Bishop Charles Cardwell McCabe embodies the spirit of American University's founders. McCabe, Vice Chancellor and Chancellor of the university from 1899-1902, dreamt of an educational system unlike that of any other university of its time. He believed in building a lasting future for AU and began the first successful fundraising campaign with his call to action, "Five dollars each, from one million people," to foster the new university.

Under Bishop McCabe's leadership, American University's second building was constructed: the McKinley Memorial Building, created in honor of United States President William McKinley. McCabe himself laid the cornerstone for the building.

Filmmaker Alex Rivera: Artificial Intelligence, Science Fiction, and Rasquache Futures October 24, 2023

Named by Variety as one of “Ten Directors to Watch," award-winning filmmaker Alex Rivera will speak to American University's College of Arts and Sciences for the 2023-24 Bishop McCabe Lecture Series.

Rivera's work explores themes of globalization, migration, and technology. For over 25 years, Rivera has used science-fiction imagery to illuminate Latinx lives and politics. He will discuss how rhetoric and the recent and profound emergence surrounding ‘artificial intelligence’ have impacted his image-making and thinking about technology, labor, and power. Rivera will be joined by Professor David Vazquez and Professor Despina Kakoudaki for a panel discussion after his presentation.

About Alex Rivera

Rivera’s first feature film, Sleep Dealer, a cyberpunk thriller set on the US/Mexico border, won awards at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival and the Berlin International Film Festival, was screened at the Museum of Modern Art and had a commercial theatrical release in the US, France, Japan, and other countries. In The New York Times, A.O. Scott described Rivera as “a brilliant young director” and Variety named him one of “Ten Directors to Watch.”

Rivera’s second feature, The Infiltrators, won the NEXT: Audience Award and the Innovator Award at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival. The Infiltrators uses documentary and scripted forms to tell the true story of Dreamers who ‘infiltrate’ a detention center to get immigrants out. The Hollywood Reporter raved “watching it is a thrill” and The New Yorker Radio Hour called the film “extraordinary and important.”

Alex Rivera is a 2021 MacArthur Fellow, Sundance Fellow, Creative Capital Grantee, and was The Rothschild Lecturer at Harvard University. He studied at Hampshire College, lives in Los Angeles, and is an Associate Professor of Filmmaking Practice at ASU's Sidney Poitier New American Film School.