Anderson to Deliver First Amendment Address Sept. 20

LEXINGTON, Ky. (Sept. 16, 2010) − A journalist held hostage in Lebanon for nearly seven years will speak about the state of freedom of expression in the United States Sept. 20 at the University of Kentucky's Scripps Howard First Amendment Center annual celebration. Terry Anderson will deliver the State of the First Amendment Address at 6 p.m. at UK's William T. Young Library auditorium. The program will also feature presentation of the James Madison Award for Service to the First Amendment to Danville Advocate-Messenger editor John Nelson.

Anderson was chief Middle East correspondent for the Associated Press in 1985 when he was kidnapped off the street in Beirut, Lebanon, and held hostage by Shiite militants. He wrote the story of his experiences in “Den of Lions,” published in 1993, and subsequently produced and narrated a prize-winning documentary about his return to Lebanon five years after his release and that country's recovery from its 16-year civil war.

Anderson has worked in television and radio news, as a wire service reporter, a foreign correspondent and a newspaper editor. He is honorary co-chairman of the Committee to Protect Journalists and has been involved in efforts to free journalists imprisoned by governments. He is completing a two-year lectureship in UK's School of Journalism and Telecommunications. During the lectureship, he has taught courses on international journalism and diversity, worked on the Kentucky Open Government blog, taught a five-week course for UK journalism students in Lebanon and worked to expand the university’s international studies program. He also collaborated with the University of Edinburgh on a conference on war, journalism and history, "Covering Conflicts in a Modern World," held at UK in April.

“We’ve been privileged to have Terry Anderson with us on campus for the past year and a half," said the school's director Beth Barnes. "Our students who have taken courses with him, including the group that spent five weeks in Beirut this summer, have benefitted greatly from his experience and insights. The scope of his career, and particularly his work with the Committee to Protect Journalists, provides a unique platform from which to comment on the challenges facing the First Amendment.”

One topic Anderson will discuss is how new media may present new issues for press freedom. "We’re in a very interesting time, with new communication technology like Facebook, Twitter, the Internet and blogs," he said. "There are a lot of things coming under question that affect our freedoms. The First Amendment protects the press - but who is the press when everyone can publish?”

Anderson has previously taught at Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism and Ohio University's Scripps School of Journalism. He is founder and co-chair of the Vietnam Children's Fund, which has built more than 40 elementary schools in that country.

“Terry Anderson will remind all of us that freedom of speech and freedom of the press are fragile entities that, while precious to all of us, are easily eroded,” said journalism professor Mike Farrell, director of the Scripps Howard First Amendment Center. “We all need to remember that unless we are vigilant against government encroachment or unreasonable groups who want to hijack the media, our freedoms can be diminished and our democracy turned into a dictatorship.”

The Scripps Howard First Amendment Center, housed in the university's School of Journalism and Telecommunications and directed by a committee of its faculty and staff, seeks to promote understanding of the First Amendment among citizens of Kentucky, to advocate for First Amendment rights in the Commonwealth and nationally, and to produce internationally recognized scholarship concerning the First Amendment and its related freedoms.

To view a transcript of the video above, please click on the transcript link just below the photo gallery.