Hesburgh Lecture 2024

John Deak, Ph.D., professor of History at Notre Dame, is presenting “The First World War and the Birth of the Twentieth Century” on Oct. 15, 2024 at 7 p.m. as part of the annual Hesburgh lecture that’s co-sponsored by the McGowan Center for Ethics and Social Responsibility and the Notre Dame Club of Hanover Township. Deak will discuss the end of the First World War, the larger trends in society and culture that it fostered, and its significance for understanding both the economic and political crises that followed.

Dr. Deak is an associate professor of History at the University of Notre Dame. He specializes in the history of Modern Central Europe and the First World War. His first book, a political history of the Austrian Civil Service, received the Austrian State Prize for Social History in 2018. He is currently co-writing a book on the collapse of the Habsburg Empire in the First World War.