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Past Events
Thursday, 19 Apr 2007
Journalists in Jeopardy: The Hazards to Freedom of the Press - A Panel Discussion
2:00 PM – 102 Science I - Featured panelists include Dan Ehl, managing editor and writer for the Daily Iowegian in Centerville, Iowa, who was assaulted by a local business owner over editorials he wrote; Dennis Chamberlin, assistant professor in the Greenlee School of Journalism and Pulitzer Prize-winning photojournalist who worked in Poland and Russia; and John Carlson, columnist for the Des Moines Register who spent a month in the fall of 2005 reporting on Iowa troops stationed in Ramadi and Tikrit, Iraq. Part of the First Amendment Day Celebration.
Tuesday, 17 Apr 2007
A Young Star's Road to Recovery - "Full House" actress Jodie Sweetin
8:00 PM – Sun Room, Memorial Union - Jodie Sweetin, best known as Stephanie Tanner on the sitcom Full House, got her start in show business at the age of four doing television commercials. She graduated from Los Alamitos High School in 1999 and after a two-year absence from television landed a repeating guest starring role on Party of Five and guest appearances on such shows as Brotherly Love and Yes, Dear. Sweetin admitted to a methamphetamine addiction and a problem with alcohol and following a reported intervention staged by former Full House costars checked herself into a rehab facility in March 2005. She has been clean and sober since. Sweetin will discuss how her life changed after the end of Full House and how she got sober after her battles with alcohol and drugs.
Monday, 16 Apr 2007
Kremlin Rising: Vladimir Putin and the Russian Counter-Revolution - Peter Baker
6:00 PM – Sun Room, Memorial Union - Peter Baker has been a reporter for the Washington Post for eighteen years and currently serves as White House correspondent covering President Bush. He served as the Post's Moscow bureau chief from January 2001 through November 2004, covering Russia and fourteen former Soviet republics. After the 9/11 attacks, he was the first American newspaper journalist into Afghanistan, where he lived with anti-Taliban rebels and spent eight months covering the conflict and new government. He reported from Saddam Hussein's Baghdad and was embedded with the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force during the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Prior to his foreign assignments, Baker served as the Post's White House correspondent, covering the Clinton Administration, including the Monica Lewinski scandal. He is the author of The Breach: Inside the Impeachment and Trial of William Jefferson Clinton. His most recent book is Kremlin Rising: Vladimir Putin and the Russian Counter-Revolution, coauthored with fellow Moscow bureau chief Susan B. Glasser. The Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies Program Distinguished Speaker; part of the World Affairs Series; and part of the First Amendment Day Celebration.
Sunday, 15 Apr 2007
A Conversation with Wendell Berry
7:00 PM – Great Hall, Memorial Union - Poet, essayist, farmer, and novelist Wendell Berry will be joined by daughter Mary Berry Smith and area farmers to discuss the changing landscape of American agriculture and its relationship to local economies and rural life. Berry, who has taught English at New York University and at the University of Kentucky, lives on a farm just five miles from his birthplace in northern Kentucky. He is celebrated not only as a writer but as a philosopher, ethicist, and conservationist. Mary Berry Smith lives in north-central Kentucky, not far from her father, on a traditional cattle and tobacco farm. She has diversified her operation to include grape growing and wine-making in the centuries-old tradition of family farms in Europe. This lecture commemorates the 20th anniversary of the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture. It is also the 2007 Shivvers Memorial Lecture, in memory of John Shivvers, who farmed near Knoxville, Iowa.
Africa and the Curse of Foreign Aid - Andrew Mujuni Mwenda
3:00 PM – Sun Room, Memorial Union - Andrew Mujuni Mwenda is currently a Knight Fellow at Stanford University. Since 2004, he has been political editor for the Daily Monitor newspaper, Uganda's leading independent daily. In addition to supervising a staff of reporters, Mwenda writes two columns a week. He also hosts a prime time current affairs radio talk-show every weekday evening. He began his journalism career at Monitor Publications Limited, first as a reporter, then assistant editor for investigations. From 2002 to 2004, Mwenda was general manager of KFM radio. He earned his bachelor's degree in mass communication from Makerere University in Kampala, Uganda. He also studied at the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies. Mwenda is the coauthor, with Roger Tangri, of a forthcoming book on corruption in Uganda.
