News

Some highlights of Public Humanities–affiliated faculty,
graduate students in the certificate program, and alumni:

Sylvia Ryerson, PhD student in American Studies and Public Humanities affiliate, has received the Appalachian Studies Association’s 2022 Jack Spadaro Documentary Award for Calls From Home, which she directed. An intimate portrait of rural prison expansion, Calls From Home documents WMMT-FM’s longstanding radio show that sends familial messages of love over public airwaves to reach people incarcerated in Central Appalachia.

Melissa Barton, Curator of American Literature, Drama and Prose Writings at the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, served as a judge for the 2023 Connecticut History Day contest. The program is designed to encourage middle- and high-school students to engage in college-level historical research, interpretation, and creative expression in response to an annual theme. Read more at Yale Libraries.

Ned Blackhawk, the Howard R. Lamar Professor of History and American Studies, has published The Rediscovery of America: Native Peoples and the Unmaking of U.S. History (Yale University Press, 2023), which the New York Times called an "important new book." Blackhawk appeared on the Washington Post's Capehart podcast on April 27 and will give a public talk at the Mark Twain House (Hartford, CT) on May 16.

Benjamin Doolittle, Professor of Medicine, Pediatrics, and Divinity at Yale School of Medicine, co-authored an op-ed in the Connecticut Post with Mary Sarah Thanas titled "Diabetes death by administrative hassle." The piece addresses bureaucratic barriers to accessing insulin and other diabetes care. Read more at Connecticut Post.

Crystal Feimster, Associate Professor of African American Studies and American Studies, has been named the head of Yale's Pierson College. As college head, Feimster will serve as the chief administrative officer and presiding faculty member within the residential colleges, and help nurture the social, cultural, and educational life there. Read more at Yale News.

Beverly Gage, Professor of History & American Studies, has received the New-York Historical Society’s 2023 Barbara and David Zalaznick Book Prize for G-Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the Making of the American Century (Penguin Random House, 2022). The prize is awarded annually for the best work of American history or biography. Read more at the New York TImes.

Langdon Hammer, the Niel Gray, Jr. Professor of English, moderated a conversation with iconic musician Paul McCartney and Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Paul Muldoon, who edited McCartney's book, The Lyrics: 1956 to the Present (Liveright, 2021). The event at Woolsey Hall attracted a capacity crowd. Read on at Yale News.

Jennifer Klein, the Bradford Durfee Professor of History, was quoted as an expert contributor for a Business Insider piece about recent Wall Street Journal polling that found a declining American belief in the value of hard work. Read more at Business Insider.

Kathryn Lofton, Dean of Humanities and the Lex Hixon Professor of Religious Studies and American Studies, has published "Cancel Culture and Other Myths" in The Yale Review. Read the full piece here.

Millicent Marcus has been appointed the Sarai Ribicoff Professor of Italian Studies. Read the full announcement at Yale News.

Timothy Snyder, the Richard C. Levin Professor of History, was the subject of a recent profile in The Guardian: "Putin, Trump, Ukraine: how Timothy Snyder became the leading interpreter of our dark times." Author Robert P. Baird observes that "Historians aren’t supposed to make predictions, but Yale professor Timothy Snyder has become known for his dire warnings – and many of them have been proved correct." Read the full article on The Guardian's website.

Gabriel Winant, PhD '18 and current Assistant Professor of US History at the University of Chicago, was featured as an expert contributor in Lydia Polgreen's recent New York Times opinion piece on labor conditions and burnout among nurses in the United States. An expert on deindustrialization and the US health care economy, Winant joined us for a September 2021 Democracy in America webinar about his 2021 book, The Next Shift: The Fall of Industry and the Rise of Health Care in Rust Belt America (Harvard University Press). Read the full New York Times piece here.

As always, we welcome any news submissions from the Public Humanities at Yale community, including publications, events, career updates, and anything else you'd like to share! Send us a note at publichumanities@yale.edu.

Puzzling The Humanities

Click the "START THE PUZZLE" button below to play this month's crossword puzzle: "Side Streets." This puzzle was created by Matthew Stock, Yale College '18.

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