The Gabon-Oregon Center at the University of Oregon will host Juridical Adviser to the Presidency of Gabon and law professor Guy Rossatanga-Rignault for a lecture Jan. 21 from 5-7 p.m.

Rossatanga-Rignault’s talk, "Law and Environment in Traditional Gabonese Society: A Legal-Anthropological Perspective," will be held at the Knight Law Center Campbell Auditorium. It is free and open to the public and will be followed by a Q-and-A session.

The lecture will explore the role of environmental law in Gabon today, as well as the past role of law and environment in Gabonese tradition. It will be given in French, with simultaneous translation by UO professor Géraldine Poizat-Newcomb.

Rossatanga-Rignault received his law degree from Omar Bongo University in Libreville, Gabon. He obtained his political science and international public law and international organizations master’s degrees, followed by a Ph.D. in political science from l'Université de Paris-1 Panthéon-Sorbonne in France.

Rossatanga-Rignault joined the law and economics faculty at Omar Bongo University in 1992, where he currently teaches, in addition to being a faculty affiliate at Boston University, Leiden University and other institutions. He serves on the international advisory board for the Gabon-Oregon Transnational Research Center on Environment and Development. He is a consultant for a number of public and private international and Gabonese entities, and is president of the Raponda-Walker Foundation for Science and Culture, a nonprofit organization that promotes culture and science in Gabon.

He has published 19 books and articles on law and political science, including his most recent works, “The White Man's Work Never Ends. The African, Time and Modern Work,” “Washing the Body: Symbolism and Therapeutics of Water in Africa” and “Gabon and the State: History and Institutions.”

- by Katherine Cook, UO Office of Strategic Communications intern