Susan Owen to deliver 34th Regester Faculty Lecture
November 1, 2006

Tacoma, Wash. – University of Puget Sound Distinguished Professor of Communication Studies A. Susan Owen will present “White Benevolence and Cultural Amnesia: Allegories of Race and politics in American Popular Cinema,” at the university’s 34th John D. Regester Lecture on Thursday, Nov. 9, 8 p.m., in Kilworth Memorial Chapel. The event is free and open to the public. A reception will follow the lecture.

“Film narratives have played and continue to play a significant role in the construction of cultural memory about the nation’s story,” said Owen. Her lecture will explore the role of popular films in telling the stories of America.

Owen’s scholarly interests center upon the rhetorical influence of American mass mediated culture in structuring public consciousness, moral sensibilities, and social conduct. Her research concerns the manner in which the texts of popular culture sustain and/or transform social constructions of gender, race, and race relations. Owen also studies the implications of these constructions upon the dynamic field of our cultural memory-the meaning of our nation’s stories and our collective sense of identity as a national people. Her research and teaching have been guided by a central concern with the role of public communication in that process of constructing public meanings for structuring social and institutional relationships.

Owen earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the University of Alabama before teaching speech, debate, and rhetorical criticism at the University of Texas in San Antonio. She received her doctorate degree in rhetorical studies at the University of Iowa and later accepted a position at University of Puget Sound, where she has taught courses in the critical media studies curriculum for the past 20 years.
The John D. Regester Faculty Lectureship was established in 1965 to honor the service of John D. Regester, who joined the Puget Sound faculty in 1924. Regester taught philosophy throughout his career, served as dean of the university, and later as first dean of the graduate school. The lecture series is a means of honoring members of the university faculty with an opportunity for them to address the campus community on a subject of particular interest to the lecturer. The John D. Regester lecture is recognition of the scholarship and accomplishment of the lecturer, and gives faculty members an opportunity to develop ideas further and to explore them with colleagues and the public. 

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