Robert Cochran
Robert Cochran will deliver the annual Robert B. Walz Lecture in Arkansas and Regional Studies at 7 p.m. on Thursday, September 25, in Foundation Hall of the Southern Arkansas University Reynolds Center.
The lecture is free and open to the public. Cochran’s presentation is “True Hearts Under Coarse Frocks: Arkansas on the Big Screen.” The audience is also welcomed to attend a reception for Robert Cochran in the Reynolds Center following the lecture.
Cochran is professor of English and director of the Center for Arkansas and Regional Studies at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville.
He is the curator of Lights! Camera! Arkansas!, a current exhibit at the Old State House Museum in Little Rock. The exhibit includes hundreds of artefacts associated with those from Arkansas who made their mark in Hollywood, films shot in the state, and works by Arkansans that were turned into movies. A volume of the same title that he co-authored with his spouse, Suzanne McCray, will be published next year by the University of Arkansas Press.
Cochran has written nine books. His works devoted to Arkansas topics include Singing in Zion: Music and Song in the Life of an Arkansas Family; A Photographer of Note: Arkansas Artist Geleve Grice; and Our Own Sweet Sounds: A Celebration of Popular Music in Arkansas.
A three-time Fulbright lecturer and Guggenheim Fellow, Cochran has also directed three documentaries and produced two CDs of traditional Arkansas music.
The Walz Lectureship was established in 1995 with a bequest from the estate of Mrs. Curtistine A. Walz, in honor of her husband’s long service to the university.
Dr. Robert Walz taught history at SAU from 1958 to 1987. He promoted the study of Arkansas history through his scholarship, preservation of historic photographs, and leadership in state organizations.
The lecture is sponsored by the College of Liberal and Performing Arts at Southern Arkansas University.
