Yale Biographer to Open UA’s Bankhead Lecture Series in November

TUSCALOOSA, Ala. – A Yale University history professor is the first of four leading biographers scheduled to appear on The University of Alabama campus as part of UA’s upcoming Bankhead Lecture Series.

Dr. Jonathan Spence, Sterling Professor of History at Yale University and an expert in recent Chinese history, including the Tiananmen Square massacre, will give a talk entitled “The Art of Biography and Chinese History,” on Thursday, Nov. 8, at 7:30 p.m. in the Ferguson Theater on the UA campus. Admission is free and the public is invited.

Spence’s latest work, “Treason by the Book,” was published in the spring of 2001 and is scheduled for paperback release in March 2002. His other books include the highly acclaimed “The Search for Modern China,” which traces Chinese history from the Ming dynasty to the bloody suppression of the pro-democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square, and “Mao Zedong.”

The Los Angeles Times awarded Spence its History Prize in 1982, and he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1985.

In 1982, the Bankhead family established the Bankhead Endowment Fund to further the interests of historical research and scholarly activity within the history department in UA’s College of Arts and Sciences. In recent years, the family expanded the original commission to bring visiting lecturers to campus and to further promote the teaching and study of history.

Future biographers scheduled to visit as part of the Bankhead Lecture Series include Blanche Wiesen Cook, the best-selling author of biographies on Eleanor Roosevelt; Dan Carter, an author who collaborated in the production of “Settin’ the Woods on Fire: George Wallace and the Politics of the ‘60s,” a TV documentary on Wallace; and John Morrill, a University of Cambridge professor and author, who is focusing on the religious psychology of Oliver Cromwell. Cook’s talk is scheduled for Feb. 6, while Carter will visit UA Feb. 20 and Morrill will visit March 20.