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(Rockville, MD - November 10, 2006) Actor James Earl Jones will be the keynote speaker at the annual meeting of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) on Thursday, November 16, 6:00 p.m. at the Miami Beach Convention Center in The Jackie Gleason Theater.
During the Opening General Session, Jones will address, "From Frontier to Freeway: Culture at the Crossroads." He will explore history and the present to examine how local, national, and global cultures shape our lives, and how we in turn shape and reshape the worlds we inhabit. "Culture is constantly reinventing itself" he contends, "and culture is constantly reinventing us." He will reflect on what happens when cultures change, when cultures collide, and when cultures converge and connect.
Despite being a famous TV and movie personality, celebrated Jones' beginnings are in the theater. He was in the historic company that incubated a generation of future black stars in Jean Genet's The Blacks. His long association with the New York Shakespeare Festival began in 1959 and carried him from Hamlet to King Lear.
Jones has received numerous awards over the years including Obies, Emmies, ACE Awards, Tony Awards, Golden Globe, the National Medal of Arts, and an Academy Award nomination. He is also the recipient of the prestigious NAACP Hall of Fame Image Award for his great contributions to the arts. Among his many awards and recognitions, Jones holds honorary doctorates from Yale, Princeton, and the University of Michigan. In 2002, he received the Silver Jubilee Kennedy Center Honors. Jones received critical praise in the literary world for his book, James Earl Jones: Voices and Silences, a memoir published by McMillan & Co. in 1997.
The annual ASHA convention is the most comprehensive development conference for speech-language pathologists, audiologists, and speech, language and hearing scientists. It features more than 1,500 educational sessions that highlight the latest developments in research and clinical practices for professionals who provide services in schools, hospitals, health care centers, rehabilitation clinics, and other practice settings.
Nearly 300 exhibitors, including hearing aid manufacturers and other companies in the speech and hearing industries, will showcase innovative products and services in the Miami Beach Convention Center's exhibit hall. Technology presentations on products, such as computer software programs as well as alternative and augmentative communication and assistive listening devices were also featured.
The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) is the national professional, scientific, and credentialing association for more than 123,000 audiologists, speech-language pathologists, and speech, language, and hearing scientists. Audiologists specialize in preventing and assessing hearing disorders as well as providing audiologic treatment including hearing aids. Speech-language pathologists identify, assess, and treat speech and language problems including swallowing disorders.
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