RIT Gannett Lecture Explores Indigenous American View, Dec. 9

The indigenous American perspective on the United States and broader issues of globalization will be the focus of the next Caroline Werner Gannett Lecture Series at Rochester Institute of Technology.

Native American poet Simon Ortiz will give his talk, “Memory, History and the Present: An Indigenous American View,” at 7:30 p.m., Dec. 9, in Webb Auditorium in the James E. Booth Building on the RIT campus. The talk is free and open to the public.

Ortiz has written numerous books, including Going for the Rain; A Good Journey; Fight Back: For the Sake of the People, for the Sake of the Land; Out there Somewhere and the children's book, The Good Rainbow Land. He is a visiting professor of English at University of Toronto.

A discussion will follow Ortiz's talk led by Maurice Kenny, writer-in-residence at State University of New York at Potsdam, and Penelope Kelsey, assistant professor of literature in RIT's College of Liberal Arts.

"We are delighted to have an all Native American program, including two leading Native American poets whose work speaks to issues of indigenous peoples' rights,” says Paul Grebinger, RIT Gannett lecturer and coordinator of Senior Seminar.

The Gannett lecture series is sponsored by RIT's College of Liberal Arts. For more information call 585-475-2057 or visit www.rit.edu/gannettseries, where the lecture will be available online.