Frank Baron (Germanic Languages and Literatures) began teaching at the University of Kansas in 1970, after two years of teaching with the Peace Corps in Ethiopia and an additional two years conducting research in Munich on German Renaissance and Reformation literary history. His primary teaching and research interests are in fifteenth- and sixteenth- century as well as twentieth-century studies. Baron has published books and articles on various aspects of the European Faust tradition and on the works of Rainer Maria Rilke, Thomas Mann, Hermann Hesse, and the artist/author Albert Bloch. He has received grants from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Science Foundation, the Fulbright Foundation, the German Academic Exchange (DAAD), and the University of Kansas Hall Center.Experiences as a child in Hungary during World War II prompted interest in the topic of the Holocaust and resulted (in collaboration with Hungarian journalist Sandor Szenes) in a book about Hungary and Auschwitz . He is director of the Max Kade Center for German-American Studies.
Lynn Davidman (Sociology and Religious Studies) We are delighted to announce that, in the Fall semester of 2008, Lynn Davidman will join the departments of Religious Studies and Sociology as the Beren Distinguished Professor of Modern Jewish Studies. Lynn received her doctorate from Brandeis University in 1986. She has published three books with major university presses: “Tradition in a Rootless World” (University of California Press, 1991), which won a National Jewish Book Award; “Motherloss” (University of Calif Press, 2000); and “Feminist Perspectives in Jewish Studies” (Yale, 2004), co-edited with Shelly Tenenbaum. Her research has appeared in a variety of prestigious journals such as Sociology of Religion and Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. Lynn serves on the advisory board of the Center for the Study of Religion at Princeton University and is a member of the editorial board for Qualitative Sociology. She comes to KU from Brown University, where she has been a professor of Judaic studies, American civilization and gender studies.
Joseph E. Steinmetz, Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, praises Lynn Davidman as “a foremost scholar in modern Jewish studies whose work intersects the disciplines of sociology, religious studies, Jewish studies, women and gender studies, and race, religion and ethnicity.” She brings her skills and enthusiasm to the rapidly expanding program in Jewish Studies at KU. And as a colleague in the departments of Religious Studies and Sociology, her vision will be instrumental to the development of transdisciplinary tracks in sociology of religion, women and gender at the graduate and undergraduate levels.
Sergey Dolgopolskii (Religious Studies) holds a Joint Ph.D. in Jewish Studies from UC Berkeley and Graduate Theological Union, and the degree of Doctor of Philosophical Sciences from the Russian Academy of Sciences. He specializes in the Talmud, Interpretation, and Jewish Thought both classical and contemporary. He authored a monograph Rhetoric of the Talmud in the View of Post-Structuralism (1998, St-Petersburg and Jerusalem , in Russian). His new book What is Talmud? The Art of Disagreement is forthcoming with the Fordham University Press. He is coming to KU Lawrence as an Assistant Professor of Religious Studies starting this Fall. He has previously taught Jewish Studies at UC Davis, University of San Francisco , Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley , and conducted research in Jewish Studies as Mellon Postdoctoral Researcher and Lecturer at UC Berkeley
Michael Fox ( School of Medicine , Health Policy and Management) received an Sc.D., with a major in health policy and management, from the School of Hygiene and Public Health at The Johns Hopkins University. He has graduate degrees in Studies in Behavioral Disabilities and Biostatistics and Clinical Epidemiology from the University of Wisconsin and Medical College of Wisconsin also. He worked in a variety of administrative, research, and teaching positions prior to joining the University of Kansas in 1995. Dr. Fox's teaching and research interests are in the areas of public health, disability and health policy. He teaches courses on Medicare and Medicaid (HP&M 836), clinical and administrative data analysis (HP&M 874), and outcomes evaluation (HP&M 857) in the MHSA Program and has taught Public Health Administration (HP&M 861) in the Master of Public Health Program the past ten years. He is currently the Research Director of a large multi-year, multi-site study (Rehabilitation Research and Training Center on Full Participation in Independent Living) funded by the National Institute on Disability Rehabilitation and Research and the P.I. on a Christopher Reeve Paralysis Foundation funded study of paralysis surveillance. He is also a co-P.I. on the CDC funded Nobody Left Behind project, investigating disaster management that affect persons with physicial disabilities. Dr. Fox's recent publications appear in the Journal of Ambulatory Care Management, the American Journal of Public Health, the Journal of Poverty, the Journal of Disability Studies, Medical Care, the Journal of Health and Social Policy, the Journal of Family and Community Health, Kansas Journal of Law and Public Policy, Kansas Policy Review, and the Journal of Rehabilitation. He is currently (July, 2005) president of the Kansas Health Consumer Coalition (KHCC)
David Katzman (American Studies) is Professor of American Studies and courtesy Professor of History and African and African-American Studies at the University of Kansas .With Sherrie Tucker, David edits the journal American Studies. He has been at Kansas since 1969 and has been a visiting professor at University College, Dublin (Ireland), the University of Birmingham (England), Tokushima University (Japan), the University of Hong Kong, and Kobe University. In 2002 he was a Fulbright lecturer in American Studies in Japan . He has been a Guggenheim Fellow, a Ford Foundation Fellow, and the recipient of two NEH Fellowships. He is a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and an elected Fellow of the Society of American Historians. He was the 2002 recipient of the Ned N. Fleming Trust Award for Excellence in Teaching. Professor Katzman is the author of Before the Ghetto: Black Detroit in the Nineteenth Century (1973, 1975); Seven Days a Week: Women and Domestic Service in Industrializing America (1978, 1981); co-editor with William Tuttle of Plain Folk: The Life Stories of Undistinguished Americans (1982); co-author of Three Generations in 20th Century America: Family, Community, and Nation (1977, 1978, 2nd ed., 1982); and A People and a Nation (6th edition, 2000). He has co-edited Technical Knowledge in American Culture: Science, Technology, and Medicine Since the Early 1800s (1996).