Thursday, 12 Apr 2007
Restoring Constitutional Government - Congressman Ron Paul
7:00 PM – South Ballroom, Memorial Union - Presidential Caucus Series
Congressman Ron Paul is a physician, congressman, and presidential candidate from the state of Texas. A Republican, he has represented Texas's 14th congressional district in the U.S. House of Representatives since 1997, and previously served as the representative from Texas's 22nd district in 1976 and from 1979 to 1985. Paul presently serves on the House Financial Services Committee, the International Relations Committee, and the Joint Economic Committee. He works for limited constitutional government, low taxes, free markets, and a return to sound monetary policies. Paul declared his candidacy on March 12 as a guest on Washington Journal on C-SPAN.
Wednesday, 11 Apr 2007
Law and Economics: A Catholic Critique - Mark A. Sargent
8:00 PM – Sun Room, Memorial Union - Mark A. Sargent, Dean and Professor of Law at Villanova University School of Law, specializes in securities regulation and corporate law, and he has published extensively in those fields. Sargent has held appointments as editor of The Business Lawyer and as a former member of the National Adjudicatory Council of the National Association of Securities Dealers, Inc., the national self-regulatory organization for the brokerage industry. He also has served as an arbitrator in securities and corporate law disputes; an administrative hearing judge in state securities enforcement actions; and an expert witness for the Securities and Exchange Commission, state securities regulators, and private litigants. He is editor-in-chief of the Villanova Journal of Law and Investment Management, a peer-reviewed journal he founded in 1997. This lecture is made possible with the assistance of Commonweal magazine. The Msgr. Supple Endowment Spring Lecture.
Sex Signals: The Real Life, Funny, Sort-of-Improv Show about Sex and Other Stuff
7:00 PM – Great Hall, Memorial Union - Blending a unique combination of improvisational comedy, education, and audience participation, Sex Signals provides a provocative, in-your-face look at issues surrounding dating, sex, and date rape on college campuses. Through the use of humor, the show explores how mixed messages, gender role stereotypes, and unrealistic fantasies contribute to misunderstandings between the sexes. Students are thus engaged in a candid discussion on dating and the realities of date rape as they are challenged to provide solutions that will better improve communications in interpersonal relationships. All of the performers have extensive training in interactive theater and sexual assault education.
Tuesday, 10 Apr 2007
The Deviants - Sketch Comedy
8:00 PM – Great Hall, Memorial Union - Admission Free - The Deviants are a group of six dangerous L.A. talents who spew their experiment in comedy with a mix of punk rock ferocity and Nancy Sinatra conceit. Produced by Maverick Television and Joe Forristal (Kids in the Hall) and directed by Patrick Bristow (Ellen, Curb Your Enthusiasm), the Deviants chew through current events and social taboos with panache, always on the wrong side of right. Their original characters and biting impressions include Chloe Sevigny, George W. Bush, Paris Hilton and That Gay Ghost. The Deviants are Brian Clark (That Gay Ghost), Drew Droege (Reno 911 and Campus Ladies), Tanya McClure (Pussytag), Nicol Paone (Punk'd and The Big Gay Sketch Show), Carrie Seim (Seven Deadly Hollywood Sins) and Michael Serrato (The Big Gay Sketch Show).
From Iowa to Hollywood: Comedy Writing, Performing and Promotion - A Panel Discussion with Carrie Seim and the Deviants
4:00 PM – Great Hall, Memorial Union - Carrie Seim will discuss her path from "Grandma Mojo's Moonshine Revival" on the stage of the Maintenance Shop at Iowa State to Hollywood and her comedy career. Her fellow sketch comedians and Deviants will offer helpful suggestions and fill in embarrassing details she may leave out. The other Deviants are Brian Clark (That Gay Ghost), Drew Droege (Reno 911 and Campus Ladies), Tanya McClure (Pussytag), Nicol Paone (Punk'd and The Big Gay Sketch Show), and Michael Serrato (The Big Gay Sketch Show).