EAST LANSING, Mich. - Detroit Mayor Dennis W. Archer will give a public lecture on Thursday, Feb. 3, at 4 p.m. in the Big Ten Room B at the Kellogg Hotel and Conference Center on the campus of Michigan State University.

Archer, Detroit's mayor since 1993, will speak on public relations in politics in a talk entitled, "Rebuilding the Image of Detroit: Politics, Public Relations and Persistence." His appearance is sponsored by the MSU College of Communication Arts and Sciences and is the inaugural speech of the Edward Zabrusky Public Relations Lecture Series.

"We are extremely fortunate to have Dennis Archer inaugurate this lecture series," said James D. Spaniolo, dean of the College of Communication Arts and Sciences. "As mayor of Detroit for the past six years, he has been successfully engaged in an extraordinary effort to rebuild the image and attractiveness of one of America's great cities."

Mayor Archer, a native of Michigan, is a graduate of Western Michigan University and earned his law degree from the Detroit College of Law, now Michigan State University Detroit College of Law. He began practicing law in 1970. In 1985, Gov. James J. Blanchard appointed Archer to the Michigan Supreme Court. In his final year on the bench, Justice Archer was named the most respected judge in the state of Michigan by Michigan Lawyers Weekly.

Archer has been named one of the 100 Most Influential Black Americans by Ebony Magazine and one of the 100 Most Powerful Attorneys in the United States by the National Law Journal. In 1993, he was elected to a four-year term as mayor and was re-elected in 1997 with a majority of over 83 percent of the vote. Newsweek listed Mayor Archer as one of the 25 most dynamic mayors in America.

The lectureship is named for former MSU News Bureau chief Ed Zabrusky, who retired from MSU in 1994 after almost 40 years of public relations work for the university. Ed worked with eight MSU presidents, including John Hannah and current MSU President Peter McPherson, and helped dozens of PR professionals launch their careers.

The presentation is free and open to the public.