Editors: Biographies of speakers are available by request.

ANN ARBOR—Issues of diversity and race are daily occupying increasing attention throughout the United States, most notably in efforts to end affirmative action. A symposium at the University of Michigan on Thursday (Sept. 30) seeks to provide some perspective on these issues from European and Canadian experience.

“Contexts for Diversity: Europe and North America,” a day-long program at the Rackham Auditorium on the U-M Central Campus, will bring together visiting social scientists and legal scholars from Europe, Canada and the United States with U-M faculty and graduate students for three main sessions which begin at 9 a.m. (see schedule).

Roberta Gutman, corporate vice president and director of global diversity, Motorola Corporation, will cap the day at 4 p.m. with a keynote address, “Global Diversity and Institutional Change.” Gutman, who earned degrees from Temple and Cornell universities, has worked in various human resources capacities at major corporations including Digital Equipment, SmithKline Beecham and Scott Paper.

Among the visiting scholars are: Nathan Glazer, professor emeritus of sociology and education, Harvard University and author of several major books in his fields, “Beyond the Melting Pot” (co-authored with Daniel Patrick Moynihan, 1963) and “Affirmative Discrimination” (1976); Jacqueline Bhabha, director of the Human Rights Program at the Center for International Studies, University of Chicago; and John Wrench, senior researcher at the Danish Centre for Migration and Ethnic Studies, South Jutland University.

U-M faculty who will speak include James Jackson, professor of psychology and director of the Center for Afroamerican and African Studies and Muge Gocek, professor of sociology.

The symposium, which is free and open to the public, is the first event of the 1999-2000 academic year in the continuing series, Dialogues in Diversity, a campus-wide initiative at the U-M which provides opportunities for members of the broader University community to explore the value of diversity in all its forms.

Co-sponsors of the symposium include: Institute for Research on Women and Gender; Center for the Education of Women; Arts and Citizenship Program; School of Business Administration; Institute for Social Research; and Vice Provost for International Affairs.