment of alzheimer’s, thecost-effective production of malaria vaccine, and the origins of the universe. harvardresearchers have proposed answers to challenges as varied as nuclear proliferation, americancompetitiveness, and governance of the internet.
we must continue to support our answer-seekers, who work at the crossroads of thetheoretical and the applied, at the ne_us of research, public policy, and entrepreneurship.together, they will shape our future and enhance our understanding of the world.
second, we owe the world questions.
just as questions yield answers, answers yield questions. human beings may long forcertainty, but, as oliver wendell holmes put it, “certainty generally is illusion, and repose isnot the destiny of man.” universities produce knowledge. they must also produce doubt. thepursuit of truth is restless. we search for answers not by following prescribed paths, but byfinding the right questions—by answering one question with another question, by nurturing astate of mind that is fle_ible and alert, dissatisfied and imaginative. it is what universitiesare designed to do. in an essay in harvard magazine, one of today’s graduates, cheroneduggan, wrote about seeking what she called “an education of questions.” i hope we haveindeed given her that.
questions are the foundation for progress—for ensuring that the world transcends where weare now, what we know now.
and questions are also the foundation for a third obligation that we as universities owe thefuture: we owe the future meaning.
universities must nurture the ability to interpret, to make critical judgments, to dare to askthe biggest questions, the ones that reach well beyond the immediate and the instrumental.we must stimulate the appetite for curiosity.
we find many of these questions in the humanities: what is good? what is just? how do weknow what is true? but we find them in the sciences as well. can there be any question moreprofound, more fundamental than to ask about the origins of the universe? how did we gethere?
questions like these can be unsettling, and they can make universities unsettling places. butthat too is an essential part of what we owe the future—the promise to combatcomplacency, to challenge the present in order to prepare for what is to come. to shape thepresent in service of an uncertain and yet impatient future.
we owe the future answers. we owe the future questions. we owe the future meaning. theharvard campaign, launched last september, will help us fulfill these obligations, and pay ourdebt to the future, just as the gifts of previous generations anchor us here today.
as today’s ceremonies so powerfully remind us, we also owe the future the men and women whoare prepared to ask questions and seek answers and search for meaning for decades to come.today we send some 6,500 graduates into the world, to be teachers and lawyers, scientists andphysicians, poets and planners and public servants, and—as our speaker this morning remindedus—to be in their own ways revolutionaries. ready to take on everything from water scarcity tovirtual currency to community policing. we must continue to invest in financial aid to attractand support the talented students who can build our future, and also we must invest insupporting the teaching and learning that ensures the fullest development of their capacities ina rapidly changing world.
if we fulfill our obligation, today’s graduates will have found the “education of questions”cherone described, a place where, as she put it, “ceilings are only made of sky.” but look aroundyou: we are there. this space is a “theatre” without walls, without a roof, and without limits. itis a place where e_traordinary individuals have preceded us, a place that must encourage ourgraduates—of today and all the years past—to emulate those women and men, to look skywardand to soar.
thank you very much.
第2篇 哈佛大学校长福斯特在2022年毕业典礼英语演讲稿
it is always a pleasure to greeta sea of alumni on commencement afternoon—even thoughmy role is that of thewarm-up act for the feature to come. today i am especially aware of thetreatwe have in store as i look out on not a sea, but a veritable ocean ofanticipation.
but it is my customary assignmentand privilege to offer each spring a report to thealumni on the year that isending. and this was a year that for a number of reasons demandsspecial note.
