Three profs win award

Recipients of humanist award to use money for travel research

The annual Edna T. Shaeffer Humanist Awards were announced and awarded to three JMU faculty members Thursday.

This year's new Humanist Award recipients were John Ott and Sarah Warren, both from the art history department, and Shah Hanifi, from the history department. All the recipients were new to JMU this year.

Also in attendance were winners of last year's awards: Elizabeth Janik, from the history department, Alexander S. Leidholdt, from the school of media arts and design, and Howard Lubert, from the political science department. Dolores Flamiano, from SMAD, unable to attend, also won last year.

According to Richard Whitman, dean of the College of Arts and Letters, the award has been presented for the last 10 years to outstanding faculty members engaged in the humanities. The goal of the award is to encourage research by providing faculty members with the means to travel to conduct their research. Award recipients then are expected to produce a piece of written work.

In their applications, prospective recipients propose a topic that they intend to research and then explain how they aim to spend the prize money. The reward value was $4,000 this year, although last year the prize money was less.

Leidholdt said scholars always are applying for grants and fellowships to supply the resources that allow them to conduct expensive primary research.

After announcing the 2004 recipients, the remainder of the ceremony featured presentations given by last year's award winners.

Janik's research took her to Berlin, Germany, where she visited the city's musical libraries necessary to produce her article entitled, "Recomposing German Music: Politics and Tradition in Cold War Berlin." The research conducted while in Berlin helped her to produce another recently published article and a larger book manuscript.

Leidholdt used his award to travel and research his biography on Nell Lewis, a former progressive southern journalist. He explained that writing the biography is a lengthy process, which has taken him three years.

Lubert discussed the purpose of his writing piece. "I have always been attracted to studying [Benjamin] Franklin because of his breadth of knowledge and sense of humor," Lubert said.

Ott, who was the only winner this year in attendance, hopes to research art dealers in the late 19th century and their influence on the art world.