University of Richmond lecture series to focus on politics and the body
August 26, 2008
The point where politics intersects with the body—through wearing a veil, the racial health divide or the impact of eating disorders on society—will be examined in a lecture series at the University of Richmond.
"Politics of the Body" is a series of three lectures sponsored by Women Involved in Living and Learning, the Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies program, and Richmond Quest. Each lecture will begin at 7 p.m. in the Brown-Alley Room of Weinstein Hall. All events are free and open to the public.
Farzaneh Milani, professor of Persian literature and women's studies at the University of Virginia, will speak Sept. 23 about "The Veil: A Modern Fetish." Milani contends that although the veil has become a highly controversial phenomenon, it was not always immediately associated with Islamic culture or the suppression of women.
Bioethics journalist Harriet Washington will speak Oct. 30 about "American Apartheid: Race, History and Medical Logic." She will discuss how American blacks have long suffered from health inequities not shared by whites. Her talk will explain how this disparity came about and what must be done to remedy it.
Washington is the author of numerous books about bioethics, including "Medical Apartheid: The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present." She has been a fellow in ethics at Harvard Medical School, a fellow at the Harvard School of Public Health and a senior research scholar at the National Center for Bioethics at Tuskegee Institute.
Author and professor Susan Bordo will speak Feb. 3 about "Beyond Eating Disorders: Why We Need to Rethink Everything We Thought We Knew." She will discuss the effect of body image on women, men and society. Bordo holds the Otis A. Singletary Chair in the Humanities at the University of Kentucky, where she teaches English and gender and women's studies. Her books include "The Male Body, A New Look at Men in Public and Private" and "Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture and the Body."
Each year the WILL/WGSS/Quest lecture series brings prominent women and men to the university to discuss issues surrounding gender and diversity issues.
For more information, call (804) 289-8578.