MESSAGE FROM THE DEAN
As we look ahead to the changes this new year may bring, we will have many opportunities to demonstrate the importance of the humanities for the future of democracy. Our humanities expertise in critical, comparative and synthetic analysis, in the making and the interpretation of visual art and narrative texts, and in connecting languages, cultures and histories across borders will be needed in these times. The school is well-positioned to foster the power of the humanities: our interdisciplinary programs and disciplinary majors are thriving and our enrollments continue to rise, defying national trends in the humanities.
Over the last six years, we have recruited to Rice the next generation of stellar and diverse humanities faculty: in addition to the 50 new faculty who have joined us since 2018, we’ll welcome candidates for six new searches to campus this semester in Art History, History, German (Modern and Classical Literatures and Cultures), Creative Writing, Religion and Transnational Asian Studies. These new faculty both strengthen departments and advance our new centers and programs: they bring innovative inquiry and research excellence to Rice while filling changing curricular needs. We are revitalizing the humanities and the arts through investments in our departments and in our interdisciplinary programs.
This semester will also see an external review of our five PhD programs in the Humanities with an eye toward cultivating new interdisciplinary opportunities for graduate training. We are advancing our efforts to enhance undergraduate programs that foster meaningful engagements of the humanities with the sciences, engineering, social science and business, attesting to our energetic commitment to a more fully integrated and connective humanities at Rice.
FEATURED NEWS
We eagerly look forward to celebrating the opening later this year of Susan and Fayez Sarofim Hall, our new home for the Department of Art with ribbon-cutting tentatively scheduled for September 2025. This stunning and much-anticipated addition to Rice’s arts corridor will highlight the pivotal role of the creative arts in a liberal arts education and will be a place where creativity, collaboration and exploration can flourish, marking a true homecoming for the visual arts on campus and in our community.
See Accelerate Magazine: ‘A New Era for Art and Innovation at Rice’
‘A natural fit’: Philosophy and ethics of AI
When Robert Howell considers the future of artificial intelligence, he foresees a world where an app might guide moral decisions, just as Google Maps helps navigate a road trip. This isn’t just a thought experiment for Howell, the Yasser El-Sayed Professor and chair of the Department of Philosophy. Rather, it’s a harbinger of the pressing ethical dilemmas that AI presents — and why Philosophy has become integral to the conversation about responsible AI.
Discover how we’re fostering interdisciplinary collaborations in the Ethics of Technology and how our new Thirukkural Fund for Philosophy aims to enrich the pursuit of fundamental questions about existence, ethics, reason and more.
See Story
Environmental justice education: ‘Part of the solution’
With a $500,000 grant from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, our Center for Environmental Studies will expand its environmental justice education summer program for Houston high schoolers.
“Our goal is to build an enduring program that reaches more students each year, offering them the chance to explore environmental justice, science and advocacy in ways that are meaningful to their lives and communities,” says Weston Twardowski, associate director of the center and the Rice Sustainability Institute’s EcoStudio.
See Story
Civic Humanist: Inspiring high schoolers to ‘dream big’
Luziris Pineda Turi has spoken with many students as part of Civic Humanist, a program initiated by Terri and Terrence Gee ’86 between Rice and high schools serving underrepresented and economically disadvantaged students in the Houston area. A recent Aldine High School campus visit was particularly meaningful for Turi: “You should dream big,” Rice’s associate vice provost for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, and associate teaching professor of Spanish, told the students from her alma mater.
See Story
Medical Humanities: Placing the human at the heart of medicine
In classrooms, clinics, labs and studios, and through internships, study abroad opportunities and research partnerships across the Texas Medical Center and broader Houston community, our Medical Humanities faculty, students and collaborators are playing a leading role in shaping the future of medicine with the human at the center.
“It’s incredibly exciting to be doing this work at this time,” said Kirsten Ostherr, the Gladys Louise Fox Professor of English and founding director of the Medical Humanities Program in the School of Humanities and Rice’s Medical Humanities Research Institute. “The time is ripe, people are ready for it, and we’re in the right place to be doing it.”
