Five Faculty Promoted to Full Professor

Five faculty members have been promoted from associate to full professor based on their excellence in teaching, distinction in research, and service to the College. Oceanographer Collin Roesler, religion scholar Robert Morrison and historians Dallas Denery, David Gordon and Susan Tananbaum will become full professors on July 1.

Dallas Denery researches medieval Europe, the history of religion, and intellectual and cultural history. His new book, The Devil Wins: A History of Lying from the Garden of Eden to the Enlightenment, published this year by Princeton University Press, is receiving many good reviews. The book investigates changing historical attitudes toward dishonesty, revealing a new understanding of the medieval world in the process. Denery’s first book, Seeing and Being Seen in the Late Medieval World: Optics, Theology and the Religious Life, was published by Cambridge University Press in 2005. This year, students honored Denery’s teaching by selecting him to give the annual Karofsky Faculty Encore Lecture. His courses include Medieval Europe, and The History of History. Denery received his B.A. and Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley, and his master’s degree from the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology.

David Gordon‘s research focuses on the history of southern and central Africa over the last two centuries. His most recent book, Apartheid in South Africa: A History of Documents, is being published by Bedford/St. Martin’s. His 2012 book,Invisible Agents: Spirits in a Central African History, offers a history of how spiritual beliefs have influenced human agency. His first book, Nachituti’s Gift: Economy, Society, and Environment in Central Africa, was a finalist for the Herskovits award for the best book in all disciplines of African Studies. He has published articles in numerous scholarly journals, including the Journal for African History, Journal of Southern African Studies, William and Mary Quarterly, and Comparative Studies in Society and History. Gordon’s courses include South Africa after Apartheid, and Warlords and Child Soldiers in African History. He received his bachelor’s degree from University of Cape Town, and his master’s and doctoral degrees from Princeton University.

Robert Morrison studies both Islam and Judaism, focusing on the role of science in Islamic and Jewish texts and on the history of Islamic science. He has contributed chapters on Islamic astronomy to the New Cambridge History of Islamand the Cambridge History of Science.  His 2009 book, Islam and Science: The Intellectual Career of Nizam al-Din al-Nisaburi received the Iranian World Prize for Book of the Year in Islamics Studies. The book examines the work of eminent 14th-century Iranian Shiite scholar Nizam al-Din al-Nisaburi, and is the first rigorous attempt to explain the cross-fertilization of scientific and religious thought in Islamic civilization. His new book, Astronomy in al-Andalus: Joseph Ibn Naḥmias’, is being published by the University of California Press. Morrison’s courses include Modern Judaism and Islam and Science. He received a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree from Harvard University and an M.Phil. and a Ph.D. from Columbia University.

Collin Roesler studies ocean ecosystems and is an expert in environmental optics. Her research collaborations span the globe, and include a study on harmful algal blooms in the Gulf of Maine. Her research has been funded by a host of national organizations, including the National Science Foundation, NASA, NOAA, EPA and Naval Research Laboratory. She has published numerous articles, including several bio-optical studies considered to be key papers in the field, and she has co-edited two books. In 2013, students selected her to give the annual Karofsky Faculty Encore Lecture as a nod to her teaching talents. Her courses include Oceanography, and Ocean and Climate. Roesler earned a bachelor’s degree from Brown University, a master’s degree from Oregon State University, and a Ph.D. from the University of Washington.

Susan Tananbaum’s research concerns immigrant acculturation, philanthropy and child care in the Victorian era. Her 2014 book, Jewish Immigrants in London, 1880-1939, published by Pickering and Chatto, explores the ways in which Anglo-Jewish communities, local government, and education and welfare organizations tried to socialize these new arrivals. In the book, Tananbaum focuses on the experiences of working-class women and children, arguing that Jewish women were able to assimilate more easily than Jewish men. Her journal article, “From Local to International: Cape Town’s Jewish Orphanages,” is forthcoming in Jewish Historical Studies. Her courses include Sport and Leisure in Europe and America, and Modern Britain, 1837 to the 1990s. She also teaches courses on the Arab-Israeli conflict. Tananbaum earned her bachelor’s degree from Trinity College, and two master’s degrees and her Ph.D. from Brandeis University.