Civil rights topic of prof's talk

For award-winning historian Eric Foner, there is no question in United States history quite as fascinating and difficult as: "What is freedom in America, and how have different generations defined that concept?"

Foner, Dewitt Professor of History at Columbia University, will discuss "From Civil War to Civil Rights: The First and Second Reconstructions in American History," at 7:45 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 25, in 125 Clayton Hall.

The free, public presentation, which will be followed by a reception, is part of the Lilla Brown Coombs Lecture Program, sponsored by the Department of History and the UD Faculty Senate Committee on Cultural Activities and Public Events.

Foner's books include Free Soil, Free Labor, Free Men: The Ideology of the Republican Party Before the Civil War (1970);
Tom Paine and Revolutionary America (1976); Politics and Ideology in the Age of the Civil War (1980); Nothing But Freedom: Emancipation and Its Legacy (1983); Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution (1988) and The Story of American Freedom (1998).

His honors and awards include the Bancroft Prize, Parkman Prize, Avery O. Craven Award, Owsley Award and Los Angeles Times Book Award.

Former president of the Organization of American Historians (1993-1994) and of the American Historical Association (2000), Foner has served as Pitt Professor of American History and Institutions at Cambridge University, Harmsworth Professor of American History at Oxford University and Fulbright Lecturer in American History at Moscow State University.

For information on the Oct 25 discussion, call 831-8413.