LAKELAND (Jan. 7, 2013) – A journalist who has written extensively about the critical issue of scarce water resources will be the next speaker in the Florida Lecture Series at Florida Southern College.

Cynthia Barnett will give the lecture, “Mirage: Florida and the Vanishing Water of the Eastern U.S.,” at 7 p.m. Jan. 10 in the Hollis Room on the Florida Southern campus. The event is free and open to the public.

Cynthia Barnett is an experienced journalist who has reported on freshwater issues from the Suwannee River to Singapore. Her first book, Mirage, won the 2008 Florida Book Award Gold Medal for Nonfiction and was named one of the top 10 books that every Floridian should read. Her latest book, Blue Revolution: Unmaking America’s Water Crisis, calls for a water ethic for America. Blue Revolution was named by the Boston Globe as one of the top 10 science books of 2011. The Globe describes Barnett as “part journalist, part mom, part historian, and part optimist.”

Barnett has worked for newspapers and magazines for 25 years. Her numerous journalism awards include a national Sigma Delta Chi prize for investigative magazine reporting and eight Green Eyeshades, which recognizes outstanding journalism in 11 Southeastern states. She earned her bachelor’s degree in journalism and a master’s in environmental history, both from the University of Florida, and was the recipient of a Knight-Wallace Fellowship at the University of Michigan, where she spent a year studying freshwater supply. She lives in Gainesville with her husband and two water-loving grade-schoolers.

“We are extremely delighted to have Cynthia Barnett on campus,” said Prof. James M. Denham, Director of the Lawton M. Chiles, Jr., Center for Florida History, which sponsors the Florida Lecture Series. “Her close study of water issues in Florida, the nation, and the world has contributed to a deeper awareness of this invaluable resource.”

About the Florida Lecture Series
In its 17th year, the Florida Lecture Series at Florida Southern College is a forum that brings speakers to the FSC campus who explore Florida life and culture from a wide range of disciplines, including history, public affairs, law, sociology, criminology, anthropology, literature, and art. The overall objective of the series is to bring members of the community, the faculty, and the student body together to interact with and learn from leading scholars in their fields.