(April 2, 2012)

College hosts Attaway Fellows April 16-22

SHREVEPORT, LA — Dutch scholars David Barnouw and Elma Verhey will be welcomed to Centenary's campus as Attaway Fellows from April 16-22. Barnouw and Verhey will interact with students in classes on campus and visit other area schools. Both Attaway Fellows will present separate convocations at Centenary to share their interests in World War II and the Holocaust:

Convocations are free and open to the public.

Barnouw will be in attendance Tuesday, April 17, to give an introduction to the 1959 film The Diary of Anne Frank at the Robinson Film Center. The event is sponsored by the Centenary Film Society and will begin at 7:00 p.m. Centenary students are admitted free with student ID, while other guests pay regular RFC prices.

He also will give the keynote address at the Shreveport-Bossier Holocaust Remembrance Service on Sunday, April 22, at First Presbyterian Church. His address will focus on "The Importance of Anne Frank" and will begin at 4:00 p.m. First Presbyterian is located at 900 Jordan Street in Shreveport.

David Barnouw is the premier scholar on Anne Frank and head archivist and critical editor of her surviving writings. He holds an appointment at the Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies and works at the Netherlands Institute for War Documentation. He has published extensively on the Occupation period. Barnouw is frequently invited on national and international radio and television to speak as a World War II expert.

Elma Verhey is a high-profile journalist in the Netherlands. She is currently head researcher for Zembla, a television program focused on investigative journalism. From 1979-2005, she was editor for the Vrij Nederland (Free Netherlands), a weekly founded as a clandestine paper during the German Occupation. She has written numerous books and scripts for documentaries and is an active documentary director.

Funded by and named for Douglas and Marion Attaway, with matching funds from the State of Louisiana, the Attaway Professorships in Civic Culture are awarded to intellectuals who have made notable contributions to the public discussion of ideas. They present themselves not as academics who occasionally have public roles, but as public thinkers and gifted communicators whose foremost interest is civic culture. The College reserves the title "Attaway Fellow in Civic Culture" for those whose work is known beyond the bounds of the academy and have a national reputation in their fields.