Latest News
Timothy Matovina, a professor in Notre Dame’s Department of Theology, has won the 2012 College Theology Society Best Book Award for his work _Latino Catholicism: Transformation in America’s Largest Church_ (Princeton University Press, 2012). Matovina, who specializes in Latino theology and religion, particularly Latino Catholicism, is also executive director of Notre Dame’s Institute for Latino Studies, housed in Notre Dame’s College of Arts and Letters.
Notre Dame’s Pierpaolo Polzonetti Receives Book Award
Pierpaolo Polzonetti, an associate professor in Notre Dame’s Program of Liberal Studies (PLS) and Sacred Music at Notre Dame program, has won the Lewis Lockwood Award for his book _Italian Opera in the Age of the American Revolution_ (Cambridge University Press). Bestowed by the American Musicological Society, the annual prize recognizes a book of exceptional merit by a scholar in the early stages of his or her career.
Notre Dame Announces New Ph.D. Program in Anthropology
The University of Notre Dame’s College of Arts and Letters will launch a doctoral program in the Department of Anthropology, with the first cohort of students due to enroll in fall 2014. The new program, says Susan Blum, professor and chair of the department, will focus its curriculum and training on integrative anthropology.
Political Scientist David Campbell Receives Research Grant
Notre Dame Political Science Professor David Campbell recently received a grant of more than $300,000 from the Spencer Foundation for a three-year project called “Family Matters: How Home and Family Life Affect Youth Civic Engagement.”
Bringing the Unknown to Light: Faculty Research Overlooked French Writing
Two professors of French and Francophone studies in Notre Dame’s Department of Romance Languages and Literatures are bringing recognition to little-known literature of the past and present. Through individual and joint research projects, Professor Julia Douthwaite, a specialist in 18th and 19th century French literature, and Associate Professor Alison Rice, an expert in French-language texts from the 20th and 21st centuries, are working toward this common goal.
Sacred Music at Notre Dame Receives Mellon Grant
With a $400,000 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the University of Notre Dame announces the launch of the Sacred Music Drama Project, a four-year, cross-disciplinary initiative designed to engage people more deeply with the power of shared creativity, performance, and scholarship. The project will draw on humanistic, artistic, and sacred topics from a variety of musical traditions to develop new coursework and to stage the production of a major dramatic performance each year. The Mellon grant will also bring both eminent and emerging guest artists to campus and will fund the commission of a new work of sacred music drama at the end of the project.
Psychologist Nicole McNeil Receives APA Award
In recognition of her distinguished body of scholarship, University of Notre Dame’s Nicole McNeil has received the 2013 Boyd McCandless Award from the American Psychological Association (APA). McNeil, Alliance for Catholic Education Associate Professor of Psychology, focuses her research on the development of mathematical thinking in various forms. Over the past several years, she has received more than $2 million in funding from the Institute of Education Sciences and the National Science Foundation.
English Professor Laura Dassow Walls Honored for Work on Emerson and Science
For her contributions to Emerson studies, Laura Dassow Walls, the University of Notre Dame’s William P. and Hazel B. White Professor of English, has been awarded the 2012 Ralph Waldo Emerson Society Distinguished Achievement Award.
Political Scientist Geoffrey Layman Wins APSA Article Award
Geoffrey Layman, professor in Notre Dame’s Department of Political Science, has won the 2012 Jack Walker Outstanding Article Award for “Activists and Conflict Extension in American Party Politics,” published by the _American Political Science Review_ in 2010. Bestowed by the Political Organizations and Parties section of the American Political Science Association (APSA), the award recognizes an article published within the past two years that has made a significant contribution to research and scholarship on political organizations and parties.
Christian Smith Honored by American Sociological Association
University of Notre Dame Professor Christian Smith has won the 2012 Distinguished Career Award from the Altruism, Morality, and Social Solidarity section of the American Sociology Association (ASA). The accolade, presented at the ASA’s annual meeting in August, recognizes a senior scholar who has made significant contributions to the section’s areas of focus over an extended period of time. Smith, the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Sociology in Notre Dame’s College of Arts and Letters, is a concurrent professor in the Department of Theology and director of both the Center for the Study of Religion and Society and the Center for Social Research, as well as College’s Science of Generosity initiative.
