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University Communications

Author-Ecologist to Open Speaker Series at University of Richmond

August 31, 2006

Sandra Steingraber, distinguished visiting scholar at Ithaca College and author of "Living Downstream: An Ecologist Looks at Cancer and the Environment," will open the 2006-07 WILL/WGSS speaker series at the University of Richmond Sept. 28.

Her lecture on "First Environment: Women's Bodies and Toxic Trespass" will begin at 7 p.m. in the Brown-Alley Room of Weinstein Hall. The event is free and open to the public.

A cancer survivor, Steingraber is an internationally recognized expert on the environmental links to cancer and reproductive health. She received a doctorate in biology from the University of Michigan and master's degree in English from Illinois State University. She is author of "Post-Diagnosis," a volume of poetry, and co-author of a book on ecology and human rights in Africa. She has taught biology at Columbia College, Chicago, and held visiting fellowships at the University of Illinois, Radcliffe/Harvard and Northeastern University. She served on President Clinton's National Action Plan on Breast Cancer.

She will speak about ways in which low-level exposures to toxic chemicals are undermining women's reproductive choices-from pesticides that sabotage fertility to toxins that find their way into breast milk.

Steingraber's talk is the first of six events in the series, sponsored by Richmond's Women Involved in Living and Learning (WILL), Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies (WGSS) and Richmond Quest. The series' theme is "Environmental Justice." All events are free and open to the public. For more information, contact WILL at (804) 289-8578 or will@richmond.edu.

In addition to Steingraber, this year's series will include:

  • Vernice Miller-Travis and Andrea Simpson, "A Woman's Worth: Race, Gender and Class in the Environmental Justice Movement," Oct. 25, 4 p.m., Whitehurst Living Room, Richmond College.
  • Marilou Awiakta, "Weaving Survival with Peace: Selu (Corn) as a Teacher," Nov. 2, 4 p.m., Brown-Alley Room, Weinstein Hall.
  • "Salt of the Earth," a Cold War-era film,which tells the true story of Chicano zinc miners and their wives, Nov. 15, 4 p.m., Jepson Hall, room 118.
  • Lois Gibbs, "Citizen Activism for Environmental Health: The Growth of a Powerful New Grassroots Health Movement," Feb. 6, 7 p.m., Brown-Alley Room, Weinstein Hall.
  • "Appalachian Activism" with Kate Larken, Rema Keen and Patricia Johnson, who address intertwined issues of land, class, racism, violence against women, sexual identities and identities as Appalachian women, April 12, 7 p.m., Alice Haynes Room, Tyler Haynes Commons.