In Brief: March 30

Annual Hess lecture to examine World War I and American internationalism

In commemoration of the 100-year anniversary of America’s entry into World War I, the 2017 Gary R. Hess Lecture in Policy History is “The Paradox of Wilsonianism: World War I and American Internationalism.” Presented by the Department of History, the lecture begins at 4 p.m. March 30 in 228 Bowen-Thompson Student Union. It is free and open to the public.

Guest lecturer Dr. Lloyd E. Ambrosius is a leading scholar of the Wilson presidency. He is an emeritus professor of history and the Samuel Clark Waugh Distinguished Professor of International Relations at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, as well as the author of a number of books on Wilson and World War I. His lecture will address debates surrounding U.S. foreign policy and the controversy over the U.S. declaration of war in April 1917.

The annual Gary R. Hess Lecture in Policy History is held at the initiative of Hess’s former students to recognize his contributions to the profession and the University during his 45 years of service, from 1964-2009.

For more information, contact Dr. Ben Greene at greeneb@bgsu.edu.

Advances in autism

College of Health and Human Services to host Common Read Lecture

BGSU alumna Diane L. Williams ’99 will discuss how innovations in genetics and neuroimaging have made a difference in understanding autism as the speaker for the College of Health and Human Services Common Read Lecture. Her talk will address the theme of this year’s BGSU Common Read book, “A More Beautiful Question,” by Warren Berger.

Williams’s talk will be held at 5:30 p.m. April 6 in 115 Olscamp Hall, during Autism Awareness Month.

Williams is a professor and head of the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders at Pennsylvania State University. She previously held the Anna Rangos Rizakus Endowed Chair for Health Sciences and Ethics at Duquesne University.

One of the main elements that drew Williams to the new role at Penn State was the department’s five-year strategic plan with a focus on the neurobiological foundations of communication disorders and improving outcomes for individuals with disabilities. The move resonated with her clinical work and research, which focuses on cognitive and linguistic processing in autism spectrum disorders using functional magnetic resonance imaging and behavioral methodology. She is the author of a book on neurofunctional research on neurodevelopmental disorders, and completed postdoctoral work at the Autism Research Program at the University of Pittsburgh and the Center for Cognitive Brain Imaging at Carnegie Mellon University.

Williams is a licensed speech-language pathologist with board certification in child language and language disorders from the American Speech-Language Hearing Association. She has extensive clinical experience with toddlers, preschoolers, school-age children and adults with autism spectrum disorders and other developmental language disorders.

The lecture is free and open to the public. Guests with disabilities are requested to indicate if they need special services, assistance or appropriate modifications to fully participate in the event by contacting Accessibility Services at access@bgsu.edu or 419-372-8495 prior to the event.