NEWS

UNC faculty members set dates for three local talks in January

CHAPEL HILL -- Folk art in North Carolina, American women in occupied Japan and the quest to cure cancer will be topics of three local lectures next month by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill faculty members.

The free public talks were arranged by Carolina Speakers at UNC, an outreach program that sends faculty and staff members throughout North Carolina to speak to business, civic and community groups. Through the program, more than 90 faculty members share their expertise on more than 150 topics, including 46 on North Carolina and the South.

Locally, anthropology professor Dr. Glenn Hinson will discuss the state’s folk arts tradition at 1:30 p.m. Jan. 8 at the Carolina Meadows retirement community off Mt. Carmel Church Road. Call 942-4014 for reservations, required a week before the talk. For information, call 967-7892.

On Jan 12 at 3 p.m., Dr. Janice Bardsley, associate professor of Japanese, will speak at the Chapel Hill Public Library on the role of American women in Japan from 1945 to 1952. The Americans promoted democracy to Japanese women during U.S. occupation of the country after World War II. The library is off Estes Drive near East Franklin Street. For information, call 968-2777.

Dr. Joseph Pagano, a professor of cancer research, will speak at 11 a.m. Jan. 17 at Binkley Baptist Church, 1712 Willow Drive. Peer Learning, a group of retired professionals, will sponsor the talk about researchers' goal of using new findings to help cancer patients. Pagano is a former director of UNC's Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center. For more information, call 962-1993.

Hinson, chair of UNC's folklore curriculum, has studied the culture of the South for 25 years. His interests range from gospel music and barbecue to oral poetry. His projects to enhance public education have included developing programs for the Smithsonian Institution, producing compact discs by regional musicians and working to integrate traditional North Carolina music into fourth-grade curricula. His publications include the book "Fire in My Bones: Transcendence and the Holy Spirit in African American Gospel," written in collaboration with members of the gospel community.

Bardsley will note that cartoons, advertisements and articles from Japanese women's magazines in the postwar era demonstrated that the Japanese understood American women's freedoms in marriage, work and public life. She also will explore how royal women in Japan stand at a controversial divide between the country's imperial past and conflicting ideas from other cultures. Bardsley will discuss how photographs of royal weddings depict a romantic picture of the empress and crown princess.

Bardsley, who teaches courses in Japanese literature, women’s writing and women and work, has recently contributed articles to "Education About Asia" and "U.S.-Japan Women's Journal." Her book of translations, "The Bluestockings of Japan: Feminist Fiction and Essays from Seito, 1911-1916," will be published soon by the Center for Japanese Studies at the University of Michigan.

For more information or to schedule a Carolina Speaker, contact Sandy Roberts at 962-1993 or sandy_roberts@unc.edu, or visit the Carolina Speakers web site http://www.unc.edu/depts/uncspeak.

- 30 -

Contact: Sandy Roberts, 962-1993