For the Culture: The Power Behind What We Buy, What We Do, and Who We Want to Be (Virtual)

The architect of some of the most famous ad campaigns of the last decade argues that culture is the most powerful vehicle for influencing behavior and shows us how to harness culture to inspire other people to share their vision. In For the Culture: The Power Behind What We Buy, What We Do, and Who We Want to Be, Dr. Marcus Collins uses stories from his own life as a top marketer, from spearheading digital strategy for Beyoncé, to working with iTunes and Nike+ on their collaboration, to the successful launch of the Nets NBA team in Brooklyn, to break down the ways in which culture influences behavior. Then, he shows us how they can do the same. With a deep perspective based on a century’s worth of data, and designed for our hyper-connected, light-speed world, For the Culture will give us the tools to inspire collective change by encouraging us to always consider not only what culture can do for us, but what we can do for the culture. 

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 Copies of For the Culture are available for purchase through the Mark Twain Store; proceeds benefit The Mark Twain House & Museum. Books will be shipped after the event. We regret that we are NOT able to ship books outside the United States as it is cost-prohibitive to do so. 

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 About the Author: Dr. Marcus Collins is an award-winning marketer and cultural translator with one foot in the world of practice—serving as the head of strategy at Wieden+Kennedy New York—and one foot in the world of academia—as a clinical assistant professor of marketing at the Ross School of Business, University of Michigan.  

He is a recipient of Advertising Age’s 40 Under 40 award and an inductee into the American Advertising Federation’s Advertising Hall of Achievement. His strategies and creative contributions have led to the launch and success of Google’s “Real Tone” technology, the “Made In America” music festival, and the Brooklyn Nets, among others. Prior to his advertising tenure, Marcus worked on iTunes + Nike sport music initiatives at Apple and ran digital strategy for Beyoncé. Marcus holds a doctorate in marketing from Temple University where he studied social contagion and meaning-making. He received an MBA with an emphasis on strategic brand marketing from the University of Michigan, where he also earned his undergraduate degree in Material Science Engineering. He lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan.  

About the Moderator: Dawnie Walton is the author of The Final Revival of Opal & Nev, winner of the Mark Twain American Voice in Literature Award, the 2022 Aspen Words Literary Prize, the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award, and the Audie Award for Fiction. Her debut novel was also longlisted for the 2022 Women’s Prize for Fiction and was named one of the best books of 2021 by The Washington Post, NPR, Esquire, and former U.S. President Barack Obama. She is the cofounder and editorial director of Ursa, an audio production company celebrating short fiction from underrepresented voices and is the cohost of its accompanying podcast. Formerly an editor at Essence and Entertainment Weekly, she has received fellowships from MacDowell and Tin House, and an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop (where she has taught a fiction seminar). Born and raised in Jacksonville, Florida, she lives in Brooklyn with her husband. 

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 Programs at The Mark Twain House & Museum are made possible in part by support from CT Humanities; the Connecticut Department of Economic and Community Development, Office of the Arts; Ensworth Charitable Foundation, Bank of America, N.A., Trustee; the Greater Hartford Arts Council’s United Arts Campaign; The Hartford; The Mark Twain Foundation; The National Endowment for the Humanities; and Travelers.