See Related Story
Asian Studies: Bridging cultures, creating connections
The Chao Center for Asian Studies, recently honored by Asia Society Texas with its inaugural Community Partner Game Changer Award for the center’s exceptional impact on the Houston community, stands out for its unique transnational approach, examining Asia’s complex histories, cultures and interactions beyond national borders.
See Story
PLST: Tackling ‘truly foundational questions’
Ten years on, the appeal of our most popular minor lies in its interdisciplinary nature. While rooted in political theory, the Program in Politics, Law and Social Thought attracts students from every school at Rice, bringing them together across disciplines to engage with the most pressing political and legal questions of the day.
See Story
STUDENT SPOTLIGHT
Mariam Khan: ‘Humanities at Rice is expansive’
“Someone once told me that I pursued many side quests as an English major,” says Mariam Khan. “I think this is true, and it stands as evidence that Humanities at Rice is expansive, stretching across buildings, disciplines, nations and cultures.”
Learn about her many passions in the classroom and beyond, including studying languages and cultures through the Center for Languages and Intercultural Communication’s Rice in Country summer study abroad program, supported by the Elizabeth Lee Moody International Fund in the Humanities and the Arts.
See Admission essay: ‘My Humanities Journey’
Exploring Paris: Student’s study abroad experiences
Juan-Pablo Cajiga-Pena, a Moody Research Fellow double majoring in Art History and Philosophy and minoring in Museums and Cultural Heritage, made the most of his time in Paris last summer. With a Mary Ellen Hale Lovett Travel Fellowship through Art History, he spent weeks conducting archival research on Romanian sculptor Constantin Brâncuși, whose work was featured in an exhibition at Paris’ Centre Pompidou.
At the Rice Global Paris Center, he participated in a course that invited students to “unlearn” traditional conceptions of the city, exploring Paris through a lens of historical and cultural critique.
See Story and Video: ‘A Day in the Life Abroad’
FACULTY SPOTLIGHT
Andrea Bajani: author, teacher, father, ‘endlessly in love with people’
Andrea Bajani, one of the most beloved and award-winning Italian authors in Italy and abroad, joined our Creative Writing faculty to connect with diverse voices and build a community centered on mutual learning and exploration. The professor in the practice and international writer-in-residence in the Department of English doesn’t view writing through a lens of strict classifications like fiction or nonfiction. Instead, he guides students through the “blurry lines” where stories emerge from a combination of “inventory and invention.”
See Story
See also a Humanities NOW conversation between Andrea Bajani, professor in the practice and international writer-in-residence in the Department of English, and John Sparagana, Grace Christian Vietti Professor of Visual Arts and chair of the Department of Art.
ALUMNI SPOTLIGHT
First judge on new Texas Business Court
Sofia Adrogué ’88, who majored in English and Legal Studies at Rice and is a former senior partner of Diamond McCarthy LLP, made history when she was sworn in as judge of the 11th Division Texas Business Court.
Justice David M. Medina said of the ceremony: “It was a historic day. Sofia Adrogué — the first judge for this new court; the first female judge for this court; the first Latina judge for this court; the first immigrant judge for this court; the first American from Argentina in this court; and as far as I know, the first Adrogué judge.” See Story
First curator of Latinx art at McNay Art Museum
Mia Lopez ’07, who majored in Art History at Rice, was named the first curator of Latinx art at the McNay Art Museum in her hometown of San Antonio last year. In this role, she connects Latinx art within and beyond Texas’ oldest modern art museum, work she says was inspired when she interned at the Rice Gallery. See Story
Perspective: What you can do with a philosophy degree?
A philosophy degree offers more than just an exploration of life’s big questions — it equips students with critical thinking and communication skills that are valuable in virtually any profession. Four graduates — Connor Hayes, Juliana Hunter, Brad Olsen and Brad Wendel — share their perspectives on what you can do with a philosophy degree.
