Rick Peterson

APPLETON, WIS. — A social psychologist specializing in gender stereotyping discusses his role as an expert witness in sex discrimination cases and how those cases subsquently influenced his own research in an address at Lawrence University.

Peter Glick, professor of psychology at Lawrence, presents “Why the Glass Ceiling Hasn’t Shattered: Tales from the Lab and the Courts from a Researcher Turned Expert Witness” Wednesday, April 11 at 7:30 p.m. in Science Hall, Room 102.

Hired as an expert witness in six cases, Glick will examine the role of an expert witness, what kind of testimony is allowed and how complicated research findings can be effectively communicated to a jury. The talk will include examples from two specific cases Glick worked on, including a recent class action lawsuit that settled for $15 million the day before the trial was to begin.

He also will discuss how his work on one particular case provided new research insights into the subtle ways in which female leaders are penalized for not living up to prescriptions for feminine “niceness” and modesty. He will examine the case that inspired his research, his findings and their practical implications for addressing discrimination, especially the “glass ceiling,” in the workplace.

Glick’s scholarship focuses on the subtle and the overt ways in which prejudices and stereotypes foster social inequality. In research he co-authored, he introduced the concept of “ambivalent sexism,” asserting that not just hostile, but subjectively benevolent views of women as pure, but fragile, reinforce gender inequality. According to Glick, such “benevolent sexism” rewards women for conforming to conventional gender roles and results in hostile attitudes toward women who fail to do so.

His research was recognized with the Gordon W. Allport Prize in 1995 for the best paper on intergroup relations. In 2004, he was elected a fellow of both the American Psychological Association and the American Psychological Society, the two largest and most prominent professional organizations in the field of psychology.

Glick joined the Lawrence faculty in 1985 after earning his Ph.D. in social psychology at the University of Minnesota.

APPLETON, WIS. — Author Kevin Brockmeier, hailed as one of the most innovative young writers of this generation, will conduct a reading of his fiction Thursday, April 12 at 7 p.m. in the Lawrence University Wriston Art Center auditorium. A reception and book signing will follow the reading. The event is free and open to the public.

A resident of Little Rock, Ark., Brockmeier is the author of both adult (“The Truth About Ceila”) and children’s novels (“City of Names”) and also has written a collection of short stories.

His most recent work, “The Brief History of the Dead” (2006), was honored with an O. Henry Award, one of three he has earned. In the story, Brockmeier explores relationships of people as they pass through life and into the after life through a thought-provoking tale about an isolated wildlife specialist struggling to survive at an Antarctic research station while a deadly pandemic virus spreads across the planet.

For his 2003 collection of short stories, “Things that Fall from the Sky,” Brockmeier drew inspiration from fairy tales and science fiction. The New Yorker called the collection “a curiosity shop, stuffed full of finely made whimsies.” The story “Space” from the collection was selected for The Best American Short Stories.

Brockmeier’s work also has appeared in The New Yorker, McSweeney’s, The Georgia Review, The Year’s Best Fantasy, Horror and multiple editions of the O. Henry Prize Stories anthology.

In addition to his three O. Henry Awards, Brockmeier also has been the recipient of the Chicago Tribune’s Nelson Algren Award, an Italo Calvino Short Fiction Award and a James Michener-Paul Engle Fellowship.

He attended the University of Iowa and graduated from the Iowa Writer’s Workshop in 1997.

APPLETON, WIS. — While the United States is preoccupied with the war on terror in Iraq and Afghanistan, a former national intelligence officer and scholar on East Asia warns that China poses a more significant challenge to the United States’ status as a world super power.

Robert Suettinger, who is spending most of Term III as Lawrence University’s Stephen Edward Scarff Memorial Visiting Professor of Government, presents “U.S. – China Relations: Forward and Back,” Thursday April 12 at 7 p.m. Lawrence’s Science Hall, Room 102. The event is free and open to the public.

Suettinger, a 1968 graduate of Lawrence who served as director for Asian affairs for the U.S. National Security Council in the mid-1990s, will examine four major challenges that China poses to the United States: military, economic, diplomatic and moral.

China has the world’s largest army, with missiles capable of striking the United States or any of our allies, a formidable submarine force and a defense budget that is growing at a double-digit pace. Compounding the military challenge are two potential flashpoints — North Korea and Taiwan — either of which could quickly and easily erupt into an armed confrontation.

