Agent of Change: Anna Deavere Smith on the 44th Jefferson Lecture and the Search for American Character

Humanities, the arts, words, culture, character, the language that people really speak when they speak to each other -- oh, these are creatively deep waters for somebody like Anna Deavere Smith to swim through. The acclaimed actress-playwright-professor, perhaps best known for her television roles -- Nancy McNally on The West Wing and Gloria Akalitus on Nurse Jackie -- ruminates about all this prior to her appearance as the featured lecturer at The 44th Jefferson Lecture in the Humanties for the...