New York Times writer to give two lectures on international issues

Award-winning New York Times foreign correspondent Howard French will deliver two public lectures on Thursday and Friday, Oct. 27-28, as part of a continuing lecture series on international issues sponsored by UW–Madison.

French’s first lecture, “A Continent for the Taking: The Tragedy and Hope of Africa,” will be at noon on Thursday, Oct. 27, in 5055 Vilas Hall, 821 University Ave. The second lecture, “The Politics of Memory: World War II and Sino-Japanese Relations Today,” will be at 3:30 p.m. on Friday, Oct. 28, in Godfrey and Kahn Hall, 2260 Law Building.

Both lectures are free and open to the public.

French, the Shanghai Bureau Chief of the New York Times, has won many awards, including the Overseas Press Club of America’s award for best newspaper interpretation of foreign affairs in 1997 for his work in Zaire and coverage of the fall of dictator Mobuto Sese Seko. The New York Times also has awarded French its highest prize, the Publisher’s Award, on six different occasions.

French’s acclaimed book, “A Continent for the Taking: The Tragedy and Hope of Africa” (2004), is a landmark work based on 25 years of experience.

French was a visiting scholar at the University of Hawaii where he studied the Japanese language and a Jefferson Fellow at the East-West Center in Honolulu. From 1999 to 2003 he was the Tokyo Bureau Chief. He speaks French, Mandarin, Spanish and Japanese and currently lives in Shanghai.

The visit is sponsored by the department of history and the Center for East Asian Studies, in collaboration with the University Lectures Committee, African Studies Program, School of Journalism and Mass Communication, and Legacies of Violence Research Circle.