J.K. Rowling will be the principal speaker at the Harvard Commencement ceremony June 5, 2008. The Harry Potter author will be featured at the prestigious university’s 357th graduation ceremony this summer in Cambridge, Massachusetts and will also receive an honorary degree. The president of Harvard said:
“Perhaps no one in our time has done more than J.K. Rowling to inspire young people to experience the excitement and the sheer joy of reading,” said President Drew Faust. “Her tales of Harry, Ron, and Hermione and their Hogwarts adventures have cast a spell on millions of readers around the world. Harvard isn’t exactly Hogwarts, but I’m sure that her visit with us next June will be a moment of magic for J.K. Rowling’s many admirers across the University.”
“It will be an honor and a thrill to welcome J.K. Rowling to Harvard,” said Jonathan Byrnes, president of the Harvard Alumni Association. “There are countless Harry Potter devotees throughout the Harvard family, and we look forward to warmly welcoming one of the world’s best-read authors to our Commencement festivities.”
Harvard University is renown for having some of the leading figures of our time speak at their graduation ceremony each year; a full list of past speakers can be found here.
Amy S, the invitation to Emma Watson was to speak at the Oxford Union, which is a student debating society. That’s different from the university offering her an honorary degree, which is what Harvard has done to JKR and which is a much bigger honour. I agree that it would be cool if Oxford would follow suit!
Wow! What a huge honour for Jo to be on that list! But she truely does belong there, I mean, what she has accomplished with her writing is more than anyone thought was possible. I’d love to be there to see what she has to say… I imagine it’s going to be something quite honest and thus inspiering :)
thanks Fragesteller, Amy S and gareth…Exeter makes sense, and Gareth is correct re the difference between speaking and honorary degrees…
interesting….the upper crust of universities in the UK are far more conservative than in the US, and “Oxbridge” is (Oxbridge are???)notoriously conservative ...tho I would have thought St A’s and Edinburgh as Scot universities would have honored her by now.
Also, there are informal traditions that come into play with honorary degrees, at least in the US. recipients are often invited to serve in some voluntary capacity on the university’s behalf; sometimes, it is hoped that the recipient will donate to the university in the future (this is not quid pro quo, but rather a future possible denotation to enhance the institution …the JK Rowlings Endowed Chair in Modern British literature would be an example of what could be done 30 years from now); and sometimes recipients also donate their papers to the university’s library. Please let me emphasize there is not the “expectation” that recipients will do any of those things, but rather the hope. Those receiving honorary degrees do not receive a speaker’s fee or honorarium.
Often, speakers at universities (at least here in the US) do receive a speaker’s fee or honorarium, the size of which depends on the importance of the speaker. Many big-name speakers have their fees donated to foundations or to charities.
Surprised to hear that some at Harvard are unhappy with the invitation…it cannot be on political grounds, surely!
I have found, I think, something amusing on the web:
“Meanwhile, last month, she won the Whitbread Children’s Book of the Year Award for the third book in the series, Harry Potter and the Prince [sic!] of Azkaban.”
My cousin goes to Harvard…I wonder if he’s graduating then? If this is open to the public, how are they going to keep out all the rabid Potter fans. If I can get to Massachusetts, I’m so going.
Amy S, the invitation to Emma Watson was to speak at the Oxford Union, which is a student debating society. That’s different from the university offering her an honorary degree, which is what Harvard has done to JKR and which is a much bigger honour. I agree that it would be cool if Oxford would follow suit!