Year in Review:
Faculty Achievements and Milestones
From the "Published, Performed, Presented" feature of the forthcoming Fall 2008 issue of Sarah Lawrence Magazine
Susan Bernofsky (Literature) is continuing her work on Robert Walser and has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and National Endowment for the Arts for 2008–09. She also received the Lannan Foundation Residency Award.
In March, Chester Biscardi (Music) saw the premier performance of "Recognition" by Camerata Notturna in New York. In April, the Orchestra of St. Luke's Chamber Ensemble performed his 2004 piece, "Piano Quintet," at the Chelsea Art Museum. His 1986 "Piano Sonata" was recorded in February and featured on the CD Powerhouse Pianists (American Modern Recordings).
Bella Brodzki (Literature) served as a visiting English studies professor at the Université de Montpellier in France during the spring semester. At the Université de Lausanne in Switzerland, she presented "The Dynamic Role of Translation in Comparative Literary Studies."
Drew Cressman (Biology) co-authored an article for the Journal of Biological Chemistry titled "Mitogen-activated Protein Kinase ERK1/2 Regulates the Class II Transactivator." Lilien Voong '07, Allison Slater '07, and Sebila Kratovac '05 assisted with the research.
In April, Charlotte Doyle (Psychology) participated in a Sarah Lawrence panel about late psychology faculty member Rudolf Arnheim with her presentation, "Arnheim and the Creative Process: Insights from the Creation of Guernica."
In March, Romantic Encounters: Writers, Readers and the "Library for Reading" by Melissa Frazier (Russian, Literature) was awarded the 2007 Jean-Pierre Barricelli Prize for the best work in Romanticism studies by the International Conference on Romanticism. During that month, at the Mid-Atlantic Slavic Conference, she presented "French Writing in Turgenev's Dvorianskoe gnezdo" ("Home of the Gentry"). She also gave a lecture on Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment at the Chappaqua library in New York.
In July, Peggy Gould (Dance) performed in "Dancing-on-View: The ICA Variations" with fellow faculty member Sara Rudner at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston.
In May, Rachel Grob (Health Advocacy) presented "Qualitative Perspectives on Quality and Quantity in Newborn Screening" at the Ethical, Legal, and Social Implications of Genomics International Conference in Cleveland. She also co-presented "Astigmatism in the Public Eye: An Analysis of Gaps in the Media Coverage of the Ethical and Social Issues Regarding Newborn Genetic Screening."
Daniel King (Mathematics) was appointed to the board of editors of the College Mathematics Journal, a publication of the Mathematics Association of America (MAA). He also serves as the chair of the metropolitan New York section of the MAA.
Eva Kollisch (Literature, German) published The Ground Under My Feet, a collection of autobiographical stories and essays, in April (Hamilton Stone Editions).
In February, Arnold Krupat (Literature, Global Studies) contributed an article, "Nationalism, Indigenism, Cosmopolitanism: Three Critical Perspectives on Native American Literatures" to the anthology Indigenous Peoples: Self-Determination, Knowledge, Indigeneity (Eburon). He also published "William Apess, Storier of Survivance" in Survivance (University of Nebraska Press). In April, he gave two lectures, "Debates and Changes in American Indian Literary Criticism" and "That the People May Live: Toward a Study of Native American Elegy" at the Native American Studies Conference at the University of Georgia.
Jeffrey McDaniel (Poetry) released his fourth poetry collection, The Endarkenment, in April (University of Pittsburgh).
An excerpt of Indigo, the forthcoming nonfiction project by Catherine McKinley-Davis '89 (Writing), was published in January in the 30th anniversary issue of Callaloo.
Nicolaus Mills (Literature, American Studies) lectured on the Marshall Plan and American foreign policy at the Weatherhead Center for International Studies at Harvard and the National Defense University in Washington.
The River Queen, a travel memoir by Mary Morris (Writing), was published by Henry Holt & Co. in April.
In March, Jamee Moudud (Economics) presented his article, "Challenging the Orthodoxy: African Development in the Age of Openness" at the Eastern Economic Association annual conference in Boston. At that conference, he also organized a discussion session entitled "Bring Back the Developmental State to the Developing World." In April, he gave a lecture at the New School Graduate Program in International Affairs, "Climate Change and Global Capitalism: Debates, Controversies, and Challenges for Workshops on Public Policy and the State."
Dennis Nurkse (Writing) published new poems in The Paris Review, Ploughshares, The Atlantic Monthly, TriQuarterly, and The Times Literary Supplement.
