March 2005

CLA UPDATE FOR FACULTY & STAFF

Toby Parcel

I am pleased to announce that Howard Sypher, head of the Department of Communication, is a faculty fellow at the Purdue Regenstrief Center for Healthcare Engineering this semester. Liberal Arts, thanks to sociologist James Anderson, has been involved in the creation of this center, which will focus on improving health-care delivery. As part of Professor Sypher's fellowship, he is serving as a liaison between the center and health-care organizations, and he also is working on an externally funded research project that is evaluating the use of electronic health records.

Regenstrief offers a great opportunity for Liberal Arts researchers interested in health-care systems and delivery. Professor Sypher says anyone who wants to learn more about the center should attend the March 22-24 conference entitled Energizing Healthcare: Improving Quality, Lowering Costs, and Increasing Accessibility, which will address issues and projects associated with the health-care industry. This is a networking opportunity to learn about possible interdisciplinary collaboration and study. Anyone interested in a fellowship at Regenstrief should contact Dr. Sypher.

Thank you to those in Liberal Arts who have contributed to the Campaign for Purdue. At this time, 246 Liberal Arts faculty and staff have given more than $358,000 to the college. In addition, 469 people in Liberal Arts have also given more than $1.67 million to Purdue since the campaign began in 2000.

Again, the Liberal Arts Development Office and I want to thank all of those who've supported our mission so generously in the past, and we encourage others to participate by giving to any area within Purdue they wish to support.

I also want to mention the Purdue President's Council, a group of friends and alumni who donate at least $1,000 each year to support the university. To grow that membership, the President has offered to match gifts to help donors reach the $1,000 threshold. For the first year, a $500 gift will be matched with another $500 from the President. In the second year, the President will give $250 to match a $750 contribution. The donor is responsible for $1,000 in the third year. The President's match goes wherever the gift is designated. If a gift is split among more than one department or program, the match will be split proportionately.

For more information about giving to Purdue or Liberal Arts' needs please contact Cathleen Walters, director of Liberal Arts Development.

I wish everyone a safe and relaxing Spring Break.

Toby L. Parcel

RESEARCH

Man of la Mancha celebrates 400 years in 2005

Don Quixote made his name jousting with windmills 400 years ago, but now this iconic literary figure's greatest fight will be conquering an electronic world dominated by video games and fewer fans of long novels, says a Purdue Don Quixote expert.

Howard Mancing and his
Don Quixote treasures

Howard Mancing, professor of Spanish, thinks the idealistic old knight-errant will win.

"For four centuries this character has not only lasted but also influenced many artists, writers, musicians, poets and film directors," said Mancing, who is author of The Chivalric World of Don Quixote and The Cervantes Encyclopedia.

"Don Quixote is required reading in Spain and other European countries, and even though fewer young Americans are willing to read this book on their own, I think the story and characters are significantly rooted in our contemporary literature and art. More

Purdue professor's novel maps broken family ties to car industry

Purdue associate professor and author Porter Shreve's latest novel looks at how increased mobility drives apart a typical American family.

Porter Shreve

Drives Like a Dream, released by Houghton Mifflin ($23), is Shreve's second novel. The Obituary Writer, which was published in 2000 and named a New York Times Notable Book, was partly inspired by his work on the night city desk at the Washington Post.

His new novel explores how Lydia Modine, a 61-year-old mother living near the old heart of the car industry in Detroit, handles the separation from her adult children.

"Families are scattered everywhere in this country, and this separation really began with the ease of travel made possible by the automobile industry," says Shreve who joined the English Department in 2004. "The car helped put an end to the quaint notion of the nuclear family. Even in my own family, my three siblings, my parents and I have lived for years all over the map. We're spread out like spokes to the wheel, far from home. My book dramatizes the emotional costs of this particular American condition." More

Book explores Georgian history from view of the father of three Sons of Liberty

Frank Lambert

A Purdue History professor's latest book looks at the Colony of Georgia through the eyes of a successful merchant who sided with England and whose son overshadows him in the history books.

