From Ann Cudd, Dean of CAS, and Gene Jarrett, Associate Dean of the Faculty for the Humanities
We write today to announce the outcome of the internal search for the next Director of the Boston University Center for the Humanities. We are pleased to inform you that Susan Mizruchi, Professor of English, will succeed James Winn as the next leader of the Center.
We would like to take this opportunity to thank James for his remarkable service and contributions to BUCH. A world-class scholar and Professor of English, James began to direct the center in Fall 2008, and under his leadership it underwent numerous changes and enhancements that benefited humanities faculty and CAS in general: BUCH altered its selection procedures, expanded its fellowship programs, changed its name from the Humanities Foundation, and secured expanded space. When he took office, Professor Winn established an Executive Committee to ensure a rigorous and fair-minded process by which colleagues are awarded support. In addition to granting more fellowships to junior and senior faculty than in previous years, the BUCH has now added advanced graduate student fellows to its community, a program now in its second year. BUCH continues to fund conferences, seminars, lecture series, exhibitions, and performances. Its funds designated for library acquisitions have purchased a number of databases used by faculty in their research. And through its annual “Gift to the Faculty,” BUCH has shared some of the excitement of the humanities with colleagues across the University, and its prizes for undergraduate and graduate students who have excelled in their work provide honor and welcome support to the humanities scholars of the future. We wish James the best as he proceeds to take up his well-earned sabbatical next academic year.
From the search, Susan Mizruchi emerged as an outstanding choice to be the next director of BUCH. Susan received her B.A. from Washington University and her M.A. and Ph.D. from Princeton University. She often writes at the intersection of social, religious, and literary studies. Her specialties are American literature and film; religion and culture; literary and social theory; literary history; and history of the social sciences. Her books include Brando’s Smile: His Life, Thought, and Work (Norton, 2014, 2015); The Rise of Multicultural America (North Carolina UP, 2008); Becoming Multicultural: Culture, Economy, and the Novel, 1860–1920 (Cambridge UP 2005); The Science of Sacrifice: American Literature and Modern Social Theory (Princeton UP, 1998); The Power of Historical Knowledge: Narrating the Past in Hawthorne, James, & Dreiser (Princeton, 1988); and as editor, Religion and Cultural Studies (Princeton UP, 2001). She is the recipient of many academic honors, including fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Huntington Library, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Fulbright Scholars Program. She serves as Oxford University Press’s Literature Delegate, and as a consultant for many foundations, among them, PBS (the American Master’s Series) and the Princeton University English Department Advisory Council. She has directed thirty dissertations at BU and is the 2015 recipient of the Arts and Sciences Dean’s Award for Excellence in Graduate Education. Her creative, interdisciplinary vision for leading BUCH in the years ahead, along with the world-class and interdisciplinary profile of her scholarship, combined to distinguish her candidacy for directing the center. We are pleased that she has accepted the offer to be its next leader.
Susan has our full confidence and support as she begins her new role in July 2016. Please join us in congratulating her.