See Story and Video
Alumnus celebrated for decades of dedication and generosity
Russell “Russ” Pitman visited Rice’s new Academic Quadrangle in December, marking a significant moment in the institution’s history. Pitman, who graduated from the then-Rice Institute in 1958, is celebrated as one of the university’s most generous supporters, having established more than 75 endowed funds that span nearly every aspect of campus life.
“We came together today to celebrate Mr. Russ Pitman, who is just as much of an institution as the institution is,” said university historian Portia Hopkins.
See Story and Video
FACULTY AWARDS & ACHIEVEMENTS
Krista Comer
In the aftermath of the 2020 U.S. presidential election, Krista Comer, professor of English, invited 15 colleagues into a conversation about feminism and the U.S. West. Her latest book, Living West as Feminists: Conversations About the Where of Us, moves from travelogue to interviews to critical meditations. It asks who one’s people are, to whom one feels accountable, and how we might make peace with the itinerant, often displaced lives of late-stage capitalist culture.
Jacqueline Couti
Jacqueline Couti, the Laurence H. Favrot Professor of French Studies and chair of the Department of Modern and Classical Literatures and Cultures, was named chevalier in the Ordre des Palmes académiques (French for “knight” in the Order of the French Academic Palms), an honor bestowed by the French Ministry of National Education.
Eve Dunbar
Monstrous Work and Radical Satisfaction: Black Women Writing Under Segregation, the latest book by Professor of English Eve Dunbar, offers new and insightful readings of African American women’s writings in the 1930s–1950s. She examines the writings of Ann Petry, Dorothy West, Alice Childress and Gwendolyn Brooks to show how these women explored self-fulfillment over normative and sanctioned models of national belonging.
Kiese Laymon
Heavy, the memoir by Kiese Laymon, the Libbie Shearn Moody Professor of Creative Writing and English and a 2022 MacArthur Fellow, was recognized by the New York Times in its 2024 publication, “100 Best Books of the 21st Century.” In Heavy, which has received critical and popular acclaim, Laymon explores his upbringing in Jackson, Mississippi, navigating complex relationships with his mother and family, as well as his own struggles with his identity and bodily experiences. Through a deeply personal narrative, he confronts societal failures and the challenges of love and freedom. Laymon also has just released City Summer, Country Summer, a lyrical children’s picture book about three Black boys who form a deep connection during a transformative summer trip down South to visit family.
Lida Oukaderova
Lida Oukaderova, associate professor of Art History and co-director of the Program in Cinema and Media Studies, edited the book ReFocus: The Films of Larisa Shepitko, which includes a series of articles by an international group of scholars on the cinema of the much-celebrated but little-researched Ukrainian-born Soviet filmmaker Larisa Shepitko. The book not only considers the emergence of Shepitko’s cinema within Soviet political and cultural history but examines its continued relevance for thinking about such pressing contemporary issues as war and trauma, history, memory and subjectivity, and ecology and the environment.
Edward Snow
Edward Snow, the Mary Gibbs Jones Professor for the Humanities in the Department of English, has translated to English the Austrian poet and novelist Rainer Maria Rilke’s The Book of Hours (1905), long hailed as a masterwork of modern German literature.
Ragini Tharoor Srinivasan
Ragini Tharoor Srinivasan, assistant professor of English, affiliated faculty member in the Department of Transnational Asian Studies and the Center for the Study of Women, Gender and Sexuality, and a member of the Chao Center for Asian Studies governing council and Humanities Research Center faculty council, won the 2024 ACLA René Wellek Prize for Best Edited Essay Collection for her book, Thinking with an Accent: Toward a New Object, Method, and Practice.
John ("Jack") Zammito
The North American Kant Society will celebrate the contributions of John (“Jack”) Zammito, Baker College Professor Emeritus for History of Science, Technology and Innovation, at the Feb. 21 meeting of the American Philosophical Association’s Central Division. The special panel will feature three scholars, who will present papers on Jack’s monographs: The Genesis of Kant’s Critique of Judgment (1992); Kant, Herder and the Birth of Anthropology (2002); and The Gestation of German Biology: Philosophy and Physiology from Stahl to Schelling (2018). We are excited to learn that Jack’s life work is being honored by this panel. It is a truly fitting honor!