In early American history, the name Habersham is associated with three young men, including one named Joseph, who was appointed the United States' first postmaster by President George Washington. Joseph and his two brothers were patriots known as Sons of Liberty, leading the fight for independence in the late 1770s, says Frank Lambert, professor of History.

But their father, James Habersham, who is rarely talked about, is the man responsible for salvaging colonial Georgia when it was floundering. He also unintentionally contributed to the colony's independence from Britain, Lambert says.

"One of the great ironies is that it's the father who helped give Georgians, especially three of the colony's most famous patriots who were his sons, the confidence to take on the English crown," says Lambert, who wrote James Habersham: Loyalty, Politics and Commerce in Colonial Georgia. The book ($34.95) was released by University of Georgia Press in January. More

Scholars on evil talk about the problems in the world

Terrorism, deadly earthquakes and tsunamis have some people wondering why there is evil in the world, and scholars will examine this and related issues April 1-3 at Purdue's Problem of Evil conference.

The problem of evil is about reconciling the existence of a God who is all-knowing, all-powerful and supremely benevolent, with the existence of evil in the world, said Rod Bertolet, professor and head of the Department of Philosophy.

The conference's talks, presentations and a marathon reading of John Milton's "Paradise Lost" are free and open to the public. Scholars will not only discuss the problem of evil, but also will celebrate the careers of two of the field's top scholars from Purdue – William L. Rowe, professor of Philosophy; and Calvin O. Schrag, George Ade Distinguished Professor of Philosophy Emeritus. The conference is supported by former Purdue President Arthur G. Hansen. All talks are in Stewart Center, Room 214.

"Professor Rowe is a central figure in the debates over the problems of evil in the philosophy of religion," says Bertolet, who will moderate Rowe's April 2 session from 9-11:30 a.m. "He is known for setting the agenda for the discussion of the problem of evil in analytic philosophy with his work that he began publishing in the late 1970s." More

Classics professor guides novice international travelers

Getting the most out of an overseas trip begins with homework, says a Purdue Classics professor.

"Often the students I lead on study abroad trips have never traveled outside of the United States, the Midwest or even Indiana," says John T. Kirby, a professor of Classics and Comparative Literature. "Whether visiting a foreign country for a week's vacation or living abroad, the principles for getting the most out of your travel experiences are the same. There are things one can do, and avoid doing, to make one's first international experience as thrilling and memorable as possible."

In the last three years, Kirby, who studies ancient Mediterranean cultures, has taught or visited Florence, Italy; London; France; Germany; and the west coast of Turkey. He also is leading a group of students in Athens, Greece, this summer.

His trip to Turkey was inspired in part by the recent Hollywood movie about the fall of the city Troy.

"The recent string of movies about the Greek and Latin classics will surely encourage people to travel to Europe and Asia," Kirby says. "But, in many cases, the site is very different from what one sees in the movie, so expect to be awed in a different way. The archaeological site of Troy was not as massive or Hollywood-esque as it looks in the film, but it is actually more inspiring because it is where the Illiad, Homer's immortal epic, takes place." More

OTHER NEWS

Award-winning Chinese-American novelist to speak at Literary Awards

National Book Award winner Maxine Hong Kingston will speak April 20 at Purdue's 74th Literary Awards celebration.

Maxine Hong Kingston

A public reading by the Chinese-American memoirist and novelist will be at 8 p.m. in Stewart Center's Fowler Hall. The reading is free and open to the public.

Kingston also will speak about the creative writing process during a banquet in the Purdue Memorial Union's North Ballroom to honor winners of the 73 prizes given in the Literary Awards competition to undergraduate and graduate students at Purdue and to high school students from across Indiana. The prizes are worth $14,000 total. Banquet tickets, which are $15 for students and $21 for adults, can be purchased in Heavilon Hall, Room 324, or by calling the English department at 494-3740. Ticket price includes dinner, the awards ceremony and Kingston's talk.

