Eric Klinenberg with Kim Phillips-Fein: 2020: One City, Seven People, and the Year Everything Changed

​Acclaimed sociologist and best-selling author Eric Klinenberg joins us to discuss his latest book, 2020: One City, Seven People, and the Year Everything Changed, with Pulitzer Prize finalist and Professor of History at Columbia University Kim Phillips-Fein.

This event will take place in person at the Stavros Niarchos Foundation Library on the 7th Floor.

2020 will go down alongside 1914, 1929, and 1968 as one of the most consequential years in history. Acclaimed sociologist and best-selling author Eric Klinenberg's latest book, 2020: One City, Seven People, and the Year Everything Changed, is the first attempt to capture the full human experience of that fateful time.

At the heart of 2020 are seven vivid profiles of ordinary New Yorkers—including an elementary school principal, a bar manager, a subway custodian, and a local political aide—whose experiences illuminate how Americans, and people across the globe, reckoned with 2020. Klinenberg vividly captures these stories, casting them against the backdrop of a high-stakes presidential election, a surge of misinformation, rising distrust, and raging protests. 2020 not only helps us reckon with what we lived through, but also with the challenges we face before the next crisis arrives.

At this event, Eric will discuss the book with Robert Gardiner-Kenneth T. Jackson Professor of History at Columbia University, Kim Phillips-Fein. 

To join the event in person | Doors will open 30 minutes before the program begins. For free events, we generally overbook to ensure a full house. Priority will be given to those who have registered in advance, but registration does not guarantee admission. All registered seats are released shortly before start time, and seats may become available at that time. A standby line will form 30 minutes before the program.

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS

Eric Klinenberg is the Helen Gould Shepard Professor in the Social Sciences and director of the Institute for Public Knowledge at New York University. He is the coauthor of the #1 New York Times bestseller Modern Romance and author of Palaces for the People, Going Solo, Heat Wave, and Fighting for Air. He has contributed to The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, Rolling Stone, Wired, and This American Life. He lives in New York City.

Kim Phillips-Fein is Robert Gardiner-Kenneth T. Jackson Professor of History at Columbia University. She is the author of the Pulitzer Prize finalist Fear City: New York's Fiscal Crisis and the Rise of Austerity Politics, and Invisible Hands: The Businessmen's Crusade Against the New Deal. Her articles have appeared in the Journal of American History, The New York Times, The New Republic and The Nation. She has held fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Russell Sage Foundation and the NYPL's Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers.

ACCESSIBILITY NOTES

In-Person

• Assistive listening devices and/or hearing loops are available at the venue.


• You can request a free ASL (American Sign Language) interpretation or CART (Communication Access Real-Time Translation) captioning service by emailing your request at least two weeks in advance of the event: email accessibility@nypl.org or use this Gmail template.


• This venue is fully accessible to wheelchairs.

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All programs are subject to change or cancellation. 

The 7 Stories Up Series at SNFL is made possible by the Stavros Niarchos Foundation (SNF).