October 6, 2005
Award-Winning Journalist and Documentary Filmmaker to Speak at Clark
Anisa Mehdi to lecture on Islam, Muslims and the Media
WORCESTER, MA-Anisa Mehdi, Emmy award-winning journalist and documentary filmmaker, will present “Beyond the Intellectual Quarantine: Islam, Muslims and the Media” on Thursday, October 20 at 7:30 p.m. in the Winton Faculty Dining Room in Clark University’s Higgins University Center.
Mehdi will discuss current issues in Islam, from misunderstandings about Islam nurtured by western media (i.e. treatment of women and international violence) to the struggle among Muslims to define their faith to themselves and others.
Mehdi is an internationally renowned expert on Islam. Her commitment to broadening Americans’ understanding of Muslims and the Middle East has led to unprecedented access to people and places around the world. She is the first American woman to cover the Hajj for broadcast in the USA.
A commentator for National Public Radio’s “All Things Considered,” Mehdi received critical acclaim for producing and directing Inside Mecca, a National Geographic Special premiering on PBS in 2003, and for her three-part series on the Hajj for PBS’s “Religion and Ethics Newsweekly” in 1998.
Mehdi is founder and president of Whetstone Productions, a New Jersey-based boutique production and consulting company, providing full service news and documentary development and production as well as diversity and cultural awareness training. She reported on the arts for the New Jersey News (PBS) for a decade, was a correspondent for the nationally broadcast “Religion and Ethics News Weekly,” and won a CINE Golden Eagle award as executive producer of the PBS Frontline special “Muslims.” She also produced a multi-part series for ABC News Nightline, featuring a range of Muslim thinkers from Malaysia, Turkey and Iran, and has produced for Nightline UpClose. She began her career at WBZ-TV in Boston and worked for CBS News in New York.
Mehdi is the recipient of many prestigious awards in journalism including Emmys, the CINE Golden Eagle and Society of Professional Journalists awards in enterprise, feature and deadline reporting.
Both on-camera and behind-the-scenes, she uses dynamic visual and reportorial techniques to bring inspiring personal stories of faith, culture and courage to a wide range of audiences. In addition to her many speaking engagements, she presents cultural awareness programs at middle schools and libraries. She is known for encouraging open and frank discourse, bringing her skills as a journalist and moderator to temper situations that sometimes get tense.
Mehdi’s reports and viewpoints can be found on beliefnet.com, iviews.com, and on her own website, www.anisamehdi.com.
This lecture is free and open to the public. It is sponsored by the Higgins School of Humanities. For more information, call 508-793-7479.
Clark University is a private, co-educational liberal-arts research university with 2,000 undergraduate and 600 graduate students. Since its founding in 1887 as the first all-graduate school in New England, Clark has challenged convention with innovative programs such as the International Studies Stream, the Strassler Family Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies and the five-year BA/MA programs with the fifth year tuition-free for eligible students.
Angela M. Bazydlo
Associate Director of Media Relations
Clark University
Worcester, Mass.
phone: 508-793-7635
www.clarku.edu
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