Queen of Canada Bestows Award on Professor
D’Arcy Jonathan Dacre Boulton, professor of the practice of medieval studies in the University of Notre Dame’s Medieval Institute and concurrent professor in the College of Arts and Letters’ Department of History, has been awarded the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal by the Governor General of Canada. The medal honors Canadian citizens or permanent residents who have made significant contributions to Canada or brought “great credit” to Canada for outstanding achievement abroad.
College of Arts and Letters Launches International Economics Major
Linguistic and cultural fluency is an increasingly important asset in business. And to address the growing demand for professionals who can both understand and help shape the world market, Notre Dame’s College of Arts and Letters has created a new major in international economics. The major combines substantial coursework in the Department of Economics with advanced training in language and culture, starting with French, Italian, or Spanish. It will also provide students with the potential for overseas internships and specialized research projects. “This program will be an attractive option for ambitious, sophisticated, and savvy Notre Dame undergraduates seeking to prepare themselves for successful international careers,” says Richard Jensen, Gilbert F. Schaefer Professor of Economics and chair of the Department of Economics.
Examining Christian Perceptions and Muslim Identity
Notre Dame historian Olivia Remie Constable has been awarded a fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation for her book project _Christian Perceptions of Muslim Identity in Medieval Spain_. Among other things, her work will examine Christian attitudes toward Muslim dress and appearance and whether Muslims could engage in public religious expressions, teach Arabic to their children, and maintain bathhouses, schools, cemeteries, and other separate spaces important to the continuity of their culture and religion.
Theologian Gary Anderson Elected to American Academy of Jewish Research
Gary Anderson, Hesburgh Professor of Catholic Theology at the University of Notre Dame, has been named a fellow of the American Academy of Jewish Research (AAJR). The AAJR is the oldest organization of Judaic scholars in North America, and fellows are nominated and elected by their peers. The group has approximately 100 members in the United States—and Anderson is one of a select few who are not Jewish.
Solving a Fascinating Puzzle
Robert Goulding, an associate professor in the University of Notre Dame’s Program of Liberal Studies, was recently awarded a grant from the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) to support a research project that combines mathematics, philosophy, and Renaissance science. Goulding, who also teaches in the History and Philosophy of Science graduate program, says his work focuses on English scientist and mathematician Thomas Harriot (1560–1621), whom he calls “a really unusual figure” in intellectual history.
Music Historian and Liturgical Scholar Margot Fassler Wins Three Research Awards
Art. Sacred music. Medieval history. And the digital humanities. Margot Fassler, Keough-Hesburgh Professor of Music History and Liturgy at Notre Dame, brings them all together in her current research on Hildegard of Bingen—research for which she has been recently awarded fellowships from both the American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. Adding to these accolades, Fassler, who co-directs the Master of Sacred Music program in the College of Arts and Letters, today received the 2012 Otto Gründler Book Prize for _The Virgin of Chartres: Making History Through Liturgy and the Arts_ (Yale University Press, 2010).
English Majors Delve Into Senior Thesis Projects
English and anthropology major Caitlin Wilson traveled down the rabbit hole for her senior thesis, which examines the connection between Victorian children’s literature and ethnography, or the anthropological study of customs and cultures.
English Professor Kathryn Kerby-Fulton Receives NEH Grant
Kathryn Kerby-Fulton, professor and Notre Dame Chair in English, has been awarded a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) for her book project titled _Professional Reading Circles, the Clerical Proletariat, and the Rise of English Literature_. She was also recently named a fellow in the Medieval Academy of America.
Byzantine Studies at Notre Dame Expands Research Resources
In preserving and developing the intellectual and literary traditions of the Greco-Roman world, in fashioning eastern orthodox Christianity, and in defining the notion of a Christian empire that was a center of intellectual and commercial trade, the Byzantine Empire was one of the great formative cultures in European history. Although its rule ended in 1453 C.E., Byzantium’s influence was far from over, and the University’s Byzantine Studies at Notre Dame initiative continues to explore this influential period in medieval history.