China’s economy has been growing at a rate of nearly 10 percent per year for the past 15 years and holds $1 trillion of U.S. currency. Ubiquitous “Made in China” labels contribute to a trade surplus with the United States of nearly $200 billion in 2006.

On the diplomatic front, beyond Asia, China is rapidly gaining influence throughout Africa, Latin America and Europe by dispensing foreign aid and building “strategic partnerships” with countries whose support the United States once took for granted.

Morally, China remains a one-party dictatorship, repressing political dissent and freedom of religion, the press and artistic expression.

In an attempt to explain how this situation developed, Suettinger will examine recent U.S. policy toward China and discuss what options are available to respond to these challenges.

Author of the 2003 book “Beyond Tiananmen: The Politics of U.S.-China Relations, 1989-2000,” Suettinger came to Lawrence from Centra Technology, Inc., an Arlington, Va., consulting firm that provides national security research and analysis, where he is an analytic director.

In addition to serving as director for Asian affairs for the National Security Council in the mid-1990s, Suettinger served two separate stints on the National Intelligence Council for East Asia, first as a deputy national intelligence officer (1987-94) and later as a national intelligence officer for East Asia (1997-98). He also spent 12 years with the Central Intelligence Agency.

A member of Phi Beta Kappa, Suettinger earned a bachelor’s degree magna cum laude in political science from Lawrence in 1968, undertook Chinese language study at Princeton University and Middlebury College and earned a master’s degree in comparative politics at Columbia University.

APPLETON, WIS. — Drawing upon her extensive personal experiences in Kenya, a Columbia University political scientist examines the growing problem of internally displaced people in the third installment of Lawrence University’s Povolny International Studies Lecture Series “Africa Today: Problems and Solutions.”

Jacqueline Klopp, assistant professor of international and public affairs at Columbia, presents “Violence, Land and Dispossession: The Problems of International Displacement in Africa” Tuesday, April 10 at 7 p.m. in Lawrence’s Wriston Art Center auditorium. The event is free and open to the public.

Fueled by civil war and political instability, the numbers of internally displaced people (IPDs) in recent years has surged past the number of refugees worldwide. From an estimated five million displaced persons in the 1970s, that number had mushroomed to 25 million by 2002. With at least 13 million, Africa alone accounts for more IPDs than the rest of the world combined according to a report by the Norwegian Refugee Council.

Klopp, who spent several months working as an advocate with the Kenyan IPD Network in 2002, will address the root causes and dynamics associated with human displacement. She also will examine the gaps between new international ideas on responsibilities towards the displaced and actual actions by international agencies, governments, local civil society and the IDPs themselves to fight against violent displacement.

While both groups suffer from coerced displacement, because IPDs, unlike refugees, stay within the boundaries of their own countries, Klopp says “they have, even in theory, no international legal protection. Displacement is most often linked to violence by precisely the state actors who are tasked with protecting citizens, which deeply complicates the problem of how to assist and protect the displaced.”

Klopp, who has visited Kenya seven times since 1988, including a two-year stay on a Michael Rockefeller Fellowship, has written widely on political issues confronting Kenya, including the chapter “Kenya’s Internally Displaced: Managing Civil Conflict in Democratic Transitions” in the 2006 book “East Africa and the Horn: Confronting Challenges to Good Governance.”

She has taught at Columbia since 2001 and currently serves as the interim director of the economic and political development concentration at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs.

In 2003, Klopp was invited to participate in the Kenya Support Group, a network of judges, journalists and scholars, as part of the Robert Kennedy Memorial Center for Human Rights.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in physics from Harvard University and a master’s and doctorate degree in political science from Toronto’s McGill University.

John Roome, operations director with the World Bank, will conclude the series May 14 with the address “The World Bank’s Role in Development.”

The “Africa Today: Problems and Solutions” lecture series is sponsored by the Mojmir Povolny Lectureship in International Studies. Named in honor of long-time Lawrence government professor Mojmir Povolny, the lectureship promotes interest and discussion on issues of moral significance and ethical dimensions.

APPLETON, WIS. — Actor, author and journalist Ben Stein, who earned cult status as the boring high school teacher in “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” and hosted the Emmy-winning game show “Win Ben Stein’s Money,” presents “How to Ruin Your Life” Wednesday, May 9 at 7 p.m. in an address at the Lawrence University Memorial Chapel, 510 E. College. Ave., Appleton.

