Dexter Filkins, award-winning correspondent for the New York Times, presents his book, The Forever War, at Politics & Prose on Tuesday at 7. The book is an account of Filkins’s nine years covering the wars in the Middle East, starting with the rise of the Taliban in the 1990s and continuing into the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Field biologist George Schaller will give a lecture, “A Life in the Wild,” at the National Zoo’s visitor center on Wednesday at 7:30. As head conservationist for the Wildlife Conservation Society, Schaller has spent time researching in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and helped to save endangered species on the Tibetan Plateau. Reservations are recommended for this free event; call 202-633-4085.

Stephanie Elizondo Griest, author of the guidebook 100 Places Every Woman Should Go, discusses her newest work, Mexican Enough: My Life Between the Borderlines, at Olssons Books & Records on Thursday at 7. Griest’s book begins in her racially mixed Texas town and follows her into Mexico, where she stumbles into luchadores, rebel teachers, and imprisoned political activists while investigating the story of her own roots.

The National Portrait Gallery’s film series “Reel Portraits” is screening Good Night, and Good Luck on Friday at 7 in the McEvoy Auditorium. Directed by George Clooney, the film depicts Edward R. Murrow’s famous television report on Senator Joseph McCarthy and the Red Scare, which helped lead to the senator’s downfall. American University professor of history Robert Griffith will introduce the film.

Acclaimed virtuoso harmonicist Frédéric Yonnet performs at the National Gallery of Art’s sculpture garden on Friday as part of the Duke Ellington Jazz Festival. Yonnet, who has spent time dueling on stage with Stevie Wonder, performs at 5:30 and 7:15.

The National Postal Museum celebrates Hispanic Heritage Month with a family program featuring Latin jazz on Saturday from 2 to 5 in the atrium. A student quartet from the Music Teaching Project kicks things off with a performance at 2, followed by conga-drum demonstrations, oral histories of jazz, and a presentation on the recently released Latin jazz stamp.

Robert F. Dorr signs copies of his books Air Force One and Hell Hawks!: The Untold Story of the American Fliers Who Savaged Hitler’s Wehrmacht outside the National Air and Space Museum’s store on Sunday from noon to 4.

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