March 5, 2021
Shawnee State University is pleased to welcome Maia Szalavitz, an award-winning journalist and author of Unbroken Brain: A Revolutionary New Way of Understanding Addiction, as part of the 2021 Jane M.G. Foster Distinguished Lecture Series starting at 3:00 p.m. on Friday, March 12.
Szalavitz’s lecture “Changing the Narrative of Drug Addiction” draws from her book Unbroken Brain: A Revolutionary New Way of Understanding Addiction and from her journalistic experience in writing about addiction. Her presentation aims to make the case that everyone has a responsibility in changing the narrative about people who use drugs. Szalavitz will introduce her own conceptualization of addiction and share her insights about how to accurately, yet compassionately, communicate to readers in the age of opioids.
For her lecture, Szalavitz is using her own story of recovery to explore how to reframe addiction as a learning disorder. Her work speaks to people with addiction, their family members, policy makers, concerned community members, politicians, treatment providers, physicians, social service agencies, university communities, criminal justice officials, and others who want to improve the way we prevent, treat and manage drub problems.
The Jane M.G. Foster Distinguished Lecture Series is sponsored by the SSU Development Foundation and Appalachia UNITE.
The lecture is free of charge and will be hosted virtually at shawnee.edu/lecture-series.