CHARLESTON, S.C. (Dec. 12, 2007) – Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Samantha Power, a senior policy adviser to U.S. Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign, will be the featured speaker at a Foreign Policy Forum hosted by the Communication Department at College of Charleston on Friday, December 14, at noon in Alumni Hall on campus. Power will discuss her work as a journalist, and will convey Senator Obama's plans to restore American leadership on the world stage and decrease the risk of terrorism by attacking global poverty and rebuilding international cooperation. The event is free and open to the public.
Samantha Power is the Harvard University Anna Lindh Professor of Global Leadership and Public Policy. She won the Pulitzer for her book "A Problem from Hell": America and the Age of Genocide, and was the founding director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard.
Power's New Yorker article on the horrors in Darfur, Sudan, won the 2005 National Magazine Award for best reporting. In 2007, she became a foreign policy columnist at Time magazine. From 1993 to 1996, she covered the wars in the former Yugoslavia as a reporter for the U.S. News and World Report, the Boston Globe and The Economist.
Because Power’s presentation will incorporate material relevant to the Department of Communication’s non-partisan presidential communication series, “The Bully Pulpit: Reflections on Presidential Communication,” excerpts from her presentation will be made available to the public on the Bully Pulpit Web site at www.cofc.edu/bullypulpit <http://www.cofc.edu/bullypulpit> . The Bully Pulpit series is open to presidential candidates from the two major political parties. Allstate Insurance Company is the title sponsor for the Bully Pulpit series.
“We are delighted to host Samantha Power on campus,” said Brian McGee, chairman of the Department of Communication at the College of Charleston. “Her experience as a journalist and campaign adviser, and her depth of knowledge in the field of public policy make her an excellent speaker on the topic of Presidential communication.”
With the largest undergraduate major at the College of Charleston, the Department of Communication enrolls over 800 students in its undergraduate and graduate programs. Students in the department study such topics as political communication, interpersonal communication, journalism, and public relations. The department is housed in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences.
The College of Charleston is a nationally preeminent, public liberal arts and sciences university located in the heart of historic Charleston, South Carolina. With a student population of approximately 9800 undergraduates and 1400 graduate students, the College is known for its small-college feel blended with the advantages and diversity of an urban, mid-sized university. Founded in 1770, the College of Charleston is among the nation’s top universities for quality education, student life and affordability.