The University of Notre Dame will host a conference on genocide and the media titledWitnessing Genocide: Truth, Reconciliation and the Mediathat will take place April 6 and 7 (Sunday and Monday) in McKenna Hall.

Conference speakers include policy-makers, journalists, film critics, activists and genocide survivors from Rwanda, Darfur and the Holocaust.Focusing on the relationship between genocide and the media, the conference will examine how the experience of genocide victims is reported to the general public.

Juan Mendez, former special advisor to the U.N. Secretary-General on the Prevention of Genocide and former director of Notre Dames Center for Civil and Human Rights, will give the conferences opening remarks.Other speakers include Ellen Barry, a New York Times journalist; Rwandan genocide survivors Edige Kauranga and Father Emmanuel Ntakarutimana; and Thane Rosenbaum, a distinguished writer and law professor.Menachem Rosensaft, the founding chairman of the International Network of Children of Jewish Survivors, will give the closing remarks.

Beyond the Gates,a film directed by Michael Caton-Jones about the Rwandan genocide, will be shown as part of the conference April 6 (Sunday) at 7 p.m. in the Browning Cinema of the DeBartolo Center for the Performing Arts.

The event is sponsored by the Notre Dame Department of Theology, Notre Dame Holocaust Project, the Kurt and Tessye Simon Fund, Kroc Institute for International Peace 91ÊÓƵ, Center for Social Concerns, Center for Civil and Human Rights, College of Arts and Letters, Nanovic Institute for European 91ÊÓƵ, and the Institute for Scholarship in the Liberal Arts.

_ Contact: Betty Signer, College of Arts and Letters, 574-631-7635_

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Thane Rosenbaum, a distinguished novelist, essayist and law professor, will deliver a lecture titledAfter Auschwitz and the Twin Towers: Trauma and Memoryat 7:45 p.m. April 7 (Monday) in McKenna Hall at the University of Notre Dame.

Part of the Liss Lecture Series, the event is presented by the Department of Theology in cooperation with the Notre Dame Holocaust Project and is free and open to the public.

Rosenbaums lecture will address the questions: How does one properly memorialize a tragic event?What are the moral duties that are owed the dead?What obligations to remember must be undertaken by the living?

Considered one of the leading Jewish intellectuals of his generation, Rosenbaum is the only child of two Holocaust survivors who died when he was young.In his lectures and stories, Rosenbaum addresses the fragmentation of the Jewish family, his generations weak identification with their faith, and the widening chasm of experience between Holocaust survivors and their descendants.

Rosenbaum is the award-winning author of several critically claimed novels, and his reviews and essays appear frequently in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, New York Sun and other national publications.His novels includeThe Golems of Gotham,Second Hand Smoke,which was a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award in 1999, and the novel-in-stories,Elijah Visible,which received the Edward Lewis Wallant Award in 1996 for the best book of Jewish-American fiction.

Now a professor at Fordham Law 91ÊÓƵ, Rosenbaum is a former Wall Street lawyer who gave up a lucrative practice in order to devote himself to the creation of art and the teaching of ethics to American law students.At Fordham, Rosenbaum teaches human rights, legal humanities, law and literature, and also directs the Forum on Law, Culture and Society.

_ Contact: Betty Signer, College of Arts and Letters, 574-631-7635
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The University of Notre Dame will host filmmakers and scholars March 27 to 29 (Thursday to Saturday) for the annual Asian Film Festival and conference, this year titledLove at First Sight: Romance and Relationships in Asian and Asian American Cinema.

The festival will showcase four award-winning films in the Browning Cinema of the DeBartolo Center for the Performing Arts.

Admission is $6 for the general public, $5 for Notre Dame faculty and staff, $4 for seniors, and $3 for students.Tickets may be purchased in advance at or by calling the center box office at 574-631-2800.

The films are:

•Train Man— This 2005 film directed by Masanori Murakami is based on true events that took place on a popular bulletin board Web site in Japan.This is the fairy-tale story of one geek, one beauty, and 1,000 noisy chat room residents. (March 27 at 7 p.m.)

•The Trouble with Romance- Directed by Gene Rhee, this 2007 film takes place in one Los Angeles hotel where each room hides a different trouble with romance. (March 28 at 7 p.m.)
•My Sassy Girl- This 2001 film directed by Jae-young Kwak is based on an on-line serial written by Kim Ho-sik that details his relationship with his off-the-wall college girlfriend. (March 29 at 7 p.m.)