Creative Writing MFA Student Betsy Cornwell Signs Book Deal
Betsy Cornwell, a master’s student in Notre Dame’s Creative Writing Program, has sold her first two novels to Clarion Books, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Both books, written for a young adult audience, have their roots in the science fiction and fantasy genres.
Senior Anthropology Major Catalogs Native American Artifacts
After years of neglect and collecting dust, Native American artifacts at the Morristown National Historical Park have finally been rediscovered because of the work of Carleigh Moore, a senior anthropology major at the University of Notre Dame.
Political Scientist Michael Zuckert Wins Lifetime Achievement Award
University of Notre Dame political scientist Michael Zuckert has been awarded the 2011 Jack Miller Center (JMC) Chairman’s Lifetime Achievement Award for Academic Excellence. According to the prize committee, the honor recognizes Zuckert’s scholarship as well as “his extraordinary ability as a classroom teacher who has provided generations of undergraduates and graduate students a profound understanding of our constitutional heritage.”
Anthropologist Vania Smith-Oka Wins Global Citizenship Award
Vania Smith-Oka, assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Notre Dame, has been awarded the Center for Public Anthropology’s Ruth Benedict Global Citizenship Award—an honor granted to just one percent of faculty teaching introductory anthropology courses across the United States.
Political Scientist Michael Desch Awarded Carnegie Planning Grant
Professor Michael Desch, chair of Notre Dame’s Department of Political Science, has been awarded a second grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York to expand his research on how American scholars can contribute to the formation of U.S. national security policy.
Psychologist Nicole McNeil Developing New Math Learning Strategies
What do children know about mathematics before they start learning it in school? How do external factors like language, education, and culture affect children’s understanding? What is the best way to structure an environment so they have the building blocks needed for success in math? These are just some of the questions Notre Dame psychologist Nicole McNeil seeks to answer in her research, for which she recently received a three-year, $565,000 grant from the Institute of Education Sciences (IES).
Sociologist Christian Smith Wins Multiple Book Awards
Christian Smith, William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of Sociology at the University of Notre Dame, was recently honored for two of his latest books: _What Is a Person?: Rethinking Humanity, Social Life, and the Moral Good From the Person Up_ and _Souls in Transition: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of Emerging Adults_.
Music Historian and Liturgical Scholar Margot Fassler Wins International Book Prize
Margot Fassler, Keough-Hesburgh Professor of Music History and Liturgy and co-director of the Master of Sacred Music program at the University of Notre Dame, has won the biennial ACE/Mercers’ International Book Award. The award from Art and Christianity Enquiry (ACE) recognizes Fassler’s 2010 book _The Virgin of Chartres: Making History Through Liturgy and the Arts_ as “an outstanding contribution to the dialogue between religious faith and the visual arts.”
Noted Conductor and Artist Carmen-Helena Tellez Joins Notre Dame
In July 2012, scholar, conductor, and interdisciplinary artist Carmen-Helena Tellez will join the University of Notre Dame as a professor in the Department of Music and in the Master of Sacred Music program in the Department of Theology. She comes to the College of Arts and Letters from Indiana University Bloomington, where she was the director of graduate choral studies in the Jacobs School of Music
Political Scientist and Legal Scholar Donald Kommers Receives Mellon Fellowship
Can a newly minted constitution help revive a people devastated by war? Can it produce a deliberative democracy and respect for human rights? Can it provide a foundation for political loyalty and facilitate the reunification of a divided nation? These are questions University of Notre Dame political scientist and legal scholar Donald Kommers seeks to answer in his study of the creation, maintenance, and legitimacy of Germany’s postwar constitutional order, for which he has been awarded a yearlong Emeritus Fellowship from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
Rousseau Exhibit to Focus on Dignity of the Human Person
Julia Douthwaite, professor of French in Notre Dame's Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, is organizing a series of events to honor Swiss philosopher and writer Jean–Jacques Rousseau’s 300th birthday and stimulate a cross–disciplinary discussion on social justice and human dignity. The project, called Rousseau 2012: On the Road to DIGNITY, will be part of the curriculum for more than a dozen courses throughout the College of Arts and Letters and the Law School and will feature both guest lectures and an Amnesty International photography exhibit on poverty and human rights that includes portraits from Mexico, Egypt, Nigeria, India, and Macedonia.