In April, Robert Paterson (Music) released Winter Songs, a song cycle for bass-baritone and chamber ensemble, which was commissioned by the New York State Music Fund. In May, the American Modern Ensemble premiered Eating Variations at the Tenri Cultural Institute in New York City. In March, the Volti Choir of San Francisco performed The Essence of Gravity, a four-movement choral arrangement.
In February, Kevin Pilkington (Writing) read his poetry at Manhattanville College; he was interviewed in March for the Writer's Digest blog "Poetic Asides." He published "Key West, Greek Wedding" in the March 2008 edition of Inkwell and "The Unemployed Man Who Became a Tree" in the April 2008 edition of The North American Review.
In May, Judith Rodenbeck (Art History) moderated an Art & Life panel entitled "Intervene! Interrupt! Rethinking Art as Social Practice" at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She also spoke at Santa Cruz about visual and performance histories in "The Interruption of Hierarchies, the Academy, and the Gallery." She was a panelist at "Line Up: A Celebration of Trisha Brown" at Sarah Lawrence College in April. In March, she performed "Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms" at the Whitney Biennial in New York City, and she moderated the discussion "Toward a Political Art for the 21st Century" at the College Art Association in Dallas.
Frank Roosevelt (Economics) traveled to China in June, where he gave a lecture on "Alternative Roads to Socialism: Central Planning, Decentralized Planning, and Market Socialism" at the Shanghai University of Finance & Economics.
Tristana Rorandelli (Italian) received the Julie and Ruediger Flik Travel Grant for research in Italy during the summer of 2008.
Shahnaz Rouse (Sociology) was granted a Fulbright Research Award for 2007–08 to conduct research on the social history of Lahore, Pakistan, for her project "Landscapes of desire: history and memory in the life of a city." In January, she traveled to Pakistan to advise the humanities and social sciences department of the Lahore University of Management Sciences. In February, she spoke in Dubai at the Social Science Research Council's International Conference on Inter-Asian Connections.
In July, Sara Rudner (Dance) was in residence at Summer Stages at the Concord Academy in Massachusetts. She performed "Dancing-on-View: The ICA Variations" at the Institute of Contemporary Art in Boston.
William Shullenberger (Literature) published "Milton's Primavera" in the anthology Renaissance Ecology: Imagining Eden in Milton's England in May (Duquesne University). "Circe's Best Boy" was published in Uncircumscribed Mind: Reading Milton Deeply (Susquehanna University) in February. In March, he gave a lecture at the New York Public Library titled "The Father's Word, The Daughters' Freedom: Mihaly Munkacsy's The Blind Milton Dictating Paradise Lost to His Daughters."
The Size of the World, a new novel by Joan Silber (Writing), was published in June by W.W. Norton & Co. In July, a book tour took her to cities across the Northeast.
Fred Smoler (Literature) contributed "Mercenaries and the Markets" to the Spring 2008 issue of Dissent. In May, he wrote several reviews for the inaugural issue of Standpoint, a British journal.
Choosing You: Deciding to Have a Baby on My Own by Alexandra Soiseth MFA '00 (Writing) was published in April by Seal Press.
In August, Kathy Westwater MFA '01 (Dance) attended the Djerassi Artist Residency Program in Santa Cruz, California.
John Yannelli (Music) served as a visiting professor at the University of Padova in Italy in the spring, where "Solo Flight 11" for violin was performed as part of the "Viaggio in Europa" ("Travel in Europe") concert series. He was also a guest lecturer at the Conservatorio Steffani in Veneto, Italy; his electronic works "The River" (1988) and "Yeats Project" (1997) were performed, and he conducted an improvisation ensemble.
From the "Published, Performed, Presented" feature of the Spring 2008 issue of Sarah Lawrence Magazine
In November, LaShonda Barnett (Writing) published I Got Thunder: Black Women Songwriters On Their Craft (Thunder's Mouth Press/Da Capo). She completed a seven-city book tour and spoke about the book on NPR's "News and Notes" and WNYC's "Soundcheck."
Susan Bernofsky (German/Literature) has translated two German novels, The Assistant by Robert Walser and The Book of Words by Jenny Erpenbeck, both published by New Directions. In October, she and Erpenbeck were writer and translator in residence at Chatham University in Pittsburgh. In November, Bernofsky gave a presentation on contemporary German literature at the American Literary Translators Association conference in Dallas. In addition, she has received grants from the NEH and NEA to support her work.
