LEWISTON – A Morehouse College professor of religion will be the keynote speaker for the 2008 Martin Luther King Jr. Day observances at Bates College.

The Rev. Lawrence Edward Carter Sr. will speak at 10:45 a.m. Monday in the Bates College Chapel. His address is part of a celebration of King’s life and work that will include performances, art exhibitions, workshops and orations.

Classes at the college will be canceled and special programming is scheduled throughout the day with an emphasis on the theme “Modernizing King: Old Roots, New Struggles.”

All events are open to the public free of charge. They include:

• A memorial service at 11 a.m. for Amadou Cissé, a graduate student at the University of Chicago who died last fall. Sponsored by the Office of Multicultural Affairs and the Multifaith Chaplaincy, the service will be held in the Bates College Chapel, College Street.

• An opening reception at 6 p.m. on Sunday, Jan. 20, for an MLK Day Committee-commissioned art exhibition by first-year students Clyde Bango of Harare, Zimbabwe, and Uriel Gonzalez of Von Ormy, Texas, in Chase Hall Gallery, 56 Campus Ave.

• A memorial service of worship at 7 p.m. Sunday in the College Chapel, College Street. The Rev. Elijah Hatch of Chicago, recipient of the 2006 Weston Howland Jr. Award for Distinguished National Leadership based on his community work addressing issues of drugs, violence and poverty, will deliver the annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day Memorial Service of Worship sermon. The service includes musical performances by Bates students. Following the service, the Multicultural Center will host an 8:30 p.m. reception with Hatch at 75 Franklin St.

• The Bates Jazz Band will play at 10:30 a.m. Monday, before the keynote speech. The speaker, the Rev. Lawrence Edward Carter Sr., has honored the life of King and devoted considerable time traveling the globe as an advocate for peace and nonviolence.

In 1985, Carter founded the Morehouse College International Hall of Honor, which consists of 131 original oil portraits of distinguished leaders in the civil and human rights movements, including King, Mays, Mahatma Gandhi, Adam Clayton Powell Jr. and Thurgood Marshall. Carter also founded the college’s Gandhi Institute for Reconciliation in 2000.

• Concurrent Monday afternoon workshops hosted by various academic departments and student organizations begin at 1:20, 2:35 and 4 p.m. in classrooms throughout Pettengill and Dana Chemistry halls. The workshops, featuring speakers, films and discussion, will focus on various topics tied to the day’s theme “Modernizing King: Old Roots, New Struggles.” Topics range from diversity at Bates, in a panel discussion led by President Elaine Tuttle Hansen, to the spoken word and the Harlem Renaissance, from music, technology and black emancipation to King’s link to race, class and the hip hop generation.

• The King Day observance will end with a performance in the Olin Arts Center Concert Hall at 7:30 p.m. Bates students commissioned to create cultural work for the occasion will present music, dance and spoken-word pieces.

The college also will co-sponsor an MLK Day Read-In at 1:30 p.m., Wednesday, Jan. 23, at Martel School in Lewiston. Faculty, staff, students and members of the community will share picture books with students in grades four through six. Anyone interested in volunteering can e-mail Daniel Aiello at [email protected] or call 207-786-8351. The snow date for this event is Wednesday, Jan. 30.