Socialite, activist Joanne Herring to discuss memoir at Baker Institute Nov. 29

FROM RICE NEWS STAFF REPORTS

Joanne King Herring, the Houston socialite and political activist portrayed by Julia Roberts in the film “Charlie Wilson’s War,” will talk about her recently published personal memoir, “Diplomacy and Diamonds: My Wars from the Ballroom to the Battlefield,” Nov. 29 at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy.

Herring’s lecture will begin at 6 p.m. in Baker Hall’s Kelly International Conference Facility. A book signing will follow.

Herring is known to many from “Charlie Wilson’s War,” a movie about her efforts in the 1980s with then-Congressman Charlie Wilson to aid the Afghans fighting the Soviet Union. In 2009 Herring founded the Marshall Plan Charities, which unites the efforts of various nongovernmental organizations concerned with the Afghan people in hopes of providing villages with clean water, food, health care, schools and jobs.

Rice faculty, staff and students who want to attend must RSVP by email (bipprsvp@rice.edu), by fax (713-348-5993) or on the Web at

http://bakerinstitute.org/events/diplomacy-and-diamonds-my-wars-from-the-ballroom-to-the-battlefield. A webcast of the event can also be seen at this address.