Tom Hayden Will Visit the U of M Nov. 11 to Discuss the Prevention of Gangs and Violence
For release: November 3, 2004
For press information, contact Gabrielle Maxey

Social activist Tom Hayden will be the guest speaker for the Ben Hooks Lecture Series on Thursday, Nov. 11, at the University of Memphis. His talk will begin at 7 p.m. in the Fogelman Executive Center, Room 136. The public is invited to the free event.

He will discuss his tenth book, Street Wars: Gangs and the Future of Violence. The book is the culmination of Hayden's work as a California state senator to prevent gang violence in Los Angeles.

Hayden may be best known for his highly visible role as a civil rights activist in the1960s. He began his career as a freedom fighter by delivering a carload of food to Fayette County, Tenn., sharecroppers who were evicted from their land for trying to register to vote in the 1960 presidential election.

Hayden was also a co-founder of the Students for a Democratic Society, and in the 1970s he was active in the environmental and anti-nuclear movements.

He served in the California Assembly and Senate from 1982 to 1999. Under his chairmanship of the labor, higher education, and natural resources committees, the legislature passed pivotal legislation on behalf of African-Americans, Hispanics, Holocaust survivors, recent immigrants working in sweatshops, women, and young people.

Among Hayden's books are Reunion: A Memoir, The Whole World Was Watching, The Lost Gospel of the Earth, Irish Hunger, and Street Wars. The latter examines effective strategies to overcome the negative influence of gangs on young people in American cities.

Hayden is a professor at Occidental College in Los Angeles, a member of the editorial board of The Nation and the national coordinator of "No More Sweatshops!" In 2003 he was a Visiting Fellow at Harvard University's Institute of Politics.

For more information, call 901-678-2769 or visit the Hooks Institute Web site, http://benhooks.memphis.edu.

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