17 Oct 2022 Noted ornithologist, writer to speak at Hendrix College

CONWAY — Ornithologist, writer, and avid outdoorsman J. Drew Lanham, will read and discuss his work at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 26, in Reves Recital Hall on Hendrix College campus. A reception and book signing in Trieschmann Gallery will follow the reading, and WordsWorth Books of Little Rock will sell select titles of his work. This event is free, open to the public, and no tickets or reservations are required.

Lanham’s work addresses the confluence of race, place, and nature. His memoir, “The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man’s Love Affair with Nature,” was the winner of the Southern Book Prize for Memoir, the Reed Environmental Writing Award, and was recognized by Literary Hub as one of the Best Memoirs of the Decade and by The Chronicle of Higher Education as a Best Scholarly Book of the Decade. He is the author of “Sparrow Envy: Field Guide to Birds and Lesser Beasts.”

Lanham’s creative work and opinion has appeared in Orion Magazine, Vanity Fair, Oxford American, Newsweek, Slate, NPR, and The New York Times, among others. His work has also been included in several anthologies, and he has appeared on various podcasts including “This is Love and On Being” with Krista Tippett.

He is known widely as a conservation and environmental advocate and has served on national boards including the National Audubon Society, the Aldo Leopold Foundation, Birdnote, and the American Birding Association.

Lanham is an Alumni Distinguished Professor, Provost’s Professor, and Master Teacher of wildlife ecology at Clemson University. He was raised in Edgefield, South Carolina, and earned his PhD from Clemson in 1997. 

He is a winner of the Dan W. Lufkin Conservation Award, the Rosa Parks and Grace Lee Boggs Outstanding Service Award, and the E.O. Wilson Award for Outstanding Science in Biodiversity Conservation for his efforts as a conservationist.

This event is sponsored by the Hendrix-Murphy Foundation Programs in Literature and Language, which are designed to enhance and enrich the study and teaching of literature and language at Hendrix College. For more information about this and future events, please contact Julia Lee McGill at [email protected].