STUDENT RECOGNITION
Environmental Studies minor Jae Kim named Rhodes Scholar
Jae Kim, who is minoring in Environmental Studies and majoring in Integrative Biology, has been awarded a Rhodes Scholarship, chosen to study at the University of Oxford in England next fall. Rice’s 13th Rhodes Scholar, Kim serves as the Student Association president. Passionate about addressing climate change, he has aspirations to influence policy to develop solutions that safeguard both the planet and human health.
See Story
From ‘Fallout’ to Rice Theatre, Viola Hsia finds her stage
During her Owl Day visit, Viola Hsia had been searching for a university where she could balance her two loves of writing and acting. Now in her fourth year at Rice, Hsia, who is studying English and Theatre, has been busy on stage and behind the scenes of Rice Theatre productions, performed with the improv troupe Spontaneous Combustion, and served as assistant news editor for the Rice Thresher and as a managing coordinator for the Rice Players. All this comes just after her appearance as Jamila opposite star Aaron Moten in Amazon’s breakout summer hit “Fallout."
See Rice Magazine: ‘Balancing Act’
NEW APPOINTMENTS
Leadership in the School
We are excited to welcome Nicole A. Waligora-Davis, the Alan Dugald McKillop Associate Professor of English and a Rice faculty member since 2008, to the Humanities Dean's Office as associate dean with responsibilities for undergraduate programs and special projects. We are deeply grateful to Natasha Bowdoin, who returns to the faculty and her art practice, for her incredible work as associate dean.
We welcomed the following staff members earlier this year:
Joyce Brown joined the School of Humanities from Rice’s Office of Undergraduate Research and Inquiry as the administrator for our Program in Jewish Studies.
Fatima Bazan Mota joined Rice from Texas A&M University, serving in the Humanities Dean’s Office as undergraduate programs administrator supporting our Elizabeth Lee Moody Undergraduate Research Fellowship Program in the Humanities and the Arts, the Center for Latin American and Latinx Studies, the Program in Medical Humanities, the Program in Theatre and the HEDGE Summer Internship Fund.
Jenny Ustynik joined Rice from Texas Woman’s University, serving in the Humanities Dean’s Office as graduate program administrator supporting graduate students in the departments of Art History, English and Philosophy.
EVENT HIGHLIGHTS
Campbell Lectures with Mel Chin
Mel Chin, internationally acclaimed conceptual artist, brought his thought-provoking perspective to Rice as our 2024 School of Humanities Campbell Lectures speaker. A MacArthur Fellow and winner of the Hiroshima Art Prize for his community-engaged art that fosters social transformation, Chin is a visionary artist who defies conventions and challenges perceptions of art’s role in society. His ability to merge artistic expression with environmental and social activism made him the ideal speaker for our Campbell Lecture Series, which is generously supported by the Campbell Foundation and where we celebrate the intersection of creativity and critical thought.
Nov. 12 — Real Life Boogie: The Inadequate Metaphor vs. the Evolutionary Process
Nov. 13 — When the Going Gets Weird …
‘Historical Perspectives on the Presidential Election’
Two weeks before the U.S. presidential election, the School of Humanities hosted a discussion on its historical context and stakes. The event, part of the Humanities Innovations series and co-sponsored by the Progressive Forum of Houston, brought together Douglas Brinkley, the Katherine Tsanoff Brown Professor of Humanities and a nationally recognized presidential historian, and Caleb McDaniel, the Mary Gibbs Jones Professor of Humanities and Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, to explore parallels between past and present.
