WCSU Announces Provost’s Distinguished Lecture Series

Press release

WCSU announces Provost’s Distinguished Lecture Series

DANBURY, Connecticut — Western Connecticut State University Provost Dr. Stephen Hegedus has announced the Provost’s Distinguished Lecture Series: Advancing Knowledge Through Dialogue and Discovery. The three-part series will bring leading voices from across disciplines to share their insights, scholarship, and vision with the community. The lectures, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday evenings in November, February and April, are scheduled as follows:

• On Wednesday, Nov. 19, Dr. Neeta Connally, CSU Professor of Biology and director of the university’s Tickborne Disease Prevention Laboratory, will kick off the series with a talk about “How to Be a Bad Host: Preventing Lyme Disease When There are More Ticks in More Places.” The talk will be at 5:30 p.m. in Room 125 of the Science Building on the university’s Midtown campus, 181 White St. in Danbury.

Connally’s lecture summary states, “It has been five decades since Lyme disease was first discovered in southeastern Connecticut. Since then, preventing this illness has proved challenging, with nearly 500,000 cases of Lyme disease occurring in the United States each year. This talk will explore the natural history and geographic spread of disease-causing ticks in the Northeastern United States. The current science of tick prevention will also be discussed.”

• The featured lecturer on Wednesday, Feb. 25, will be CSU Professor of Legal Studies Terrence P. Dwyer, JD, MFA. Dwyer will discuss “Criminals, Clients, Curricula, and Creativity” at 5:30 p.m. in Ives Concert Hall in White Hall on the Midtown campus.

As an academic, Dwyer has presented at national conferences, published in criminal justice and law journals, authored three textbooks, and been cited in academic articles, course books, and a petitioner’s brief before the U.S. Supreme Court. However, his desire to reach a wider audience and speak on issues important to him, as well as his creative writing interests, led him to reconsider how research is shared with the public. With a diverse background as a retired police officer and attorney, and many years in academia, he decided to forgo traditional academic writing and present his work as a playwright and author. Dwyer will discuss the three research topics he has been working on and how he took alternate paths to presenting his work.

• The series will conclude on Wednesday, April 1, with a talk by Dr. Brian Clements, CSU Professor of Writing, Linguistics and Creative Process, and director of the university’s Kathwari Honors Program, at 5:30 p.m. in Room 218, the President’s Reception Room, in the Westside Classroom Building, 43 Lake Ave. Extension in Danbury.

Clements will share his thoughts on “The Marketplace of Campo de’ Fiori, or What is Poetry?” Clements’ summary states, “In the United States, the public often turns to poetry after times of tragedy and forgets about it much of the rest of the time. Poetry receives less funding than any of the other arts. Yet there are more people writing (if not reading) poetry now than ever before, and capital-P Poetry is highly reputable — so much so that we commonly praise songwriters and speechwriters by calling them poets. In this talk and reading, Dr. Clements will discuss the public and private roles of poetry and the reasons poetry persists in a hyper-capitalist economy where it seems to have little economic value.”

Following each Distinguished Lecture, a reception will be held to allow for conversation and connection. The lectures and receptions are free, and the public is invited. Register to attend at www.wcsu.edu/academics/provosts-distinguished-lecture/.