University of New England

U. Penn. scholar William R. LaFleur to discuss Japanese views on organ donation March 30th

PORTLAND - University of Pennsylvania Japanese Studies professor William R. LaFleur, Ph.D. will present "Bodies Owned, Disowned and Desired: Japan's Debates about Bioethics," as the University of New England's 2007 Crosley Lecture at noon on Friday, March 30, 2007 in Ludcke Auditorium on the Westbrook College Campus in Portland.

The 2007 Crosley Lecture is free and open to the public.

Many of Japan's bioethicists are increasingly worried about technology making our body-parts detachable and commercially valued items, such as with the concepts of brain death and cadaveric organ transplantation. At the forefront of this discussion is the long-standing Buddhist emphasis on not exacerbating one's "desires." Dr. LaFleur will discuss how Japanese philosophy and religion influence Japan's thinking about bioethics, compared with how bioethical debates are framed in the United States.

Author of The Karma of Words: Buddhism and the Literary Arts in Medieval Japan (1986) and Liquid Life (1992), a widely-cited book on the differing perspectives of Japan and the U.S. on abortion, Dr. LaFleur is an E. Dale Saunders Professor in Japanese Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. His specialty lies in the study of Japan, particularly comparisons between Japan and the United States in the areas of religion, public philosophy and social ethics. He was the first non-Japanese to be awarded the Watsuji Tetsurô Culture Prize. Dr. LaFleur is also a Senior Fellow at Penn's Center for Bioethics.

Dr. LaFleur earned his master's degrees in Comparative Literature from the University of Michigan and in the History of Religions at the University of Chicago. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago, where he studied Buddhism in Japan. Dr. LaFleur held positions at Princeton University and UCLA before joining the University of Pennsylvania in 1990.

The Crosley Lecture
The Crosley Lecture in Ethics has been given since 1984. The purpose of the lecture series is to bring distinguished scholars to the University of New England to address ethical issues in contemporary life.

The UNE Crosley Lecture is an annual endowed lecture created to honor the Rev. Marion Crosley and his wife, Mehitable Adelia Swift Crosley. The Rev. Crosley was a Universalist minister who lived in Portland from 1885 to 1889 and served on the board of the Westbrook Seminary, which later became Westbrook College, which merged with the University of New England in 1996.

Over the past 20 years, the Crosley Lecture Series has stimulated students, faculty and other members of the Maine community to think about topics in ethics such as a world-wide ethical system, corporate conscience, genetic engineering, patients' rights and physician-assisted suicide.

For more information, contact Ron Morrison at (207) 602-2108 or rmorrison@une.edu.