(September 30, 2011)

Contact: Dena Pruett, Centenary Marketing & Communication, 318.869.5715

Centenary College Hosts Attaway Scholar Naimah Fuller

SHREVEPORT, LA — Naimah Fuller, an award-winning media artist and independent filmmaker, will be visiting the campus as an Attaway Scholar from Oct. 5 through Oct. 7. Fuller will host a showing of her documentary at Robinson Film Center and participate in student discussions in American Religious Experience and Diversity in the Workplace classes.

Born in rural Georgia, Fuller's love of cinema began at an early age, as her father, grandfather and great-grandfather were all photographers. Pursuing this passion, she majored in commercial photography at the Arts & Crafts Institute in Detroit, Mi. After studying filmmaking at the Studio Museum in Harlem and working on movie sets, she embarked on a seven-year stint as a producer-writer at WABC-TV. These experiences led her to become the producer, director, writer and cinematographer of her current documentary project: Home: The Great Migration of the 21st Century.

Public screening and presentations:

"The question I set out to answer was: Why were African Americans moving en masse to the south?" said Fuller. "What began as a curiosity became a calling, an ancestral calling, to identify those descendants who were coming back home to fulfill the dream of those who fought and died for the freedom and equality in the south."

Home: The Great Migration of the 21st Century connects the historical dots between the current mass migration of African-Americans relocating to the south to the era of the twentieth century when six million African-Americans migrated "new south" to the west or north, known as the Great Migration. This project looks at how the "new south" is attracting a whole new generation of young African-Americans who are the descendants of parents and grandparents who fled the terror of the Jim Crow South.

Funded by and named for Douglas and Marion Attaway, the Attaway Professorships in Civic Culture, Attaway Fellows and Attaway Scholars designations are awarded to intellectuals who have made notable contributions to the public discussion. Any student, faculty or staff member may propose Attaway Fellows or Scholars to the Convocation Committee, who in turn, make recommendations to the Provost.

About Centenary College of Louisiana

Centenary College is a private, four-year arts and sciences college affiliated with the United Methodist Church. Founded in 1825, it is the oldest chartered liberal arts college west of the Mississippi River and is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. Centenary is one of 16 colleges and universities constituting the Associated Colleges of the South and has been recognized as "One of the Best 371 Colleges" by the Princeton Review and one of "America's Best Colleges" and one of "America's Best Private Colleges" by Forbes.com. In 2008 Centenary College celebrated 100 years in Shreveport and Bossier City.