Based on his best-selling humor self-help book of the same name, the address is free and open to the public, but tickets will be required. Tickets for the general public will be available through the Lawrence University Box Office (832-6749) beginning Wednesday, April 25. There will be a limit of four tickets per person.

Stein, 63, who holds a degree in economics from Columbia University and a law degree from Yale University, has enjoyed an exceptionally diverse career, including stints as a civil rights activist, an attorney, a law professor, a speech-writer for presidents Nixon and Ford and a columnist for the Wall Street Journal. A frequent guest commentator on “CBS Sunday Morning,” Stein has written more than a dozen books, among them “Hollywood Days, Hollywood Nights: The Diary of a Mad Screenwriter,” “Tommy and Me: The Making of a Dad” and 2004’s “Can America Survive?”

But it is as an actor that Stein is perhaps best known. In addition to his turn as a boring economics teacher in “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” he has appeared in nearly two dozen other films, among them “Planes, Trains and Automobiles,” and “Honeymoon in Vegas.” He also has had roles in more than 20 television shows, including “The Wonder Years,” “Full House” and “Murphy Brown.”

In 1997, he launched his own quiz show, “Win Ben Stein’s Money,” which ran for five years on Comedy Central and won seven Emmy Awards, including one for Stein as outstanding game show host.

APPLETON, WIS. — British historian and political scientist Michael Fosdal examines the politics behind Britain’s foreign aid — how it is allocated, how it is debated and how it could be improved — in the third installment of Lawrence University’s Povolny International Studies Lecture Series “Africa Today: Problems and Solutions.”

Fosdal will deliver the address “Britain’s Role in Aid and Development” on Tuesday, April 3 at 7 p.m. in Lawrence’s Wriston Art Center auditorium. The event is free and open to the public.

Providing both a British and European context while focusing on the Darfur region of Sudan, Palestine and southern Africa, Fosdal will examine the geographical and historical imperatives of British foreign aid practices, discuss how Britain’s imperial past has influenced its present policies and try to assess the direction national debates on the subject may go in the future.

A graduate of the University of London, Fosdal has taught politics and history for 20 years. For the last 10 years, his teaching duties have centered on teaching many American study abroad courses in London and Oxford, including courses in government and British culture at Lawrence’s own London Centre. He also has been a guest lecturer at universities in the United States and Czech Republic.

Prior to his teaching career, Fosdal worked as a parliamentary advisor for a major professional organization in the United Kingdom. He is a member of the Royal United Services Institute and of the Royal Irish Society of Antiquaries.

Remaining speakers in the series include:

• April 10, Jacqueline Klopp, assistant professor of international and public affairs at Columbia University, “Violence, Land and Dispossession: The Problems of Internal Displacement in Africa.”
• May 14, John Roome, operations director with the World Bank, “The World Bank’s Role in Development.”

The “Africa Today: Problems and Solutions” lecture series is sponsored by the Mojmir Povolny Lectureship in International Studies. Named in honor of long-time Lawrence government professor Mojmir Povolny, the lectureship promotes interest and discussion on issues of moral significance and ethical dimensions.

APPLETON, WIS. — The gray intersection of neuroscience and government-sponsored research in the name of national security will be explored in the final address of Lawrence University’s annual Edward F. Mielke Lecture Series in Biomedical Ethics.

Noted bioethicist Jonathan Moreno presents “Mind Wars: Brain Research and National Defense,” Friday, March 30 at 7 p.m. in Lawrence’s Wriston Art Center auditorium. The event is free and open to the public.

Based on his 2006 book of the same name, the talk will focus on Moreno’s investigation into the ways U.S. defense agencies are utilizing cutting-edge brain research to harness the human nervous system as a weapon against its enemies.

Among the projects Moreno will discuss are virus-transported molecules called “neuroweapons” that fatally infect the brain, the development of drugs that repress emotional reactions to violence, “anti-sleep” medications that can enhance soldiers’ battlefield performances and brain machine interface devices that relay images and sounds between human brains and machines.

He also will discuss the ethical and political issues emerging from the partnership of government and neuroscience. Moreno believes there is a need for the establishment of some kind of “neurosecurity” board that would oversee the use of emerging technology.

