Autumn brings a tide of scholars to 365 Fifth Avenue, and with it a renewed vitality to our community. Provost Connolly and I are pleased to welcome several outstanding GC-based faculty this semester, as well as announce two important administrative changes:
Professor Joshua Brumberg (Psychology) has been named Dean for the Sciences, having served as Interim Dean since last September. Previously the Acting Executive Officer of the Ph.D. Program in Psychology, he will be responsible for overseeing all of the science doctoral programs, including the health science programs. His research in neuroscience examines the individual building blocks of cortical microcircuits and the role that sensory activity has on their development.
Professor Martin Ruck (Psychology/Urban Education) has been appointed Senior Advisor to the President for Diversity and Inclusion. In this inaugural position he will oversee program-based diversity efforts, develop and maintain relationships with 'feeder' institutions both inside and outside the University, and foster a climate promoting diversity and inclusion for all members of the Graduate Center community. He is a widely published specialist in cognitive socialization, specifically concerning young people's thinking about intergroup relations, human rights, educational opportunity, and social justice.
Professor Scott Burnham (Music) joins the Graduate Center from Princeton, where he taught Musicology and Music Theory. His scholarly interests include the history of tonal theory, problems of analysis and criticism, and 18th- and 19th-century music and culture. His writings have appeared in Current Musicology, Musical Quarterl, and other journals, and he has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the National Humanities Center.
Professor Miranda Fricker (Philosophy), whose main areas of interest are in ethics, social epistemology, feminist philosophy, and political philosophy, comes to the Graduate Center from the University of Sheffield. She served as Director of the Mind Association until 2015 and was recently appointed as moral philosopher on the Spoliation Advisory Panel, a U.K. government panel that resolves claims from families that lost property during the Nazi era.
Associate Professor Erika Lin (Theatre), previously at George Mason, specializes in early modern English theatre and culture with particular attention to embodied performance, affect, spectacle, and audience. Her research examines dramatic texts, performance theory, and theatre historiography by incorporating approaches from multiple fields. Her first book, Shakespeare and the Materiality of Performance, won the 2013 David Bevington Award for Best New Book in Early Drama Studies.
Professor Charles Mills (Philosophy) comes to the Graduate Center from Northwestern. He is a scholar of social and political philosophy, particularly in oppositional political theory as centered on class, gender, and race. His first book, The Racial Contract (1997), has been adopted widely in hundreds of courses across the country; his sixth, Black Rights/White Wrongs: The Critique of Racial Liberalism, is forthcoming from Oxford University Press.
Meanwhile, the Advanced Research Collaborative (ARC) welcomed its 2016–2017 cohort of scholars: 10 Distinguished Fellows hailing from universities across the United States, South America, the Middle East, and Europe. They join 15 other Distinguished CUNY Fellows and will conduct research and collaborate with 31 student fellows, under the direction of Professor Don Robotham.
All bring extraordinary credentials and expertise to the Graduate Center. Please join me in welcoming and congratulating them.