Roy Brand (Philosophy) acted as a consultant curator and catalog editor for "Bare Life," a contemporary art exhibit at the Museum on the Seam in Jerusalem that features the work of many international artists. The exhibit will be displayed until September.
In August, Bella Brodzki (Literature) attended the International Comparative Literature Association conference in Rio de Janeiro, where she presented "Gendering Theory: Is Transdiscursive Translation Possible?" In November, she attended a bilingual conference entitled Postcolonial Ghosts at the University of Montpellier in France, where she delivered a paper entitled "The Ghosts of Translation in Postcolonial Literature and Theory." She also chaired a session on French and Francophone Literary, Philosophical, and Political Engagements in December at the Modern Language Association in Chicago.
Scott Calvin (Physics) co-authored an article on "Exploration of heterogeneous chemistry in model atmospheric particles using extended X-ray absorption fine structure analysis," published in the journal Atmospheric Environment in November. Ryan Hinrichs (Chemistry) and former students Joe Bramante '07 and Ethan Brown '05 contributed to his research.
Kevin Confoy (Theatre) directed Christine Farrell in "A Lady Alone," a one-woman show about Elizabeth Blackwell, the first woman in the U.S. to attend medical school.
Charlotte Doyle (Psychology) spoke at the Create08 conference in Costa Rica in January. Her presentation, "A Qualitative Vision of the Creative Process: What Rudolf Arnheim Taught Me," was an expanded version of her article, "Pioneer of Process," published in the fall issue of Sarah Lawrence.
Christine Farrell (Theatre) performed the lead in the world premiere of "The Coffee Trees" with the Resonance Theatre Ensemble in New York City. She also performed in "A Lady Alone" in Washington, D.C., and at Hobart and Smith Colleges.
Chris Garces (Anthropology) published his article, "The Ethical Turn... to Saintliness? An Ethnographic Challenge," in the Winter 2007 edition of Anthropology and Humanism.
Joy Ladin (Poetry) published a collection of poems, Transmigration (Sheep Meadow Press, 2007). Her essay, "This Consciousness that Is Aware: Emily Dickinson's Phenomenology as Consolation," was published in the anthology Wider than the Sky: the Healing Power of Emily Dickinson (Kent State University, 2007). She also published four poems in New Writing Review (Fall 2007) and one in Literary Imagination (issue 9). She also gave readings at Northwest Missouri State University and the 92nd Street Y in the fall.
Three stage productions of work by Joseph Lauinger (Literature) were produced last summer. "Bury Him" was commissioned by the Gallery Players of Brooklyn and was performed in June. "Rich on Skins" won Best Play at the Shortened Attention Span Festival of one-act plays in New York City, and "Dawn and Sean" won Best Play at FutureFest in Ohio.
In June, Yvette Louis (Literature) presented "Birds of a Feather Flying North: Immigrant Women from the Spanish-Speaking Caribbean" at the annual conference of the National Women's Studies Association in St. Charles, Ill. In September she spoke on "Oral History and Constructions of Racial Memory" at the Latin American Studies Association conference in Montreal.
In July, Doug MacHugh (Theatre) directed two one-act plays in New York City: "Mafia on Prozac" and "Seventeenth of June," both written by Edward Allan Baker (Theatre). In October MacHugh designed lighting for a new ballet of Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" for the Ballet Memphis in Tennessee.
Last year Joshua Muldavin (Geography/Asian Studies) completed major fieldwork in China, Japan, Nepal, and India. In December, he published the editorials "China's not alone in environmental crisis" in The Boston Globe and "The West's part in producing China's deadly pollution" in The South China Morning Post. Muldavin gave a variety of presentations at the China Agricultural University in Beijing and the Institute of Comparative Culture at Sophia University in Tokyo, and he was appointed visiting scholar at both these institutions, as well as at the International Center for Integrated Mountain Research and Development in Katmandu. He presented "Global Warming and Environmental Policy: Can technology and markets solve the problem?" at a symposium at the Japan Foundation Center for Global Partnership in Tokyo in September. He received a National Science Foundation supplemental grant for his research in the Himalayas, and he created "Food, Agriculture, Environment and Development," a college-level curriculum for a new DVD release of The Future of Food.
