FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Sept. 16, 2005

MUW’s Southern Women’s Institute to be dedicated Sept. 30

By Jill D. O’Bryant

COLUMBUS, Miss. -- Mississippi University for Women’s Southern Women’s Institute, which opened this fall as a multidisciplinary center for the study of southern women in both traditional and nontraditional roles, will be dedicated Sept. 30.

The dedication, which is free and open to the public, will take place at Orr Annex from 2-4 p.m.

"I'm very excited about the official opening of our new Southern Women's Institute, and I'm very proud of our new facility and the resources we can now provide to the campus and the region,” said Dr. Bridget Pieschel, professor of English and resident scholar for the Institute. “I believe that this new Institute at MUW sends a very positive signal to the state and region about our university's significant past and its vibrant future."

The Institute, which will serve as a gathering place for learning and research on women in areas of leadership, health, art and business, also will become a repository for southern women’s and MUW’s history.

In addition, the project will provide many programs and services to the university, community and southern region. There will be a variety of special speakers scheduled throughout the year, leadership dinners for MUW faculty and students, a community workshop series and a state-wide Women’s Leadership Conference in the spring held in partnership with the Mississippi Women in Higher Education group.

Prize-winning North Carolina poet Ruth Moose, the Institute’s first writer in residence, will be on campus for the Welty Symposium October 13-15. She will stay afterward in October to meet with faculty, students and the public.

In spring and summer 2006, two visiting scholars will provide expertise on various women’s issues, teach classes, offer seminars and give presentations.

"As a fiction writer and as a former women's studies professor, I am very excited about the Southern Women's Institute and its many possibilities," said MUW President Dr. Claudia A. Limbert. "I believe it will serve as a great and much needed resource for researchers and writers throughout the South."

The Southern Women’s Institute is funded by a $496,000 congressionally-directed grant received through the assistance of U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran. The grant is administered through the U.S. Department of Education.