On April 24, nationally renowned cartoonist Keith Knight will visit Appalachian State University. While on campus, he will be the focus of two events that are free and open to the public.

All incoming first-year students at Appalachian State University will receive a copy of Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s novel “One Amazing Thing” during summer orientation as part of the university’s Common Reading Program for the 2017-18 academic year.

The gala concert featured 10 works chosen by conference adjudicators, including “Tiny Potato on the Train,” by Assistant Professor of Dance Studies Cara Hagan, and “From Here I Saw What Happened and I Cried,” which was choreographed by Juliet Irving, a junior dance studies and graphic design double major.

Robert Gipe is a graduate of Wake Forest University, with a master’s degree in American Studies from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He lives in Harlan, Kentucky, and works as the director of the Appalachian Program at Southeast Kentucky Community & Technical College, where he is a key producer of Higher Ground, a series of community-based musical dramas inspired by oral histories and local issues.

As part of a continued exploration of Civil War themes this semester, the Department of History at Appalachian will host Dr. Curt Fields for “An Evening with General Ulysses S. Grant: The Man Behind the Uniform.” Fields is the National Park Service representative for Grant. He has portrayed the commanding general of the Union Army in films, posters and re-enactments.

Dr. Michael Thomas Smith, an associate professor of history at McNeese State University, will present “General Benjamin Butler, Politics, Warfare and Masculinity in the Civil War North” as part of the Civil War Speaker Series at Appalachian.

Dr. Jason White, an assistant professor in the Department of History at Appalachian, will deliver the lecture “Between Two Worlds: the English Levant Company and the Ottoman Empire, 1581-1688.”