"Morphogenesis Digital Animation," a piece by Prema Murthy (Visual Arts), premiered at the Borderline Video Festival in Beijing over the summer and was shown at the AFX Festival in Amsterdam in November. She had a solo show, "Fuzzy Logic," at P.S.1/MOMA in New York City over the summer, and "deStructures Digital Animation" was featured in the Scottish exhibit Bon Voyage: Reconsidering Landscape beginning last fall.
Maria Negroni (Spanish/Literature) published two books in Argentina, Ciudad Gotica: Essays on Art and Poetry in New York and La Pasion del Exilio: Translations of 10 American Women Poets of the 20th Century (Bajo la Luna, 2007). Several of her poems appeared in the anthology A Joyful Gravity (Editorial Difácil, Spain, 2007), and she published critical articles in the anthologies Argentine Writers Inside and Outside the Country (Editorial Norma, Buenos Aires, 2007) and Nobody Knows about Me (Fondo Editorial del Congreso del Perú, Lima, 2007). Negroni participated in panels at Columbia and Yeshiva University Museum, gave a poetry reading at the Americas' Society, and was the guest creative editor for the Argentinean issue of Latin American Review.
In March, Chikwenye Okonjo Ogunyemi (Literature faculty emerita) published Juju Fission: Women's Alternative Fictions from the Sahara, the Kalahari, and the Oases In-between (Peter Lang, 2008).
In June, the Russian Chamber Orchestra performed the European premiere of Suite for String Orchestra, a composition by Robert Paterson (Music), at Kursk State University in Russia. In December, Forecast Music performed his piece "Thursday" at the Brooklyn Conservatory. Paterson was recently commissioned to compose a piece for the Volti Choir in San Francisco.
Francis Randall (History faculty emeritus) presented "Alfons Mucha's Giant Series of Giant Paintings, ‘Slavic Epic'" at a seminar on Slavic culture at Columbia in December.
Judith Rodenbeck (Art History) wrote several articles for the journal Modern Painters: "Tacita Dean" (July/August); "Hands Off: Deskilling Adapted for the 21st Century" (October); "Sadie Benning" (November); and "Beginning with a Bang! From Confrontation to Intimacy: An Exhibition of Argentine Contemporary Artists, 1960-2007" (December). She also gave lectures and participated in panels at The New School, Performance Studies International, Bryn Mawr College, Gallery 400 in Chicago, and Dia:Beacon.
Sara Rudner (Dance) took her four-hour dance marathon (featured in the fall 2007 issue of Sarah Lawrence) to Ireland this summer for two performances in Dublin.
"Pursuit of Happiness," a new play by Stuart Spencer (Theatre), was produced in December by The Impulse Company in London.
Gina Luria Walker (Global Studies) co-edited Rational Passions: Women and Scholarship in Britain 1702-1870, which was published in March. She organized a special session on "Female Biography: Imagined Communities of Intellectual Women" at the North American Society for the Study of Romanticism in Bologna, Italy, and presented an English faculty talk at the Sorbonne on "Pride, Prejudice, and Patriarchy: Jane Austen and Mary Hays."
Komozi Woodard (History) appeared on a live New York City cable television show in December, speaking about the urban crisis and racial rebellion in Newark in July 1967. He worked with Cecily Tyler '97 on a NBC television series about African-American History, which aired in February. He also helped organize the Women's History Conference this year: "Black Power, Black Feminism."
From the "Published, Performed, Presented" feature of the Fall 2007 issue of Sarah Lawrence Magazine
In addition to publishing her new book, Bella Brodzki (Literature) has been elected to a four-year position on the advisory board of the American Comparative Literature Association. In October 2006 she moderated a panel entitled "Translation's Conundrums" at a colloquium on translation and commentary at the University of Paris. In December 2006 she chaired a panel on "Translation and Globalization" at the Modern Language Association in Philadelphia.
This year Melvin Jules Bukiet (Writing) published two essays in The American Scholar: "The Life of Melvin Jules Bukiet" and "Brooklyn Books of Wonder."
Scott Calvin (Physics) published "Advantages of an Automated Chemical Processor for XAFS Analysis of Novel Materials" as part of the 13th International Conference of X-Ray Absorption Fine Structure. He also gave a lecture at the Joint National Synchrotron Light Source and Center for Functional Nanomaterials users' meeting, titled "Expanding the Synchrotron Community."
During a half-time leave last semester, Ray Clarke (Biology) wrote up the results of his three-year project studying how water motion on coral reefs affects the way fish catch prey. He presented two papers on the topic this spring—one in February at the annual meeting of the American Society of Limnology and Oceanography in Santa Fe, N.M., and one in March at the Benthic Ecology meetings in Atlanta.
