AFTER 19 consecutive years at Florida International University (FIU), the Eric Williams Memorial Lecture, has a new home at the John L Warfield Center for African and African American Studies at the University of Texas, Austin (UT).
The Eric Williams Memorial Lecture honours the distinguished Caribbean statesman, consummate academic, internationally-celebrated historian and author of several books.
Williams was also the first prime minister of TT and head of government for a quarter of a century until his death in 1981. He led the country to Independence from Britain in 1962 and onto Republican status in 1976.
The 23rd Eric Williams Memorial Lecture was held at the UT on March 28 and was delivered by CNNs Abby Phillip, who is of TT heritage.
In a news release on April 15, the Eric Williams Memorial Collection said the lecture was attended by 250 people, both in-person and online.
Phillip spoke on Journalism in Challenging Times, the release said.
'With Phillip ably displaying her masterful navigation of her craft, and emphasised particularly the need to not only have all voices heard, especially those with whom we are at odds, but also to focus on the facts, where too much of social media today traffics in the alternative,' the release said.
Wading into what she deemed as the obligation to 'tell our story' with courage and clarity, Phillip drew parallels to Eric Williams' fearless condemnation of the status quo during his hugely popular University of Woodford Square speeches in the 1950s, where Williams endeavoured to teach the TT populace, most of whom had only had a primary school education, 'what one French writer of the 18th century saw as the greatest danger, that they have a mind!'
Phillip talked about partially growing up in TT, and of how Williams' policies with regard to free secondary and tertiary education made both her parents and, by extension, their children believe anything was possible, that there were few constraints on an individual's desire to achieve.
With respect to the oft-times heated discussions on her programme in these deeply polarised times, she said she often feels like a school teacher having to admonish unruly children. Ground rules are imposed beforehand and she does not hesitate to intervene with 'Stop talking', when people interrupt and speak overreach other. As a journalist, and in order to navigate the inevitable political partisanship, Phillip affirms her responsibility to be informed on both sides of an argument, and to demonstrate that even parties who disagree vehemently can still participate in dialogue. In fact she marvelled at how, after a contentious programme, guests can leave the studio conversing about their children, grandchildren or other innocuous matters.
The lecture, the release said, was followed by a lively and probing Q&A session that touched on, among other topics, media technology changes and the urgency for legacy media/cable news to keep up with it.
She bemoaned the lagging of the news media to adapt rapidly to the way in whic
