Influence of environmental factors on the South is focus of first Ford Lecture
Contact: Rene Abadie
10/12/06
HAMMOND – A Rice University expert on U.S. Southern history will discuss the role of impersonal and environmental factors in shaping the culture of the South at Southeastern Louisiana University’s first Judge Leon Ford III Lecture in History Thursday, Oct. 19.
John Boles, the William Pettus Hobby Professor of History at Rice, will present two lectures as part of Fanfare, Southeastern’s annual fall festival of arts and humanities.
A 10 a.m. lecture in the Student Union Theatre will feature a scholarly focus, while the 6:30 p.m. presentation in the Pottle Music Recital Hall will be on a more general level. Both lectures, entitled “Climate, Geography, and Southern History: The Influence of Non-Human Factors,” are free and open to the general public.
Sponsored by the Ford Family Charitable Foundation, the lectures honor the late Judge Ford who served in the 21st Judicial District. A Hammond native and local historian, Judge Ford and his family established Southeastern’s second endowed chair, the Leon Ford Family Endowed Chair in Regional Studies, a position now held by history professor Samuel C. Hyde Jr. who directs the university’s Center for Southeast Louisiana Studies.
Boles’ talks will focus on the influence of global factors on the South, such as climate and geography as well local environmental factors ranging from the honeybee and boll weevil to the mosquito and cattle tick. “Human action always occurs in an environmental context,” Boles says. “It is important in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to consider the synergistic relationship between nature and human history.”
Boles is the author of the book “A Companion to the American South” and editor of “Shapers of American History.” He has lectured extensively on a wide variety of Southern history topics.
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