Kevin Confoy (Theatre) directed the New York premier of "Bunbury," a play by Tom Jacobson, at the Connelly Theatre in New York City. In June, he directed at the Forestburgh Playhouse in the Catskills, which is the oldest equity summer stock theatre in New York.
In March, Michael Davis (Philosophy) gave two lectures at Notre Dame University: "The Daimonic Soul: On Plato's Theages" and "The Fake that Launched a Thousand Ships: The Question of Identity in Euripides' ‘Helen.'"
Melissa Frazier (Russian/Literature) published Romantic Encounters: Readers, Writers and ‘The Library for Reading' (Stanford University).
This fall Suzanne Gardinier (Writing) published a book of poems titled 101 Ghazals (Sheep Meadow).
Peggy Gould (Dance) performed in "Dancing-on-View (Preview/Hindsight)" by Sara Rudner (see page 26). Gould has also been invited to create a new dance theatre work for the Dangerous Music series at the Proctors Theater in Schenectady, N.Y.
In the spring Philip Gould (Art History faculty emeritus) spent a month lecturing in Turkey. He was elected to the New York Council for the Humanities for a three- year period and continues his associate membership in the Columbia University seminar on the arts of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas. In February he curated and lectured at an exhibition of African ornaments at the Donnell Library in New York City.
Matthea Harvey (Writing) has published two books: Modern Life, a book of poems that came out in September (Graywolf) and The Little General and the Giant Snowflake, a children's book released in October (Soft Skull). Matrimony, a novel by Joshua Henkin (Writing), was published in October by Pantheon.
In May, Susan Kramer (History) published "Understanding Contagion: The Contaminating Effect of Another's Sin" in the anthology History in the Comic Mode: Medieval Communities and the Matter of Person (Columbia University).
Arnold Krupat (Literature/Global Studies) received the 2007 Excellence in Teaching Award from the College. He contributed to the newest edition of the Norton Anthology of American Literature, and published "Atanarjuat and Its Audiences" in Critical Inquiry. In May, Krupat presented "On David Treuer's Native American Fiction: A User's Manual" at the University of Oklahoma's International Indigenous Studies Conference; in Mainz, Germany, he presented the keynote address at the International Symposium on the Indigenous Americas titled "Culturalism and Its Discontents: Native American Literary Criticism Today."
A collection of poems by Joan Larkin (Writing), My Body: New and Selected Poems, was published in May (Hanging Loose).
Greg MacPherson (Theatre) designed the lighting for a new ballet based on The Wizard of Oz that opened in Memphis in April. In June, he designed "The Well of Immortality" at the Theater for the New City, and spent July and August working on two series of plays for the 52nd Street Project in New York City.
Winning the Peace: The Marshall Plan and America's Coming of Age as a Superpower, by Nicolaus Mills (Literature), was published this fall (John Wiley). An excerpt appeared in the June edition of The American Prospect.
In March, La Anunciacion, a novel by Maria Negroni (Spanish) was published in Argentina (Editorial Seix-Barral, Planeta). This summer she traveled to Umbria, Italy, as a writing fellow at the Civitella Ranieri Foundation.
Dennis Nurkse (Writing) published poems in Poetry Wales, Poetry London, and Triquarterly, and was awarded the 2007 Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in poetry.
In May, Kevin Pilkington (Writing) lectured and read his work at the Ann Arbor Book Festival in Michigan.
Judith Rodenbeck (Art History) published two articles, "Joan Jonas: The Cult of Lateral Thinking" and "Gordon Matta-Clark" in Modern Painters this spring. In May, she gave a lecture on John Armleder at the Rose Museum at Brandeis University, and presented papers at the Arts Administration conference in Chicago and the Center for Design Research in Copenhagen. In August she also gave a museum lecture in Beacon, N.Y., on Gerhard Richter. The first issue of Art Journal, which she edits, came out this summer.
Demetria Royals (Filmmaking) accepted a one-year residency at Carnegie Mellon's University Studio for Creative Inquiry. Royals was awarded this residency in conjunction with her curating the Digital New Media Room for the August Wilson Museum. This is her second residency at Carnegie Mellon.
Penelope Umbrico (Photography) exhibited her work at Bernard Toale Gallery in Boston, the McDonough Museum of Art in Youngstown, Ohio, and the Drake in Toronto.
