Two Remaining in the President’s Speakers Series

Noelle Blair, Staff Reporter

noelle_blair@csumb.edu

March 24, 2008

The CSU Monterey Bay (CSUMB)

President’s Speakers Series continues this

semester with an esteemed scholar in gender

studies and an award-winning author.

There are a total of four planned speakers

for the President’s Speakers Series, two of

which happened in February. The next two

speakers will be Dr. Sharon Hays on Mar.

13 and Sherman Alexie on Apr. 15. Dr.

Robert Curry and Thomas DeWolf spoke

on Feb. 6 and 20.

“The president speaker’s series brings to

campus intellectual and creative thinkers

so that the university can situate the

conversations that are current in all of the

different places so that the community

members see that ‘Oh, my university is

the informational hub’,” said Dean Renee

Curry.

Dr. Sharon Hays, a professor of

contemporary gender studies at University

of Southern California, will speak about

single mothers on welfare. Her speech titled

“Flat Broke With Children” will focus on

governmental treatment of single women.

According to the CSUMB website,

“Hays’ subjects tell stories of the extreme

poverty, broken families, sexual abuse,

homelessness, and the lengths to which

they go in attempts to juggle multiple parttime

low-paying jobs in order to feed and

support their children.” Dr. Hays’ speech

will take place on March 13. This event is

free to the public although reservations are

recommended.

Sherman Alexie, a writer and comedian

from Seattle Washington, will speak on

April 15. The winner for the National Book

Award for “The Absolute True Diary of a

Part-Time Indian”, Alexie’s speech is titled

“Without Reservations: An Urban Indian’s

Comic, Poetic & Highly Irreverent Look at

the World”.

According to Alexie’s official website

(fallsapart.com), his first book of short

stories, “The Lone Ranger and Tonto

Fistfight in Heaven,” was published in

1993. He is also an award-winning poet.

“He uses laughter to remind us that deep

inside the human, the human knows they

are only here for a short period of time

and some of the predicaments there put

in are just absurd The urge to laugh at the

absurdity, even in our own predicaments,

looms large in his writings,” Dean Curry

said.

Alexie’s speech will be free to the public

as well and reservations can be placed

starting March 14.

Both events will take place at the CSUMB

World Theatre at 7 p.m.