Law Professor Receives Fulbright Scholar Award
For release: January 14, 2004
For press information, contact Gabrielle Maxey

Michele Alexandre, an assistant professor at the University of Memphis' Cecil C. Humphreys School of Law, has been awarded a Fulbright Scholar grant to lecture and conduct research in Haiti during the 2004 academic year. She will be at the Catholic School of Law in Jérémie, Haiti, through June.

Alexandre's research will be on legal issues behind the Haitian practice of placage, an informal form of polygamy in which men set up households with more than one woman, often in addition to being married. Haitian women often tolerate this practice because it is so widespread and they feel powerless. Alexandre's plan is to analyze how the Haitian legal system can be reformed to provide more rights to women and children in placage.

Alexandre is a graduate of Colgate University and the Harvard University law school.

Some 800 U.S. faculty and professionals will travel abroad to 140 countries through the Fulbright Scholar program.

Established in 1947 under legislation introduced by the late Sen. J. William Fulbright of Arkansas, the program's purpose is to build mutual understanding between the people of the U.S. and other countries. The Fulbright program, America's flagship international educational exchange, is sponsored by the U.S. State Department's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

Recipients of Fulbright awards are selected on the basis of academic or professional achievement and extraordinary leadership potential in their fields.

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