April 8, 2002

A former student of the late Luis Eyzaguirre will give this year's lecture in honor of his professor.

John Dwyer of the U.S. Department of State will address the topic, "Is There Something Special About the U.S.-Latin American Relationship?" The lecture will take place at the William Benton Museum on April 11, at 4 p.m.

A native of Waterbury, Dwyer studied at UConn from 1964 to 1968 and was Eyzaguirre's student in 1967. He says his former professor had a profound impact on his understanding of Latin America, and played an important role in mentoring him both as an undergraduate and graduate student and as a colleague.

Dwyer, a career foreign service officer whose overseas assignments include Bolivia, Venezuela, Mexico, and Brazil, has been coordinator of the Bureau of International Information Programs at the State Department since October 1999.

He is an assistant secretary of state and was previously the deputy associate director for information at the United States Information Agency.

Before joining the Foreign Service, Dwyer was an assistant professor and director of undergraduate studies in Spanish at Simon's Rock College, now part of Bard College. From 1985 to 1987, he was the managing director for Latin American affairs at the Americas Society/Council of the Americas in New York City.

Dwyer has received many awards for his work, including the Edward R. Murrow Award for Excellence in Public Diplomacy in 2000, the highest award in public diplomacy given by the state department in conjunction with Tufts University.

Luis Bernardo Eyzaguirre taught at UConn for 32 years in the Department of Modern and Classical Languages. The Eyzaguirre Lecture was inaugurated in May 2000, to provide the UConn community an opportunity to learn about Latin American culture.

Eyzaguirre used to stress that literature is more than the text, and the lecture series remains faithful to his philosophy, bringing notable literary and cultural figures to the Center to share ideas.