According to Moreno, “regulating the introduction of devices spun off from neuroscience is going to be one of the big social policy challenges of this century. With military and intelligence needs on the cutting edge of these developments, the policy challenges are going to be still more daunting.”

Moreno joined the University of Pennsylvania in January as the holder of the David and Lyn Silfen University Professorship. He had spent the previous eight years as the director of the Center for Biomedical Ethics at the University of Virginia. At Penn, Moreno holds appointments in both the School of Medicine (medical ethics) and in the School of Arts and Sciences (history and sociology of science).

He also has held faculty appointments at Swarthmore College, the University of Texas, George Washington University and the SUNY Health Science Center at Brooklyn.

He is a former president of the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities, serves as a bioethics advisor for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and is an elected member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies. He has been an advisor to the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and served as senior policy and research analyst for the President’s Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments.

In addition to “Mind Wars,” Moreno has written seven other books, among them “In the Wake of Terror: Medicine and Morality in a Time of Crisis” and “Undue Risk: Secret State Experiments on Humans.”

He earned a bachelor’s degree in philosophy and psychology from Hofstra University and was a University Fellow at Washington University in St. Louis, where he earned his Ph.D. in philosophy in 1977.

Moreno’s appearance is supported by the Edward F. Mielke Lectureship in Ethics in Medicine, Science and Society. The lectureship was established in 1985 by the Mielke Family Foundation in memory of Dr. Edward F. Mielke, a leading member of the Appleton medical community and the founder of the Appleton Medical Center.

APPLETON, WIS. — William Lewis, director of institutional diversity at Bridgewater State College in Massachusetts, leads a discussion on the ways bias, stereotypes and prejudices can impact a person’s daily interactions with others in an appearance at Lawrence University.

Lewis presents “Unpacking My Cultural Baggage,” Thursday, March 29 at 8 p.m. in the Wriston Art Center auditorium. This event is free and open to the public

Through personal experiences, group interaction and humor, Lewis will focus on increasing the awareness of the personal “baggage” everyone carries as well as how organizational culture impacts individuals.

An experienced facilitator and trainer specializing in conflict resolution and community building, Lewis also serves as a senior associate for the Study Circles Resource Center in Pomfret, Conn., where he provides community building consultation to cities across the country.

Prior to joining the staff at Bridgewater State, Lewis was the director of diversity for Indiana University’s Kelley School of Business Undergraduate Program, where he was responsible for minority student recruitment, retention and implementing the program’s overall diversity strategy. While there, he also served as a member of the Indianapolis Race Relations Leadership Network and the Board of Directors for Flanner House Multi-Service Center in Indianapolis.

A six-year member of the U.S. Marine Reserves, Lewis holds a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice and a master’s degree in social work from Indiana University-Purdue University.

Lewis’ appearance is sponsored by the Office of Multicultural Affairs.

APPLETON, WIS. — A Lawrence University astrophysicist specializing in the formation of solar systems has been awarded a $105,000 research grant by the NASA Planetary Geology and Geophysics Program.

Associate Professor of Physics Megan Pickett will use the three-year grant to support her on-going research on the origin of Jupiter and other giant planets as well as the more than 200 known extrasolar planets orbiting other stars.

Pickett, who has been investigating this topic for the past 10 years, utilizes high-speed computers to simulate the evolution of our solar system shortly after it formed some 5 billion years ago. The computer-generated simulations attempt to determine exactly how Jupiter came into existence.

“Astronomers to date have detected more than 200 extrasolar planets that orbit other stars, all of them presumably like Jupiter,” said Pickett. “According to current estimates, at least 10 percent of all stars like our sun have planets around them.  Despite their prevalence and Jupiter’s importance in our own solar system, the issue of giant planet formation remains one of the outstanding and hotly debated problems in planetary science today.”

 In addition to funding her primary research, the NASA grant will support a summer student research assistant as well as publication costs and travel to scientific conferences. This is the fourth NASA PG&G program research grant Pickett has been awarded since 1997, with her funding support totaling more than $500,000.

NASA’s PG&G program supports scientific investigations that will improve the understanding of the extent and influence of planetary geological and geophysical processes on the bodies of the solar system, the origin and evolution of the solar system and the nature of Earth and its history in comparison to other planets.