See Story and Video
‘Diverse perspectives’ on energy, waste and environment in West Africa
Nana Osei-Opare, assistant professor in the Department of History, in collaboration with Gökçe Günel, associate professor of Anthropology, organized an interdisciplinary conference that sparked critical conversations among West African and North American scholars about how societies are managing their natural resources and dealing with the consequences of energy production and waste. The event spotlighted two of our interdisciplinary areas of excellence: our Center for Environmental Studies and Center for African and African American Studies.
See Story and Video
Scientia’s Democracy lecture series
Headlines tell us that democracy is under attack, under threat and in decline. Why is that happening? What can we do about it? Peter C. Caldwell and Christian J. Emden presented as part of Rice’s Scientia lecture series focusing on democracy. Caldwell, the Samuel G. McCann Professor of History, and founding and current director of the Program in Politics, Law and Social Thought, presented “Democracy and Dictatorship: Of Fuzzy Distinctions, Political Passions, Militant Democracy and Power.” Emden, the Frances Moody Newman Professor of German Intellectual History and Political Thought, and PLST co-founder, presented “Democracy is Not Community.”
See Video of Lectures
Gray/Wawro Lecture with Cherríe Moraga
Cherríe Moraga, Chicana activist, author and co-editor of the anthology This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color, presented “They Are Falling All Around Me — A Borderless América Reimagined,” this year’s Gray/Wawro Lecture. The Center for the Study of Women, Gender and Sexuality lecture series is made possible by the generous support of Melanie Gray and Mark Wawro. See Story
UPCOMING EVENTS
School of Humanities Lightning Talks
On campus
Thursday, Jan. 23
12 – 1:30 p.m.
Kyle Morrow Room, Fondren Library
Speakers:
Barnabas Ticha Muvhuti (Department of Art History)
Carly Thomsen (Department of English and Center for the Study of Women, Gender and Sexuality)
Susannah Wright (Department of Modern and Classical Literatures and Cultures)
Nandi Theunissen (Department of Philosophy)
Organized by the School of Humanities Dean’s Office, these gatherings offer an opportunity for faculty, postdoctoral fellows, graduate students and staff to come together and hear from our new faculty and postdoctoral fellows about their research and creative work.
Medical Humanities Sawyer Seminars
Online
Thursday, Jan. 23
4 p.m.
Speaker: Susannah Fox, author of Rebel Health
On campus
Wednesday, Feb. 26
4 p.m.
Speaker: Heidi Larson, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine
On campus
Thursday, April 10
4 p.m.
Speaker: Roderic Crooks, University of California, Irvine
Organized by Rice’s Medical Humanities Research Institute, the Sawyer Seminars is supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. This lecture series explores the intersection of technology, race and health through a humanities lens.
American Democracy through Foreign Eyes
On campus & online
Thursday, Jan. 30
4 p.m. Kyle Morrow Room, Fondren Library
As part of Rice's Scientia Lecture Series, four Humanities scholars, who created a massive open online course (MOOC) available on Coursera, “America Through Foreign Eyes,” will share perspectives about the state of democracy in America from their areas of specialty: China, Russia, France and Mexico.
Speakers:
Anne Chao, adjunct lecturer in the Humanities; manager of the Houston Asian American Archive
Lida Oukaderova, associate professor of Art History
Julie Fette, associate professor of French Studies
Moramay López-Alonso, associate professor of History
Visiting Artist Lecture Series
On campus
Thursday, Jan. 30
6 p.m., reception | 6:30 p.m., lecture Welcome Center, Sewall Hall
Speaker: Hicham Bouzid
Hicham Bouzid is a creative director, editor and curator based in Tangier, Morocco, whose work delves into the intricate interplay of Morocco’s urban and social landscapes influenced by neoliberal policies over the past quarter-century. In 2016, Hicham co-founded Think Tanger, an innovative cultural organization working at the intersection of contemporary art, design, participatory research and urban fields.
Presented by the Department of Art, with support from the Humanities Research Center, Department of Art History, and Center for African and African American Studies.