Marni Kessler (Art History) has been an assistant professor of art history at KU since 2000. Her specialty is 19th century European art. She completed her bachelor's degree in English at Vassar College , then received a master's degree in art history from Williams College and both master's and doctoral degrees in the history of art from Yale University . Her honors and awards include the KU Byron T. Schutz Award for Excellence in Teaching in May 2005; KU Mentor of the Year, Honorable Mention in May 2003; Luther Gregg Sullivan Visiting Post-doctoral Fellow at from 1999-2000 and Mellon Post-doctoral Fellow in 1997-1998, both at Wesleyan University. She currently has a Hall Center for the Humanities Research Fellowship.
Cheryl Lester (English and American Studies) is Director of the American Studies Program at The University of Kansas, Associate Professor of English and American Studies, and Courtesy Faculty Member of African and African-American Studies, Editorial Board member of American Studies and author of articles on American literature and critical and cultural theory. With Alice Lieberman, she is the co-editor of the 2003 textbook Social Work Practice with a Difference: Stories, Essays, Cases, and Commentaries. Ongoing projects include a study of William Faulkner and black migration, a co-edited volume of essays on Bowen family systems theory, and research on the history and life of her Jewish family. In 1995, she was an NEH fellow, in 1997 she was a visiting professor at the University of Hong Kong , and in 1998 she was a visiting professor at the University of Gaston-Bergere in St. Louis , Senegal . In 1998, Lester received a Kemper Teaching Award and a Center for Teaching Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching. In 2000, she received a Center for Teaching Award for Excellence in Graduate Teaching.
Eve Levin (Russian and East European Studies) associate professor of history, comes to KU from Ohio State University , where she taught for 20 years. Levin, who received doctoral and master's degrees from Indiana University , reads or speaks 13 languages, including French, Russian and Serbo-Croatian. She has written many monographs and articles and has served as editor or translator for three books. Levin is editor of the Russian Review.
M. J. McLendon (English) teaches Holocaust literature and American literature. She is a member of Holocaust Education Academic RoundTable (H.E.A.R.T.), Midwest Center for Holocaust Education, and leads a Holocaust literature book discussion monthly at the Jewish Community Center.
Jim Mielke (Anthropology) is currently the chair of the Anthropology Department at KU. Besides his administrative duties he enjoys teaching classes such as Fundamentals of Physical Anthropology and Adaptation and Disease. He recently completed, with Professors Lyle Konigsberg ( University of Tennessee ) and John Relethford ( SUNY College at Oneonta), a book titled Human Biological Variation (Oxford University Press). His research interests include historical demography, historical epidemiology, human variation and adaptation. His research has taken him to Finland and Costa Rica .
Renee Perelmutter (Slavic Languages and Literatures) is the newest addition to the Jewish Studies faculty. She will complete her Ph.D. at UC Berkeley in May 2008. Her teaching and research interests are Yiddish and Slavic morphosyntax and pragmatics, general and Jewish folklore, and Jewish culture. One of her most recent articles is "The Language of Dream Reports and Dostoevsky's The Double,” Slavic and East European Journal 52/1.
Sara Rosen (Linguistics) joined the KU faculty in 1991 as an assistant professor. Her primary research interest is the relationship between sentence structure and sentence interpretation. She has recently been named associate vice provost and dean of graduate studies.
Hagith Sivan (History) specializes in Ancient history, Roman history, early Christianity, early medieval, Judaica. Research on late antiquity, women in antiquity, and early Christians. She is the author of Ausonius of Bordeaux : Genesis of a Gallic Aristocracy
David N. Smith (Sociology) is a specialist in sociological theory who studies social inequality and the psychology of inequality. His writings include publications on genocide, the Rwandan genocide, anti-Semitism, irrationalism, authoritarianism, charisma, inequality, classical and critical theory, and political psychology.
Norman Yetman (Sociology) has major interests in American society, in race and ethnicity, in the relationship between history and sociology, and in the sociology of sport. His publications include Majority and Minority: The Dynamics of Race & Ethnicity in American Life (6th edition, 1999), Sociology: Experiencing a Changing Society (7th edition, 1997), and Voices From Slavery (also published under the title Life Under the Peculiar Institution, 1970; reprint edition, 2000).
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