Pickett, who began her career as a postdoctoral research associate in 1995 at the NASA-Ames Research Center, spent seven years teaching in the physics and astronomy department at Purdue University Calumet before joining the Lawrence faculty last fall.

She earned a bachelor’s degree in physics from Cornell University, a master’s degree in astronomy from Indiana University and a Ph.D. in astrophysics from Indiana.

APPLETON, WIS. — Micha Jackson is convinced she was born a conservationist.

Among her earliest memories are moments of complete fascination with anything that crawled, wiggled, ran, floated or swam. As a 10-year old, she heard frogs all over the world were dying, so she set out to catch tadpoles, protect them through their growth period and then release them back into ponds as frogs to help the situation.

That early sense of wonder for creatures great and small has since developed into a passion for the natural world and a desire to help preserve its beauty and diversity in the face of increasing human encroachment

Jackson will soon have an opportunity to practice her passion when she begins a year-long investigation of coastal marine resources thanks to the Providence, R.I.-based Thomas J. Watson Foundation. Jackson was named one of 50 national recipients of a $25,000 fellowship, which support a year of independent travel and exploration outside the United States on a topic of the student’s choosing.

Beginning in August, Jackson, 20, will embark on an examination of culturally different approaches to conservationism that will take her to Oman, Australia and the island country of Palau in the western Pacific Ocean.

“Coastal countries have always had a unique relationship with the seas and its inhabitants,” said Jackson, an economics, environmental studies and government major from Brighton, Ontario. “Australia, Oman and Palau are all home to a marine ecosystem teeming with life. These countries have vastly different histories and cultures and each is at a very different stage of its development and integration with the modern global economy.”

During her travels, Jackson hopes to explore the governmental interactions with local coastal cultures as well as the role social and religious traditions play in how these three distinct countries developed their approaches to conservationism.

“I want to find out the extent to which the various governments are willing or able to enforce its policies and what role local coastal residents play in conservation decisions and enforcement,” Jackson said. “I also want to learn about the ancient myths and legends that pertain to marine resources and mammals, particularly the dugong, and see what role those play in modern culture and conservation.”

Jackson will open her trip with three months in Oman, where she plans to collaborate with Dr. Aaron Henderson, a professor of ecology at Sultan Qaboos University. The following six months will be spent in northeast Australia, home of the Great Barrier Reef as well as a large population of Aborigines. She’ll conclude her investigation in Palau, where traditional approaches to fisheries management practiced by village chiefs are still prevalent.

“I tried to pick three countries that were all very different,” said Jackson, who mentially started formulating this project in 2005 after spending part of that summer on the islands of Turks and Caicos in the British West Indies participating in a fieldwork and marine management course. “I’m particularly interested in Palua because I wanted to examine a place that is very isolated and investigate how its conservation efforts developed.”

Tim Spurgin, who serves as Lawrence’s campus liaison to the Watson program, says the Watson fellowship allows students “to chase their own dreams.”

“Micha’s project is the culmination of her studies at Lawrence, combining her interests in ecology and public policy, but it’s also the result of her lifelong love of the water,” said Spurgin, associate professor and Bonnie Glidden Buchanan Professor of English. “Her project is deeply personal, not narrowly academic, and that’s one of the reasons why she’s such a perfect choice for this fellowship.”

As she looks forward to her adventure, the logistics of globetrotting to three destinations she has never visited before doesn’t faze Jackson in the least. Any anxieties she has have more to do with meeting the spirit of a project she’s been thinking about for two years.

“What I’m most concerned about is staying true to my proposal. How well will I be able to adapt if things aren’t quite the way I expected them to be” said Jackson.

“And…finding a place to live in Palua,” she adds with a laugh.

Jackson was selected for the fellowship from among 179 finalists who came from an original pool of nearly 1,000 applicants representing 50 of the nation’s top liberal arts colleges and universities. She is the 65th Lawrence student awarded a Watson Fellowship since the program’s inception in 1969.

The Watson Fellowship Program was started by the children of Thomas J. Watson, Sr., the founder of International Business Machines Corp., and his wife, Jeannette, to honor their parents’ long-standing interest in education and world affairs.

Watson Fellows are selected on the basis of the nominee’s character, academic record, leadership potential, willingness to delve into another culture and the personal significance of the project proposal. Since its founding, more than 2,400 fellowships have been awarded.