Sussman Lecture
About this Event
Brian Goldstone, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning book There Is No Place for Us: Working and Homeless in America,will deliver the fall Sussman lecture, presented by The Harkin Institute for Public Policy & Citizen Engagement in partnership with Anawim Housing on Tuesday, September 8, 2026.
Goldstone’s presentation will highlight how the working poor have been pushed out of affordable housing in Atlanta and what risks the rest of our nation’s capital cities face as well.
WHAT: Sussman Lecture presented by The Harkin Institute for Public Policy & Citizen Engagement at Drake University in partnership with Anawim Housing
WHO: Brian Goldstone, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning book There Is No Place for Us: Working and Homeless in America
WHEN: Tuesday, September 8, 2026 at 7:30 p.m. CDT
WHERE: Sheslow Auditorium, Old Main, on the Drake University campus, Des Moines, IA
LIVESTREAM: The Harkin Institute YouTube channel
About Brian Goldstone
Brian Goldstone is a journalist and author of . Told through the lives of five families in Atlanta, the book traces the rise of America’s “working homeless,” exposing the forces—gentrification, racialized displacement, precarious low-wage labor—fueling a growing housing insecurity crisis. The book was a finalist for the Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction, was named one of the 10 Best Books of 2025 by The New York Times and The Atlantic, and was selected as one of Barack Obama's favorite books of the year.
His longform reporting and essays have appeared in The New York Times, Harper's, The New Republic, The California Sunday Magazine, Guernica, and Jacobin, among other publications. He has written about psychiatric care in Ghana, life after incarceration, the plight of chronic pain sufferers during an opioid epidemic, Israel's secretive campaign to deport African asylum seekers, and, most recently, homelessness and housing precarity. He is editor of . In 2019, he co-organized the symposium “Uncertain States: Narrative Journalism and Its Limits” at the Columbia School of Journalism.
Brian received his PhD in anthropology from Duke University. In 2021, he was a National Fellow at New America; prior to this, he was a Mellon Research Fellow in the Society of Fellows at Columbia University. He is the recipient of grants and fellowships from the Luce Foundation, Fulbright, the Wenner-Gren Foundation, and the American Council of Learned Societies. In 2015-2016, as a Justice-in-Education Fellow at Columbia, he taught at Sing Sing Pr*son.
Accommodations
American Sign Language (ASL) and live captioning (CART) will be provided. Further accommodations can be requested on your ticket order form or by emailing [email protected]
Accessing the Event
Everyone who registers will receive additional information on how to access the Sussman Lecture ahead of the event.
About the Sussman Lecture Series
Established by Richard Sussman, AS’51, in memory of his late wife, Lila, the Sussman Lecture Series takes place twice a year and invites notable public figures to discuss timely topics. Past Sussman speakers include Microsoft Chief Accessibility Officer Jenny Lay-Flurrie, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Kailash Satyarthi, NASA Chief Historian Bill Barry, and Celine Cousteau, a French explorer, education ambassador and documentary filmmaker.
Where is it happening?
Event Location & Nearby Stays:
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