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January 31, 2004

Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence at ULM this Semester

The University of Louisiana at Monroe has received funding to bring Italian archeologist Dr. Vincenzo Di Giovanni to campus as a part of the Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence program for the spring 2004 semester. The program is funded by the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs in the U. S. department of State. This is the first time the university has received a Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence.

Di Giovanni will work with ULM throughout the spring 2004 semester, teaching an honors seminar on Roman and Etruscan archeology, and will participate in a Chautauqua Nexus to be held on March 19th at 6:30 p.m. on campus. He will also be coordinating activities with local archeologists in Northeast Louisiana, visiting high school classes and giving guest lectures in foreign language and classics classes.

"I am excited about the opportunity this will give our honors students to study with an internationally renowned archeologist," said Dr. Holly Wilson, associate professor of philosophy, director of the University Honors Program and interim head of the Department of History and Government at ULM.

Wilson is also principal investigator on a submission for a Board of Regents' Enhancement Funds grant. If this grant is obtained, students from ULM will be able to participate in a course in field archeology at the Campanian site of Conza, located on the slopes of the Apennines, a city whose remains date back to the ninth century B. C.

The Fulbright Program, signed into law in 1945 by Senator J. William Fulbright, was built on the idea that a mutual understanding of cultural differences needed to be established in the wake of the Second World War. Today, the program involves up to 140 countries worldwide, who are able to communicate directly to students in the United States through their respective Fulbright scholars. The scholars are asked to come on an individual basis, according to their field of expertise.

Di Giovanni is co-director of New Archeology, a region of professional archeologists who excavate sites in Campania, in south central Italy where Naples is the principal modern city. Work done by Di Giovanni and his colleagues has brought to light artifacts that realign the current understanding of the Greek, Etruscan, and Italic roles in the formation of Roman Civilization.

A graduate of the University of Rome, Di Giovanni has participated in various excavations in the Campania region for the Italian Superintendence of the Antiquities. He has also served as a visiting scholar for the National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Seminar for College and University Teachers held in Campania.

Last semester, Di Giovanni worked as a scholar-in-residence at another school in the University of Louisiana System, Northwestern State University, where he also taught a seminar in archeology.

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