Haiti and the World: Global Encounters of the Past, Present and Future
On campus & online
Friday, Feb. 7
Anderson-Clarke Center, Susanne M. Glasscock School of Continuing Studies
Saturday, Feb. 8
Ralph S. O’Connor Building for Engineering and Science
8 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Organized by Jacqueline Couti, the Laurence H. Favrot Professor of French Studies and chair of the Department of Modern and Classical Literatures and Cultures, and Linsey Sainte-Claire, assistant professor of French Studies, this international symposium will delve into Haiti’s history, challenges and future prospects, addressing themes such as historical context, socio-political and economic issues, and ecological concerns. Participants will engage in dynamic panel discussions, roundtables and presentations featuring scholars, artists and community leaders from Houston and beyond. This interdisciplinary and inclusive platform aims to deepen understanding and appreciation of Haiti’s complex and enduring legacy.
Sponsored by the Department of Modern and Classical Literatures and Cultures and supported by the School of Humanities, Humanities Research Center, Center for African and African American Studies, Center for Latin American and Latinx Studies, Center for Environmental Studies, Medical Humanities Research Institute, Department of History, Rice’s Creative Ventures, Tulane University and Louisiana State University.
Bhagwaan Mahavir Lecture Series in Jain Studies
On campus & online
Wednesday, Feb. 19
4 p.m.
Herzstein Hall 210
"Multispecies Solidarity and Nonviolence in Jain Practices of Unselfing"
Speaker:
Brianne Donaldson, associate professor of Philosophy and Religious Studies and Shri Parshvanath Presidential Chair in Jain Studies, School of Humanities, University of California, Irvine
The Bhagwaan Mahavir Lecture Series in Jain Studies is intended to deepen the global understanding of Jainism as a religion and culture. This lecture is organized by the Department of Transnational Asian Studies and the Chao Center for Asian Studies, with the support of members of the Jain community.
Humanities Innovations: Austin
Tuesday, March 4
6 - 8 p.m.
This will be a timely and thought-provoking discussion on the ethics of technology and the crucial role of philosophy and ethics in conversations about responsible AI.
This invite-only event is part of our Humanities Innovations series, which spotlights faculty innovators and high-impact interdisciplinary initiatives in the School of Humanities, while providing an opportunity for networking among alumni, parents and friends of Rice University.
Austin-area alumni, parents and friends, look for your invitation to join us.
Humanities Dean Kathleen Canning will introduce the event and provide an update on new directions in the humanities at Rice.
Robert J. Howell, chair of the Department of Philosophy and the Yasser El-Sayed Professor at Rice, will offer reflections on the impact of AI on human endeavors and on the significance of the humanities in addressing these challenges.
Women’s History Month lecture
On campus
Thursday, March 6
4 p.m.
Kyle Morrow Room, Fondren Library
Speaker:
Siyen Fei, associate professor of history, University of Pennsylvania
This year’s Women’s History Lecture is sponsored by the Department of History and Center for the Study of Women, Gender and Sexuality, with support from the Department of Transnational Asian Studies.
A Retrospective Series on America’s War in Vietnam: 50 Years Later
On campus
4 p.m., reception | 4:30 p.m., talk
Kyle Morrow Room, Fondren Library
Tuesday, March 25
"T.E.A.C.H.: Memory Work in the Vietnamese Diaspora 50 Years Later"
Speaker:
Thuy Vo Dang, assistant professor of Information Studies and Asian American Studies, UCLA
Organized by the Chao Center for Asian Studies, the Liu Distinguished Visitor Series is made possible through the generosity of Frank ’78 and Cindy Liu.
Humanities Research Center
The Humanities Research Center — a hub for innovative and collaborative inquiry — is leading a series of conversations that mobilize interdisciplinary humanities and arts research to understand, challenge and reimagine the idea of “repair.”
Higher education conversation
On campus
Wednesday, March 26
4 p.m.
