Colloquium Highlights Secrecy, Intelligence

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post by Nash Dunn, a writer in NC State’s College of Humanities and Social Sciences.

Researchers who study intelligence often face methodological and conceptual challenges associated with the secret nature of the field.

Next week, members of the academic and intelligence communities will come together at NC State to discuss how to overcome those barriers.

“Secrecy and Intelligence: Opening the Black Box” will be held from April 18-19 at NC State’s Talley Student Union and James B. Hunt Jr. Library. Organized by NC State’s College of Humanities and Social Sciences in conjunction with Professor Brian Balmer of University College London, the event is expected to draw Science and Technology Studies and related scholars, civil society members and intelligence community practitioners from the United States and Europe.

The first day of the colloquium will be held from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in Talley Student Union, Room 4280. The day will be capped off by a special Rolf Buchdahl Lecture on Science, Technology and Human Values from George Washington University scholar Hugh Gusterson at 7:30 p.m. in Talley’s BR-Coastal Ballroom. Gusterson, a professor of anthropology and international affairs at GWU, will give a talk entitled “Secrecy and its Discontents.”

The second day of the colloquium is 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the James B. Hunt Jr. Library, Duke Energy Rooms C and D. For more information on the event or to see a full schedule, visit go.ncsu.edu/secrecyandintelligence. This is a public event; however, scheduled meals and certain items on the agenda are by invitation only.

This colloquium is sponsored by the U.S. National Science Foundation; U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency’s Intelligence Community Centers for Academic Excellence (IC-CAE) Program; the Laboratory for Analytic Sciences (LAS); the Kenan Institute for Engineering, Technology, and Science; the Science, Technology and Society and Interdisciplinary Studies programs in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at NC State; and the Buchdahl Fund.

For information and directions to the Talley Student Union, click here. For directions to the Hunt Library, click here.

Public parking (on an hourly basis) is available at the Poulton Paylot across the street from the first-floor entrance to the Hunt Library. The lot is gated and requires a credit card to enter and for payment upon exit. Daily visitor parking permits are available at the Visitor Information Booth on Varsity Drive for $5 per day. Click here for the Poulton Paylot map. Click here for the Visitor Information Booth map.