“the world is too much with us”—the lines of wordsworth’s well-known poem echoed in mymind as i thoughtabout my remarks today, for the world has intruded on us this year in wayswenever would have imagined. the university had not officially closed for a daysince 1978. thisyear it closed three times. twice it was for cases of e_tremeweather—first for superstorm sandyand then for nemo, the record-breakingfebruary blizzard. the third was of course the day ofboston’s lockdown in theaftermath of the tragic marathon bombings. this was a year thatchallengedfundamental assumptions about life’s security, stability and predictability.
yet as i reflected on theseintrusions from a world so very much with us, i was struck by howwe at harvardare so actively engaged in shaping that world and indeed in addressing somanyof the most important and trying questions that these recent events have posed.
just two weeks ago, climatescientists and disaster relief workers gathered here for a two-day conferenceco-sponsored by the harvard humanitarian initiative and the harvarduniversitycenter for the environment. they came to e_plore the very issues presentedbysandy and nemo and to consider how academic researchers and workers on theground cancollaborate more effectively.
this gathering represents justone e_ample of the wide range of activities across theuniversity dedicated toaddressing the challenges of climate change. how can we advance thesciencethat helps us understand climate change—and perhaps avert it? how can wedevisesolutions—from new technologies to principles of urban design—that mightmitigate it?how can we envision the public policies to manage and respond toit? harvard is deeplyengaged with the broad issues of energy andenvironment—offering more than 250 courses inthis area, gathering 225 facultythrough our environment center and its programs, enrolling100 doctoralstudents from 7 schools and many different disciplines in a graduateconsortiumdesigned to broaden their understanding of environmental issues. our facultyarestudying atmospheric composition and working to develop renewable energysources; theyare seeking to manage rising oceans and to reimagine cities foran era of increasinglythreatening weather; they are helping to fashionenvironmental regulations and internationalclimate agreements.
so the weather isn’t somethingthat simply happens at harvard, even though it may haveseemed that way when wehad to close twice this year. it is a focus of study and of research, aswework to confront the implications of climate change and help shape nationalandinternational responses to its e_tremes.
when boston e_perienced thetragedy of the marathon bombings last month, the city andsurroundingmunicipalities went into lockdown on april 19 to help ensure the capture oftheescaped suspect, and harvard responded in e_traordinary ways. within ourowncommunity, students, faculty and staff went well beyond their ordinaryresponsibilities tosupport one another and keep the university operatingsmoothly and safely underunprecedented circumstances. but we also witnessedour colleagues’ magnificent efforts tomeet the needs of boston and our other neighborsin the crisis. the harvard police worked withother law enforcement agencies,and several of our officers played a critical role in saving thelife of thetransit officer wounded in watertown. doctors, nurses and other staff, manyfrom ouraffiliated hospitals, performed a near-miracle in ensuring that everyinjured person who arrivedat a hospital survived. years of disaster planningand emergency readiness enabled theseinstitutions to act in a stunninglycoordinated and effective manner. i am deeply proud of thecontributions madeby members of the harvard community in the immediate aftermath of thebombings.
but our broader and ongoingresponsibility as a university is to ask and address the largerquestions anysuch tragedy poses: to prepare for the ne_t crisis and the one after that, evenaswe work to prevent them; to help us all understand the origins and themeaning of suchterrible events in human lives and societies. we do this workin the teaching and research towhich we devote ourselves every day.
investigators at the harvardhospitals are e_ploring improved techniques for managinginjury. researchers atbrigham and women’s, for instance, are pursuing the prospect of legtransplantsfor amputees. a faculty member in our school of engineering and appliedsciences isstudying traumatic brain injury. faculty in the business andkennedy schools are teaching andlearning about leadership in times ofcrisis—analyzing historic and contemporary e_amples,from shackleton inantarctica to katrina in new orleans—in order to search for lessons forthefuture. the very day of the lockdown, the mahindra humanities center and theharvard lawschool program on negotiation had scheduled a conference on“confronting evil,” e_aminingthe cognitive, behavioral and social implicationsof both what it called “everyday evils” and“e_traordinary crimes.” a few dayslater, the harvard divinity school assembled a panel ofe_perts to discuss“religion and terror,” e_ploring sources of violence in bosnia, in themiddleeast, and during the troubles in ireland, which served as a formativee_perience for ourdivinity school dean in his youth. at the institute ofpolitics at the kennedy school, lawenforcement, emergency management and othere_perts gathered to consider lessons learnedfrom the bombings. as we struggledto understand the events that shook our city and ourregion, members of ourcommunity were already engaged in interpreting the world that hadproduced suchtragedy and in seeking ways to prevent its recurrence.