"Maxine Hong Kingston is best known for her two memoirs The Woman Warrior and China Men," said Donald Platt, associate professor of English and Literary Awards committee chair. "Both of these works combine Chinese myths, the stories of her family members and the experience of Chinese immigrants in the United States to create her own version of 'talk-stories,' narratives transmitted and passed down orally from one generation to another. Her work has been credited with creating a new space in our literature for the voices of a generation of Asian-American writers." More

FACULTY AND HONORS

Purdue names three Liberal Arts faculty to teaching academy

Kristina Bross, associate professor of English; Janice Kelly, professor of Psychological Sciences; and Richard Rand, professor of Visual and Performing Arts, were recently inducted into The Purdue Teaching Academy, which consists of fellows and associate fellows who provide leadership for the improvement of undergraduate, graduate and outreach teaching.

Members are chosen by the academy's executive council from nominations by each college and school. Colleges and schools are allowed to nominate one faculty member for a fellowship and one faculty or staff member for an associate fellowship each year.

Winners are those who have demonstrated excellence in teaching and have identified and solved a problem within education. More

– Purdue's National Youth Sports Program is being recognized for its 2004 program by the national organization. For their leadership, the national program also recognized Thomas Templin, project administrator and head of the Department of Health and Kinesiology; William Harper, activity director and professor of Health and Kinesiology; and Bonnie Blankenship, associate director and associate professor of Health and Kinesiology. This summer will be Purdue's fourth National Youth Sports Program, in which more than 300 students, ages 10-16, are expected to participate. The five-week program offers sports instruction, health education and science courses on Purdue's campus and is free for children who were referred by their schools in Tippecanoe County. More than 200 universities and colleges participate in the federal program.

Alumni Honors

– Martin Walls, who earned his master's of fine arts degree in creative writing from Purdue in 1997, has been awarded a Witter Bynner Library of Congress Poetry Fellowship. Walls is one of two poets selected by Ted Kooser, the nation's poet laureate. As part of the fellowship, Walls read some of his work at the Library of Congress in February.

The award is funded through the Witter Bynner Foundation. Walls is the author of two books of poems: Commonwealth, published by March Street Press 2005, and Small Human Detail in Care of National Trust, published by New Issue Press in 2000. He was poetry editor of the Sycamore Review while at Purdue. After graduation, he taught poetry at Purdue and Ball State University, and he also has taught courses at Syracuse University and Onondaga Community College in New York. Walls, originally from southern England, is currently assistant editor of Making Music, a magazine for music-making hobbyists, and a senior writer for International Musician, the journal of the American Federation of Musicians.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Spring symposium focuses on global women's issues

The Purdue Women's Studies Program is bringing together a variety of speakers on April 7-9 for a conference to discuss feminism on a global scale.

The Trans/Positions conference will feature five keynote speakers and 25 panels for discussion of how gender issues cross a variety of national, sexual and disciplinary boundaries, says Ruth Salvaggio, professor of English and director of Women's Studies. Those who register will be able to attend all events plus the conference reception and final dinner.

The conference, as well as a related art show and film screenings, is free for Purdue faculty, staff and students. Fees range from $10 to $60 for others wanting to participate. Anyone interested in attending can register now through early March. For more information, call 494-7231. More

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

Purdue Theater upcoming productions include Metamorphoses on April 14-24.

Based on the epic works of Ovid, Mary Zimmerman's Metamorphoses is about love, loss, obsession and inspiration. This mix of comedy, tragedy and music breathes new life into such tales as the legend of King Midas, and recounts the captivating stories of Cupid, Psyche, Aphrodite, Orpheus and others.

EXPERTS IN THE NEWS

ScienCentral - a news video production company that distributes to ABC News –
Stuttering brains: Language link
(Christine Weber-Fox, Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences)

The New York Times –
Road trip from glitter to grandeur, and back
(Porter Shreve, Department of English)

Indianapolis Star –
Friends, many foes agree the image is the man
(James McCann, Department of Political Science)

ABC News –
Stuttering kids need help to cope with bullying
(William P. Murphy, Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences)

New Karala (India) –
Parents advised to review child's friendships
(Tom Berndt, Department of Psychological Sciences)

Any story ideas or news tips can be sent to Amy Patterson-Neubert at the Purdue News Service, 494-9723, apatterson@purdue.edu

Purdue News Service: 494-2096; purduenews@purdue.edu