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Environmental Activist and Feminist to Deliver Stevenson Address

Vandana Shiva
Vandana Shiva will present a talk titled “The Future of Food” as part of the Adlai E. Stevenson Memorial Lecture Series on Monday, April 15 at 7:30 p.m. in the Hansen Student Center.

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. –– International environmental activist, food sovereignty advocate and feminist Vandana Shiva will present an address as part of the Adlai E. Stevenson Memorial Lecture Series on Monday, April 15 at 7:30 p.m. in the Hansen Student Center at Illinois Wesleyan University.

In addition to her address “The Future of Food,” Shiva will host a master class for students in Illinois State University’s Bone Student Center Old Main Room at 3 p.m. on April 15.

Emphasizing the need for sustainable agriculture, Shiva is a supporter of getting women across the globe more involved in planting and farming.

Shiva currently chairs the Commission on the Future of Food set up by the Region of Tuscany in Italy and is a Board member of the International Forum on Globalisation (IGF). She is the author of more than 20 books and has spoken at universities around the world. In 2003, Time magazine lauded Shiva as an “environmental hero” for her work.

Shiva’s contributions to gender issues are nationally and internationally recognized as well. Her book Staying Alive dramatically shifts popular perceptions of Third World women. She founded the gender unit at the International Centre for Mountain Development (ICIMOD) in Kathmandu, and was a founding Board Member of the Women Environment and Development Organization (WEDO).

In 1993, Shiva received the Right Livelihood Award –– often known as the Alternative Nobel Peace Prize –– for her work "placing women and ecology at the heart of modern development discourse." She is also the recipient of the United Nations Environment Programme's Global 500 Award and the Earth Day International Award of the United Nations.

Shiva studied as a physicist at the University of Punjab before earning her Ph.D. from the University of Western Ontario, Canada in 1978. She later shifted to interdisciplinary research in science, technology and environmental policy, which she carried out at the Indian Institute of Science and the Indian Institute of Management in Bangalore, India.

The Adlai E. Stevenson Memorial Lecture Series was established by a group of local civic leaders to honor the legacy of Bloomington native Adlai E. Stevenson II, former Illinois Governor and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, after his passing in 1965. The events are co-hosted by Illinois Wesleyan University and Illinois State University.

By John Twork