The academic symposium, titled “Ethical Leadership in the Arts: The Power of Storytelling and Representation,” will be held Friday, Sept. 20, at 12:45 p.m. at the Tinkham Veale University Center. The symposium is presented in conjunction with the annual Inamori Center Prize.
The symposium will feature LeVar Burton and distinguished panelists:
- Cara Byrne, lecturer in English/SAGES teaching fellow and research advisor on diverse children’s literature for the Schubert Center for Child Studies; and
- Joy Bostic, interim vice president for inclusion, diversity and equal opportunity, and associate professor in the Department of Religious Studies.
Shannon E. French, director of the Inamori International Center for Ethics and Excellence and the Inamori Professor in Ethics, will moderate the discussion.
About LeVar Burton
Burton is the first Inamori Ethics Prize recipient to be honored for ethical leadership in the arts. His work for children’s literacy through the long-running PBS children’s series Reading Rainbow and his nonprofit RRKIDZ has had a profound impact around the world, as has his support for more funding for AIDS research.
As an actor, he is best known for his powerful performance as Kunta Kinte in the mini-series Roots (based on the book by Alex Haley on slavery in America) and his role as engineer Geordi La Forge on the TV series Star Trek: The Next Generation and related films, which portray a positive and just future for humanity.