SPARTANBURG, S.C. – Dr. Gary Paul Nabhan, the W.K. Kellogg Endowed Chair in Southwest Borderlands Food and Water Security at the University of Arizona, will speak on Thursday, Oct. 20, on “Food, Genes and Culture: Why Silver Bullet Diets and Quick Genetic Fixes Won’t Reduce the Prevalence of Nutrition-Related Diseases.” Nabhan’s presentation is the second installment in the Milliken Lecture Series on Sustainability and Public Health.

The program, set for 7 p.m. in Leonard Auditorium in Main Building (note location change), is free and open to the public. Following the lecture in the lobby of the Olin Building, Nabhan will sign copies of his book “Ethnobiology for the Future.” He will donate proceeds from the sale of the book to the Society of Ethnobiology.

Nabhan is a MacArthur Fellow, the recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Society for Conservation Biology, and the 2016 Distinguished Ethnobiologist of the Society of Ethnobiology. He is a research social scientist at the Southwest Center at the University of Arizona. He is an internationally celebrated nature writer, agrarian activist and ethnobiologist who works on conserving the links between biodiversity and cultural diversity.

Nabhan has been honored as a pioneer and creative force in the “local food movement” and seed saving community by Ute Reader, Mother Earth News, the New York Times, Bioneers and Time magazine. He is founding director of the Center for Regional Food Systems. The Milliken Lecture Series is part of the Milliken Sustainability Initiative at Wofford, announced in December 2015. The initiative was made possible by a $4.25 million grant from the Romill Foundation, the personal foundation of the late Roger Milliken, a dedicated champion of Wofford and the Upstate.