•Omkara- Directed by Vishal Bharadwaj,Omkarais a film adaptation of William Shakespeares tragedy,Othello.This 2006 film traces one mans unrelenting jealousy and all-consuming obsession against the backdrop of political warfare in the interiors of Uttar Pradesh. (March 29 at 10 p.m.

The 2008 Asian and Asian American Film Festival is presented by the Center for Asian 91ÊÓƵ, DeBartolo Center for the Performing Arts, East Asian Languages and Cultures, and the Provost Offices Asia Initiatives.It is sponsored and supported by more than a dozen departments, offices and organizations at Notre Dame and several external organizations, including the Korean Cultural Center in Los Angeles.

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Marilyn Krysl, the winner of the University of Notre Dames 2008 Sullivan Prize for fiction, will present a reading from her workDinner with Osamaat 7:30 p.m. March 19 (Wednesday) in the Universitys North Dining Hall Gold Room.

The event is sponsored by the Creative Writing Program, which awarded Krysl the prize forDinner with Osama,a collection of short stories.

Awarded biannually since 1996, the Sullivan Prize is presented to an author who already has published at least one volume of short fiction. The winner receives $1,000 and publication by the Notre Dame Press. Valerie Sayers and William ORourke, both professors of English and former directors of Notre Dames Creative Writing Program were the contest judges.

Krysl has published three collections of stories and seven volumes of poetry. Her work has appeared in The Atlantic, The Nation, The New Republic, the Pushcart Prize Anthology, Best American Short Stories 2000, OHenry Prize Stories, Sudden Fiction and Sudden Stories.Dinner with Osamawas published earlier this year by the Notre Dame Press.

A former director of the Creative Writing Program at the University of Colorado, Krysl is the recipient of two National Endowment for the Arts fellowships, and has taught English as a second language in the Peoples Republic of China. She has served as artist-in-residence at the Center for Human Caring, worked as a volunteer for Peace Brigade International in Sri Lanka, and volunteered at the Kalighat Home for the Destitute and Dying administered by Mother Teresas Sisters of Charity in Calcutta.

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The University of Notre Dame will host its second annual health and body image conference, titledLive As You Are,March 11 to 13 (Tuesday to Thursday) in McKenna Hall.

Sponsored by student government, this years event, formerly named the Eating Disorders Conference, seeks to expand the scope of its discussion and address issues of disordered eating as well as problems of steroid use, exercise and sexual addictions, and male and female body image stereotypes.The conference aims to raise awareness of the health and body issues affecting the Notre Dame community and to advance research and analysis of the cultural, biological and psychological contributors.

Former fashion cover model Ann Simonton, the conferences keynote speaker, will present a lecture on the media and body image March 11 at 5 p.m.Currently a leading expert on how the media perpetrates poor body image, Simonton has appeared onDr. Phil,Oprah,Larry King Live,Entertainment Tonight,and CNNsCrossfire.

The conference also will include a variety of presentations, workshops and panel discussions by medical professionals, visiting academic researchers and the Universitys own health care professionals.A screening of the movieThin,a documentary by Lauren Greenfield that explores the lives of eating disorder patients, will be shown March 12 at 8 p.m.

The event is presented by student government in cooperation with the Office of the President, the Gender Relations Center, the College of Science, the Gender 91ÊÓƵ Department, the Gender 91ÊÓƵ Honor Society, the English Department, University Health Center and University Counseling Center.

More information about the conference is available on the Web at .

_ Contact: Patrick Tighe, 480-593-8830,_ " ptighe@nd.edu ":mailto:ptighe@nd.edu , or Brenna Doyle, " bdoyle@nd.edu ":mailto:bdoyle@nd.edu

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Jeffrey Stepakoff, a former Hollywood television writer and producer, will deliver a lecture titledThe Rise of the Writer in Hollywoodat 7 p.m. Feb. 19 (Tuesday) in the Browning Cinema of the DeBartolo Center for the Performing Arts at the University of Notre Dame.

Admission is free, but tickets are required and may be ordered in advance from the center box office at 574-631-2800.

Having spent nearly two decades working in Hollywood, Stepakoff will trace the history of scripted entertainment during the era of media consolidation.He will discuss how entertainment became a great American commodity, where the business is going, and what the Writers Guild strike meant for the industry.

Stepakoff has worked on seven primetime staffs and written for 14 different television series, including the Emmy-winningWonder YearsandDawsons Creek,for which he also was a co-executive producer.He developed and wrote major motion pictures, includingTarzan(1999) andBrother Bear(2003) for Disney.

