Monday, February 2, 2009

Today’s Response
Middle Tennessee State University

Vientiane verses

Lao-American author and poet Bryan Thao Worra will conduct an hour-long poetry reading at 7 p.m. tomorrow, Feb. 3, in the State Farm Lecture Hall of MTSU’s Business and Aerospace Building. This event is free and open to the public. Worra is the first Laotian-American to receive a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship in literature and poetry. His first full-length book of poetry, On the Other Side of the Eye, was released in 2007. His writing covers topics from the ancient kingdom of Lane Xang to the CIA’s secret wartime activities in Laos during the Vietnam War era to the cosmic, science fiction and popular culture. Worra’s latest book, Barrow, will be released in April.

Contact Connie Huddleston at 615-494-7628.
chuddles@mtsu.edu

Higher ed heavyweights

Best-selling health and lifestyle author Anne M. Fletcher will speak at MTSU’s McCallie Dining Hall at 5 p.m. tomorrow, Feb. 3. Fletcher will discuss her new book, Weight Loss Confidential, which is written from the perspective of young people who succeeded at losing weight and keeping it off. It is based on firsthand accounts from students and their parents about what works and what doesn’t work for weight management. “Weight is an issue that concerns college students, and recent reports indicate that many young people are overweight,” Fletcher says. “Overweight or not, they often try to control their weight in unhealthy ways.” Fletcher is a registered dietitian and has counseled hundreds of clients with weight control issues. This event is free and open to the public.

Contact James Perry at 615-904-8486.
perry-james@aramark.com

One man, one woman?

American legislative attempts to define marriage as unions of one man and one woman ignore the fact that monogamy is not the preferred arrangement in most of the world. Dr. Marilyn Wells, medical anthropologist and professor emeritus of sociology and anthropology, says monogamy is preferred in only 25 percent of world societies. The preferred form of marriage in 73 percent of world societies is polygyny, or multiple wives. “Where a woman is considered an economic liability, polygyny is a mark of prestige for the men of privilege or men of wealth, for the elders of a society,” Wells says. “It is a privilege of kings, aristocrats, chiefs and the older men of the society. And it is a tool that is used for cementing political alliances among competing political groups.”

Contact Wells at 615-895-4385.

TR EXTRA

…AND I CAN SEE RUSSIA FROM MY DESK!--Andranik Migranyan, one of Russia’s foremost foreign policy experts, will speak at 3 p.m. tomorrow, Feb. 3, in Room 106 of the Paul W. Martin Sr. Honors Building at MTSU. This event is free and open to the public. The director of the New York branch of the Institute for Democracy and Cooperation, Migranyan also is a professor of political science at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations. He has been an acting member of the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation since 2005. A frequent commentator on television and radio, Migranyan has published several books and hundreds of articles in leading Russian and international publications. For more information, contact Dr. Andrei Korobkov at 615-898-2945 or korobkov@mtsu.edu.

MELTING POT, MOSAIC, OR MELANGE?--Eugene Robinson, associate editor and columnist for the Washington Post and MSNBC political analyst, will speak at 10:20 a.m. Wednesday, Feb. 4, in MTSU’s Keathley University Center Theater. This event, which is co-sponsored by the Seigenthaler Chair of Excellence in First Amendment Studies and the MTSU Black History Committee, is free and open to the public. Robinson, whose twice-weekly Post column is syndicated in 145 newspapers across the country, will speak on “We’re Someplace We’ve Never Been: Race, Diversity and the New America.” The address will focus on Robinson’s upbringing in segregated South Carolina with reviews of the educational and economic progress made by African-Americans, the increase in interracial marriage, the rise of Latinos as the largest minority group in the U.S., the polarization of Americans according to class, and the scientific consensus that race is meaningless except as a social construct. For more information, contact Dr. Sekou Franklin at 615-904-8232 or franklin@mtsu.edu.

WE CAN BE HEROES FOR MORE THAN ONE DAY.--An annual hallmark of Black History Month at MTSU since 1996, the 2009 Unity Luncheon honoring “unsung heroes” in the community will be held at 11 a.m. tomorrow, Feb. 3, in the Tennessee Room of MTSU’s James Union Building. This year’s honorees are Annie M. Cox, James E. McAdams Sr., Rev. James Thomas, Carl Wade, William Washington and Katie F. Wilson. Tickets for the Unity Luncheon are $20 for adults and $8 for students. No tickets will be sold at the door. For more information, contact Valerie Avent at 615-898-2718 or vavent@mtsu.edu.