Host:
Kathleen Canning, School of Humanities dean
Panelists:
- Holden Thorp, Editor-in-Chief, Science journals; former provost, Washington University in St. Louis; former University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill chancellor
- Patricia Okker, Higher education consultant; former president, New College of Florida; former dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, University of Missouri
- Ruth Simmons, Rice University President’s Distinguished Fellow; former president, Brown University, Smith College and Prairie View A&M University
Register
Keynote lecture: Christina Sharpe
On campus
Tuesday, April 8
4 p.m.
Speaker: Christina Sharpe
Christina Sharpe, a 2024 Guggenheim Fellow and winner of the Windham-Campbell Prize in Nonfiction, is the author of Monstrous Intimacies: Making Post-Slavery Subjects (2010), In the Wake: On Blackness and Being (2016) and, most recently, Ordinary Notes (2023). Ordinary Notes won the Hilary Weston Writer’s Trust Prize in Nonfiction, and was a finalist for The National Book Award in Nonfiction, The National Book Critics Circle Award in Nonfiction, the LA Times Current Interest Book Prize, and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize in Biography. Her work has appeared in many artist catalogues and in Frieze, Paris Review, Harpers, BOMB Magazine, The Funambulist, Artforum and Art in America. Sharpe is a writer, professor and chair of Black Studies in the Humanities at York University in Toronto, where she lives.
Houston premiere of SPILL, documentary play about the tragedy of the Deepwater Horizon explosion
On campus
Friday, April 11
Saturday, April 12
Moody Center for the Arts, Lois Chiles Studio Theater
Made possible through the support of the Moody Center for the Arts, the Center for Environmental Studies, the Rice Arts Initiatives Fund, the Humanities Research Center, Rice’s Center for Coastal Futures and Adaptive Resilience (CFAR), the Rice Office of Sustainability, the Rice Green Fund, the Department of History and the Rice Sustainability Institute’s EcoStudio.
On April 20, 2010, a massive explosion ripped through the Deepwater Horizon rig off the coast of Louisiana. Written by the award-winning playwright Leigh Fondakowski and directed by Weston Twardowski, associate director of the Center for Environmental Studies and the Rice Sustainability Institute’s EcoStudio, SPILL memorializes how Deepwater Horizon changed lives, the region and the oil industry. It invites audiences to consider the precarious balance of danger and beauty found on the Gulf Coast.
IN REMEMBRANCE
We mourn the passing of eminent scholar Edward Cox, professor emeritus of history. A beloved educator, mentor and gracious colleague, he left an indelible mark on Rice and the many students he guided over his nearly 30-year tenure. Cox was a member of the steering committee for the Task Force on Slavery, Segregation and Racial Injustice and a four-time recipient of the George R. Brown Prize for Excellence in Teaching. His commitment to diversity and inclusion was evident in his 22 years of service as a faculty sponsor for the Black Student Association and his role as founding director of Rice’s Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship program. In 2018, he was honored with Rice’s Meritorious Service Award, recognizing his years of dedicated service.
Janis Scott ’74, who double majored in Spanish and Behavioral Science at Rice, and was a long-standing pillar of the Houston community, died in December. A passionate advocate for public transit, Scott was widely known around the city as the “bus lady,” riding the bus her entire life. She spent years fighting for public transit, particularly in underserved communities. She was recognized for her efforts in 2016 with the Outstanding Achievement in Civic and Community Service award at Rice’s Blueprint for Excellence Gala. Learn More
Charles M. Young III ’68, who studied Philosophy and Mathematics at Rice and was a longtime professor of philosophy at Claremont Graduate University, died in August. Over the course of his career, he published many articles and monographs on Plato and Aristotle, co-authored two textbooks on formal logic, and papers on topics such as “An architechtonic of verbs” and “Computation with Roman numerals.” He also contributed translations of and commentary on Aristotle’s Nichomachian Ethics, Book V, to the online database Archelogos, and published many invited reviews of other scholars’ works on ancient Greek philosophy.
With gratitude and best wishes for good health,
Kathleen Canning
Dean, School of Humanities
Andrew W. Mellon Professor of History
Rice University