In 2007, Stepakoff published the bookBillion Dollar Kiss: The Kiss that Saved Dawsons Creek and Other Adventures in TV Writing,a revealing account of his experiences in the television industry.

Stepakoff currently resides with his wife and two young daughters in Dunwoody, Ga., and has a professorship in film and television writing at Kennesaw State University.

The lecture is sponsored by the DeBartolo Center; the Browning Cinema; the Department of Film, Television and Theatre; and the Arts and Letters Learning Beyond the Classroom Program.

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Admission is free, but tickets are required and may be ordered in advance from the center box office at 574-631-2800.The films are:

•The Last Winter- This 2007 film directed by Larry Fessenden tells the story of oil drillers in Alaska who become concerned with the irreversible environmental damage they are causing.(Feb. 15 at 10 p.m.)

•11th Hour- Directed by Leila Conners Petersen and Nadia Conners and narrated by Leonardo DiCaprio,11th Hourexplores how humanity has impacted Earths ecosystems.(Feb. 15 and 17 at 7 p.m.)

•King Corn- This 2007 film by Aaron Woolf is a documentary about the subsidized crop that drives the American fast-food nation.(Feb. 16 at 7 p.m.)

•Princess Mononoke- A 1997 animated film by Hayao Miyazaki,Princess Mononokeis a Japanese language film with English subtitles that tells the tale of a war between civilization and nature.(Feb. 16 at 10 p.m.)

•Everythings Cool- Directed by Daniel B. Gold and Judith Helfand, this 2007 film tells the story of activists on a mission to educate U.S. citizens and politicians about the gravity of global warming.(Feb. 17 at 4 p.m.)

Green Screen 2008 is sponsored by the DeBartolo Center, the Center for Ethical Education, the Department of Biological Sciences, the Center for Environmental Science and Technology, the Center for Social Concerns, College Seminar, the Cushwa Center, the University of Notre Dame Environmental Research Center, the Kaneb Center, the GLOBES Project and the Department of Film, Television, and Theatre.

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The University of Notre Dame will host the Midwest premiere of Canadian director Bernard Émonds filmSummit Circleas a part of the UniversitysFilms and Faith 2008film festival, which will take place Feb. 8 to 10 (Friday to Sunday) in the Browning Cinema of the DeBartolo Center for the Performing Arts.

Admission is $6 for the general public, $5 for Notre Dame faculty and staff, and $3 for students and seniors.Tickets may be purchased in advance at or by calling the DeBartolo Center box office at 574-631-2800.

A screening ofThe Novena,a 2005 film by Émond will open theFilms and Faith Weekend: Meditations of Death (and Life)series.Émond currently is working on a trilogy of films based on faith, hope and charity.The NovenaandSummit Circleare the first two films of the trilogy.In addition to Émonds films, the series also includes Ingmar BergmansThe Seventh Sealand Akira KurosawasIruku.

The series is sponsored by Notre Dame’s Department of Film, Television and Theatre in conjunction with the Department of Theology, DeBartolo Center, and College of Arts and Letters.
More information and a complete schedule of screenings and discussions are available on the Web at .

Contact: Leigh Hayden, director of external relations, 574-631-2726, hayden.22@nd.edu or Kyle Fitzenreiter, marketing manager, 574- 631-1873, kyle.fitzenreiter.1@nd.edu .

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The University of Notre Dame will host several events this month in celebration of African-American Heritage Month.

•African-American Heritage Month- A museum-styled display featuring thought-provoking visuals on African diaspora provided by the students of First Class Steppers and Shades of Ebony.The display will be located on the first floor of the Hesburgh Library throughout the month.

•Lest We Forget: Two Years After Katrina&Rita- An inter-race forum featuring a student panel discussion.This event will take place Wednesday (Feb. 6) from 5:30 to 7 p.m. in the Hammes Student Lounge of the Coleman-Morse Center.

•Notre Dame Collegiate Jazz Festival – The oldest college jazz festival in the country, featuring top college jazz bands, Feb. 22 and 23 (Friday and Saturday).To include a performance by the Historically Black College and University (HBCU) Jazz Band on Feb. 22 at 10 p.m.Students are admitted free of charge, but must obtain tickets. For more information about this event, visit on the Web.

•Wabrudas first annual Black History Conference – The men of the Wabruda student club invite participants to attend the event, which will take place Feb. 21 to 23 (Thursday to Saturday) at various locations on campus.The conference will feature an Underground Railroad museum exhibit, a keynote address and a spoken word concert with acclaimed artist Taalam Acey.

For more information, contact Wabruda at wabruda@nd.edu .

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