Corrina KerrOne works in translating languages; the other translates words into images. Together they are about to take audiences through a centuries-old world of lechers, louts and libertines, among others. Norman Shapiro, professor of romance languages and literatures, and David Schorr, professor of art, have been collaborating together for more than 20 years to bring ancient French verse and tales to life for an English-reading audience. Their most recent effort is a re-issue, La Fontaine's Bawdy: Of Libertines, Louts, and Lechers (2009 by the Black Widow Press), a book they will be discussing and signing at on May 5 at Broad…
Brian KattenKeisuke Yamashita '10 of Yokahama, Japan; Jory Kahan '10 of Norwich Vt.; Clare Smith '10 of Lexington, Mass.; and Beth Kenworthy '10 from New York, N.Y., were named the recipients of Wesleyan University's Roger Maynard '37 Memorial Award for the 2009-10 academic year. The award is presented annually to the outstanding male and female scholar-athletes in their last year of eligibility. Yamashita, Kahan, Smith and Kenworthy represent the finest combination of athletic accomplishment and academic achievement at Wesleyan. Kahan and Yamashita were starters on the 2009 men's soccer team that posted the first undefeated regular-season since 1940 and set a school…
Bill HolderAmy Bloom ’75, a distinguished writer of novels, short stories, nonfiction, and projects for television, has been named the Kim-Frank Family University Writer in Residence at Wesleyan University. Her appointment takes effect July 1. Bloom will enhance Wesleyan’s curricular offerings in writing by offering two courses per year, and she will serve as a senior thesis advisor. She will have an office in the Shapiro Creative Writing Center. “Amy Bloom is one of the most accomplished writers in the United States today,” says President Michael S. Roth. “Her insight, her creativity, and her deep understanding of the craft of writing…
Olivia DrakeAlbert Fry, the E.B. Nye Professor of Chemistry, is the co-author of “Substituent Effects on the Redox Properties and Structure of Substituted Triphenylamines. An Experimental and Computational Study,” published in Tetrahedron, 65, 2408-2414, 2009.
Brian Northrop, assistant professor of chemistry, is the co-author of several new articles. These include: “Ultrafast Optical Excitations In Supramolecular Metallacycles with Charge Transfer Properties,” published in Journal of the American Chemical Society, 132, 1348-1358 in 2010; “Assembly of Metallacycles on HOPG by Shape-Persistent Macrocycle Templates,” published in Journal of the American Chemical Society, 132, 1328-1333, 2010; “Surface Confined Metallosupramolecular Architectures: Formation and Scanning Tunneling Microscopy Characterization,” published in Accounts of Chemical Research, 42, 249-259, 2009; “Directed Self-Selection in the Coordination-Driven Self-Assembly of Irregular Supramolecular Polygons,” published in Journal of Organic Chemistry, 74, 3554-3557, 2009. Also, “Synthesis of Six-Component Metallodendrimers…
Rex Pratt, the Beach Professor of Chemistry, is the co-author of “Substituted aryl malonamates as new serine b-lactamase substrates: Structure-activity studies,” published in Bioorganic & Mecicinal Chemistry,18, 282 in 2010; “Approaches to the simultaneous inactivation of metallo- and serine- b-lactamases,” published in Bioorganic & Medicinal Chemistry Letters,19, 1618; 2009; “Inhibition of class A and C b-lactamases by diaroyl phosphates,” published in Biochemistry, 48, 8285, 2009; “Intramolecular cooperativity in the reaction of diacyl phosphates with serine b-lactamases,” published in Biochemistry, 48, 8293, 2009; “Structural basis of the inhibition of class A b-lactamases and penicillin-binding proteins by 6-b-iodopenicillanate,” published in the Journal of the…
Q: Joseph, you are a Ph.D candidate in ethnomusicology. How many years have you been at Wesleyan and when will you finish your Ph.D? A: I began my graduate studies in ethnomusicology at Wesleyan in the M.A. program in 1995, and don't you know you're not supposed to ask when the dissertation will be done? I'm anticipating finishing this summer. Q: What are you studying, specifically? A: I have done fieldwork in Chennai, India, on the film music industry there. It's a huge musical, social, and economic phenomenon that is under-studied in academia. I hope that my dissertation will be…
Cynthia RockwellMusicianCorps, the brainchild of CEO and founder Chris “Kiff” Gallagher ’91, was the subject of a March 8 segment on NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams. National correspondent John Yang ’81 reported, interviewing Gallagher and a number of the MusicianCorps Fellows and students and showing footage of their music classes. Modeled after such programs as Americorps and City Year, Gallagher’s nonprofit Music National Service launched MusicianCorps to offer a job and paycheck to musicians eager to make a difference in a community by sharing their passion for music in an under-resourced teaching environment. The students benefitting from MusicianCorps — dubbed…
Mollie Lane, custodian in Physical Plant – Facilities, is the recipient of the 2010 Morgenstern-Clarren Social Justice Employee Prize. She received a $1,500 award. The award was announced April 1 by awards coordinator Marina Melendez, dean for the Class of 2010. Eligible employees included custodians, dining staff, grounds crew, and building maintenance staff. Barbara Schukoske, administrative assistant in Graduate Student Services, nominated Lane for the award. She cited Lane for going beyond her usual duties to ensure that students and staff alike have a clean, safe environment in which to work. “Ms. Lane’s work in keeping the Science Library clean in the past has…
David LowMissed Connections, a short documentary directed and produced by Mary Robertson ’01, will have its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival in Manhattan in April. Once found on the back pages of local papers, Missed Connections is a forum on Craigslist where those who regret their timidity make appeals to the "Ones Who Got Away." Robertson’s documentary peers inside these popular online messages-in-a-bottle asking whether love lost can be found again. Robertson is a producer and director of nonfiction media. For television she has produced and directed long- and short-form documentary programs for major broadcasters. She recently completed work…
The sophomore effort Congratulations was released by electro-pop duo MGMT (a.k.a. Ben Goldwasser ’05 and Andrew VanWyngarden ’05) this month and covered by media across the United States and abroad. Goldwasser and VanWyngarden first wrote and played their music as students at Wesleyan and found success after graduation that many musicians would die for. They were signed to the major label Columbia, and their full-length debut album, Oracular Spectacular, went gold on the Billboard charts with more than three million songs downloads globally. They had a hit single, “Time to Pretend” that won adoring fans who started to dress like…
National Geographic Entertainment has picked up the rights to Restrepo, the documentary by journalists Sebastian Junger ’84 and Tim Hetherington that follows a platoon of American soldiers in Afghanistan. The film won the Sundance Film Festival grand jury documentary prize and is set for release on June 2. The National Geographic channel, which has worldwide TV rights, will broadcast the film next fall. The film was named after a 15-man outpost in Afghanistan’s Korengal Valley, considered one of the most dangerous postings in the U.S military. “From May 2007 to July 2008, Hetherington and Junger dug in with a platoon of…