Said and Done

May 2011 Edition
Published by the Office of the Dean
MIT School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences


 

 

 



QUOTABLE 


"There is little you can do that would be a surer path to leaping
dramatically forward in your career than doing a humanities PhD."  


Damon Horowitz, Director of Engineering for Google
Story at The Times Higher Education

 



KUDOS


Muriel Rambeloarison and Xinzhu Wang win inaugural Isabelle de Courtivron Prizes 
With this award, the Center for Bilingual/Bicultural Studies salutes cross-cultural fluency—an ability key to leadership and success in today's global world. 
More

 

 

2011 Levitan Awards for Excellence in Teaching Announced 

Dean Fitzgerald has announced the eight 2011 recipients of the James A. and Ruth Levitan Award for Excellence in Teaching, saying, "These educators and colleagues represent the very best academic leadership in the School."
More


John Harbison wins the American Music Center's Founder Award 
Institute Professor John Harbison has received the American Music Center’s prestigious Founders Award, given since 1999 for lifetime achievement in the field of new American music. Previous winners of the award have included Charles Ives, Count Basie and Philip Glass. 
Full story at MIT News


Economist Esther Duflo named to the 2011 TIME 100
"Over 1 billion people live on less than $1.25 a day. Amazingly, very little is known about how they make economic choices and what might help ease their lives. Economist Esther Duflo, 38, is changing that."
Full story at Time Magazine

 


 


 

NEWS AND FEATURES

 

Robert Kanigel's On An Irish Island | thinking about the pace of modern life     

An award-winning science writer and author of the acclaimed biography The Man Who Knew Infinity, Robert Kanigel has spent his career exploring the evolution of society through a series of unique lenses that reveal what we have gained from modernity—and what we’ve lost. A windswept island village off the coast of Ireland, is the setting for his forthcoming book. 
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Open House Photo Gallery
For MIT's historic Open House on April 30, 2011, the School's disciplines and programs presented idea stations on leading research, musical concerts, games, videos, demonstrations, readings, tours, talks—and a tent next to Kresge with café-style seating for snacks and visiting. A great scene!   
More

 

2011–12 Knight Science Journalism Fellows named
The Knight Science Journalism Fellows, a program of the School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences, has selected 12 journalists from eight countries for its 29th class of fellows. The journalists will study science, health, environment, and technology at MIT during the 2011–12 academic year.  
More at MIT News

 

Google cites value of humanities PhD for technology firms 
The Times Higher Education reports on a conference at which Damon Horowitz, Director of Engineering for Google, discussed the particular value humanities PhDs have at the internet company. TTHE writes that "Dr. Horowitz was one of several Silicon Valley executives exploring the theme at the BiblioTech conference, an event that united academics with entrepreneurs and senior managers from some of the world's leading high-tech companies." 
Story at The Times Higher Education

 

Précis | Spring 2011 edition published 
The Center for International Studies newsletter covers the wide range of Center activities and tracks the accomplishments of CIS faculty, researchers and affiliates. 
Visit précis


Scope | May/April 2011 edition published
The student publication of the Graduate Program in Science Writing 
Visit Scope

 


 



RESEARCH PORTFOLIO  


Research Portfolio 
Research is the engine for the School's capacity to help meet the world's great challenges. To name just a few areas of impact, the School's research helps alleviate poverty, safeguard elections, understand the past and present, improve health policy, articulate morality, steer economies, plan space policy, assess the impact of new technologies, understand human language, advance musicology, illuminate the U.S. Constitution, and create new forms at the juncture of art and science.
Research Portfolio


A champion of Creole
Linguist Michel DeGraff is on a quest to give Haitian Creole its due as a respected language—and to help Haitian schoolchildren learn in their native tongue.
Feature by Peter Dizikes at MIT News 

 

 

Looking beyond English
Wayne O'Neil, Professor of Linguistics, uses linguistics in an ESL classroom to teach scientific principles and to empower a new generation of critical thinkers.
Full story by Emily Finn at MIT News

 

Bookshelf 
The research of MIT's School of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences appears principally in the form of books and publications, as well as music and theater productions. These gems of the School provide new knowledge and analysis, innovation and insight, guidance for policy, and nourishment for lives.
Take a look
 


 

FORTHCOMING EVENTS

145th MIT Commencement Exercises |  Friday, June 3, 2011 
Graduation week at MIT is always spectacular, and 2011 is a very special year because it is MIT's 150th anniversary. Commencement weekend will close 150 days of academic and service programs, performances, exhibits, and special events to celebrate the past and envision the future of MIT. 
Commencement website
 



MULTIMEDIA

Ideas Matter Series | Immigrants and the right to stay 
Ideas Matter, a joint project of the School's Political Science Department and the Boston Review, is a lecture series that brings Boston Review writers together with academics, expert, and practitioners for substantive debate on the challenges of our times. In this discussion, moderated by MIT Professor of Political Science Melissa Nobles, Professor Joseph Carens argues that unauthorized immigrants who have lived in the US for a sustained period of time should be granted the right to stay. Professors Carol Swain, Mathias Risse, and Jennifer Hochschild respond.  
Watch at CCPAN Video Library

 

  
 


 

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