Framingham State University is pleased to announce its 2015-16 Arts & Ideas Program, which kicks off in September.

The program, which features dozens of free lectures, film screenings and performances, is highlighted this year by the “Stasis and Change” series. The series looks at current social and scientific issues, such as racial injustice and climate change, with an eye toward the following questions: When is stasis, or stability, a mask for inequality passed off as tradition, and when is it a valued form of continuity - our human inheritance? How do we know whether changes are positive or negative – or something else altogether?

Speakers include race and gender activist Naomi Tutu - daughter of South African social rights activist Desmond Tutu - as well as Dr. Temple Grandin, a leading advocate for autistic communities.

The program also includes the annual President’s Distinguished Lecture Series. The theme of this year’s series is “Science as a Part of our Living World,” and will feature a lecture from award-winning journalist Naomi Klein that draws on her new book on the global climate crisis, This Changes Everything. There will also be a lecture from Dr. Briana Pobiner of the National Museum of History on the facts, fallacies and fantasies in our understanding of prehistoric diet.

Other highlights of the series include the Lifelong Learning Series, run in partnership with Framingham Public Library, the World in Flicks Film Series, Mazmanian Gallery Exhibitions and the Authors and Artists Series.

Nearly every event in the Arts & Ideas Program is free and open to the public. For more information, visit www.framingham.edu/artsandideas.