Maxine Hong Kingston to Speak Dec. 1
Writer Maxine Hong Kingston, author of Woman Warrior, among other award-winning books, will speak at USF Dec. 1 at 5:45 p.m. in Lone Mountain 100. The author will discuss her recently published novel, The Fifth Book of Peace, a stream-of-consciousness account of a fictional hero, Wittman Ah Sing, and her own experience losing her home in the 1991 Oakland hills fire. The book is also Kingston’s attempt to discern the truth behind the mythological Chinese volumes, called the Three Lost Books of Peace, and to examine the need for war. Her appearance is sponsored by the Center for the Pacific Rim.
Former Philippine President Donates Books
USF is building a credible library of Philippine cultural and political research with recent help from former Philippine President Fidel V. Ramos. At a ceremony Oct. 18 at San Francisco’s Veteran’s Equity Center, Ramos donated six books from his personal collection to the USF Yuchengco Philippine Studies Program.
Jay Gonzales, assistant professor of politics and Philippine studies, said students will benefit from the donation. “But this is also something that researchers from everywhere will come to [Gleeson Library] for,” he said. “Our Philippine [book] collection in the library is already well known.”
The books offer valuable information about the Philippine presidency, government, culture, and society. “These books are really special,” Gonzales said. “Ramos actually even wrote on them, and not just signing, but full dedications to the university.”
The donation was facilitated by USF Trustee Alfonso Yuchengco, who served as ambassador under Ramos’ presidency. “(Yuchengco and Ramos) are close friends,” Gonzales said. “Ramos is generous enough to continue to support the institutes that bear (Yuchengco’s) name.”
Symposia Highlight USF Mission and Research
The College of Arts and Sciences’ new speaker series, “Where Research Feeds the Mission,” spotlights how USF faculty research intersects with the university’s social justice mission. To date, speakers have included Marcelo Camperi, chair of the physics department, on how research in theoretical physics can further the mission; Peter Novak, assistant professor of visual and performing arts, on deaf culture and American Sign Language; Cecilia Santos, assistant professor of sociology, on stereotypes of the Third World; and Lisa Wagner, assistant professor of psychology, on her work on ageism and her current course, “Communication Between Generations.” Future speakers include Richard Kamler, assistant professor of visual and performing arts, on observing peace artists collaborating with the United Nations, Nov. 10 from 12:15 to 1:15 in University Center 400. For more information or to RSVP, contact Danielle Atwood at dlatwood@usfca.edu or at (415) 422-5184.
USF Marks African AIDS Crises/World AIDS Day
The global effects of HIV/AIDS are being highlighted at USF this winter.
In an Oct. 30 talk titled “The African AIDS Crisis: A personal account of the cataclysmic disaster and how it is being confronted,” Catholic Relief Services officer Abbi Asha Marambiku Shawa described the devastating effect of HIV/AIDS on people in Malawi, one of the poorest countries in southern Africa. Of the nearly 30 million people infected in Africa, 70 percent live in sub-Sahara Africa and of those, 40 percent live in Malawi. As children have lost their parents, households are headed by older siblings or grandparents. The resulting deficit in able-bodied adults (the country’s life expectancy has dropped from 49 to 36) has resulted in fewer health and agricultural workers to keep the country functioning. Education and relief work are also stymied by cultural rituals that promote female sexual subservience, Shawa said. “And yet there are signs of hope,” he said. “Most important, the African people’s own resilience.” His talk was sponsored by the Leo T. McCarthy Center for Public Service and the Common Good.
The Student Health Education Program will sponsor activities to honor World AIDS Day on Dec. 1. An AIDS Memorial Quilt display, dance performance and art exhibition, a volunteer fair featuring AIDS organizations, and panel discussion by people living with HIV or AIDS are planned. “This year we’re trying to move forward, to get students involved and think about how they can help,” said Pim Sakhakorn, coordinator of the university events. For more information, go to www.usfca.edu/shep/wad.htm.