three unusual days, making for anunusual year. yet these three unusual daysunderscore and illuminate the usualwork of this university: calling on knowledge andresearch to addressfundamental challenges and dilemmas with resources drawn from the widestscopeof human inquiry—from the insights of the natural and social sciences to thereflectionson meaning and values at the heart of the humanities. universitiesurge us towards a betterfuture and equip us as individuals and societies toget there.
yet other events this past yearremind us we cannot take what universities do for granted.this year hasbrought home not just the threats of e_treme weather and of terror andviolence.it has also been a year that has challenged fundamental assumptions undergirdingamericanhigher education and the foundations of our nation’s researchenterprise. i have just offerede_amples of how our research and teaching cancontribute to addressing urgent problems facingour world. we live in an era inwhich knowledge is more vital than ever to nations, economiesand societies.knowledge is, i often say, the most important currency of the twenty-firstcentury.and universities are the places that, more than any other, generateand disseminate thatknowledge.
in the united states, thepartnership between universities and the federal governmentestablished afterworld war ii has been a powerful engine of scientific discovery andprosperity.yet that partnership, now more than half a century old, is threatened by theerosionof federal support for research—a situation made acute by the sequester. anestimatedalmost $10 billion will be cut from the federal government’s researchbudget in 2022. thenational institutes of health calculates that cuts to itsresources could mean the loss of morethan 20,000 jobs in the life sciencessector. here at harvard, we receive appro_imately 16% ofour operating budgetfrom federal research funding. we anticipate we may see declines of asmuch as$40 million annually in federal support for research.
what does all this mean? facultyare finding that even grant applications with perfect scoresin peerevaluations are not getting funded. they see e_isting awards being reduced.aspiringyounger scientists are fearful they will not receive career-launchinggrants on which their futuredepends. some are entertaining overtures fromcountries outside the united states wherescience investment is robust ande_panding. students contemplating graduate training arewondering if theyshould pursue other options. great ideas that could lead to improvedhumanlives and opportunities, and improved understanding, are left without supportor themeans for further development.
the world and the nation need thekind of research that harvard and other americanresearch universitiesundertake. we need the knowledge and understanding thatresearchgenerates—knowledge about climate change, or crisis management, or melanoma,oreffective mental health interventions in schools, or hormones that might treatdiabetes, orany of a host of other worthy projects our faculty are currentlypursuing. we need the supportand encouragement for the students who willcreate our scientific future. we need theeconomic vitality—the jobs andcompanies—that these ideas and discoveries produce. we needthe nation toresist imposing a self-inflicted wound on its intellectual and human capital.weneed a nation that believes in, and invests in, its universities because werepresent aninvestment in the ideas and the people that will build and will bethe future.
so as i report to you on the yearwe now bring to a close, i want to underscore the threatto universities and toour national infrastructure of knowledge and discovery that thesequesterrepresents. even in a year when sometimes the world felt too much with us, wehavenever lost sight of how much what we do here has to do with the world. andfor the world. tosequester the search for knowledge, to sequester discovery,to sequester the unrelentingdrive of our students and faculty to envision andpursue this endless frontier—such a strategydoes more than threatenuniversities. it puts at risk the capacity and promise of universitiestofulfill our commitment to the public good, our commitment to our childrenandgrandchildren and to the future we will leave them. the challenges facing theworld are tooconsequential, the need for knowledge, imagination andunderstanding is too great, theopportunity for improving the human conditiontoo precious for us to do anything less thanrise to the occasion. with thedevotion of our alumni, with the inspiration of our new graduatesand—ihope—with the support of our nation’s leaders, we must and we will.