 Travel Writers at Center for the Pacific Rim
The Center for the Pacific Rim will host “Biking and Dining Through Communism: Cuba & Vietnam,” on Nov. 19 at 5:45 p.m. in Lone Mountain 100 featuring two Bay Area writers. Christopher Baker, a travel writer on Cuba and a four-time winner of the Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism Award, will discuss his book Mi Moto Fidel: Motorcycling Through Castro’s Cuba. Richard Sterling, who has built a reputation as the Indiana Jones of gastronomy for his willingness to go anywhere and face any danger for the sake of a good meal, will discuss his book on Vietnam.
Women in Leadership Speaker Series
A new speaker series on campus is focusing on women in leadership and public service. The next event in the series is scheduled for Nov. 20, when Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey ’81 will speak on women in politics from 4 to 6 p.m. in McLaren Center.
Since she was elected to the House of Representatives in 1993, Woolsey has focused on making children and education a national priority. She is chair of the Democratic Caucus Task Force on Children and is the ranking member of the House Education Committee’s Subcommittee on Education Reform. This commitment to children, families, and education, she says, stems from personal experience as a single mother on welfare.
The year-long lecture series, “Women in Leadership: A Series of Conversations,” will bring women like Woolsey, many of them USF alumnae, who have made outstanding contributions to public service and to their professions to campus to talk about leadership. The inaugural event in the series took place Oct. 29 with a talk by Lynn Jimenez ’72, a business reporter for KGO radio.
The series is sponsored by the Leo T. McCarthy Center for Public Service and the Common Good and the President’s Advisory Committee on the Status of Women (PACSW), a standing committee of faculty and staff. The PACSW was formed in 1994 to promote gender equity and justice among the university community. For information on the Women in Leadership series, call (415) 422-5662.
USF Joins National Honors Group
USF has joined more than 190 colleges and universities nationwide as an official charter member of the National Society of Collegiate Scholars (NSCS).
USF was officially inducted at the fall convocation Sept. 19 in the McLaren Center. “It helps (increase USF’s recognition), being part of a larger movement like this,” said Saera Khan, assistant professor of psychology.
The NSCS is an honors organization that recognizes outstanding academic and community service achievements among first- and second-year college students. “Most honors societies cater to juniors and seniors,” said Khan, who was officially inducted during the Sept. 19 ceremony as adviser to the on-campus NSCS group. “It’s important to recognize academic excellence early on, and to keep students on that track.”
Community service is an integral part of the NSCS. The USF chapter includes a group of student officers who will plan academic and service activities. Students must have completed between 12 and 59 credit units at the university and achieved at least a 3.4 GPA in order to join the group. Once they join, they must participate in service activities that the group organizes in cooperation with other on-campus service groups. In October, for example, they participated in a breast cancer walk.
Every year, the USF chapter will induct one faculty and one student member at a ceremony. At this year’s convocation, inductees included Khan, Sally Vance-Trembath, assistant professor of theology and religious studies, and USF President Stephen A. Privett, S.J.
Gerald O’Collins, S.J. on “Life After Vatican II”
Gerald O’Collins, S.J., professor at the Gregorian University in Rome, lectured Oct. 30 on “Receiving and Living Vatican II.”
Fr. O’Collins discussed the ways mandates from Rome and organized activity elsewhere has helped implement the teachings of Vatican II. Organizations such as the Federation of Asian Bishops Conference, lay community movements such as Opus Dei and L’Arche, and new religious congregations have helped bring about dialogue with other Christian religions and built upon historical Church movements focused on service and worship.
Fr. O’Collins, who received an honorary doctorate from USF in 1991, has taught at the Gregorian University since 1974 and is author of 43 books, including Catholicism, Incarnation, and with Theology Professor Daniel Kendall, The Bible for Theology.
Practices in Fair Trade Chocolate Discussed Nov. 6
Abel Fernandez, traffic manager of a cocoa cooperative in the Dominican Republic, will speak Nov. 6 at 7 p.m. in Lone Mountain 148 on the benefits of fair trade chocolate as well as organic production, environmental conservation, and community development. The talk is sponsored by the Erasmus Project and the Leo T. McCarthy Center for Public Service and the Common Good.
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