The Guggenheim Foundation awarded fellowships to five University faculty members Wednesday.
“To me, our faculty receiving five Guggenheim awards in one year is an indication of the depth and breadth of scholarship here at U.Va,” University Provost Arthur Garson stated in a University press release. University faculty have won 12 Guggenheim Fellowships since 1992, but these are the first since 2005, according to the release. 180 fellowships total were granted this year, according to a Guggenheim press release, and almost 3,000 people applied for the fellowships, which are designed to recognize and encourage achievements in the arts, humanities and sciences. The average award in last year’s competition was $43,200; the amounts for this year’s awards have not been released.
Religious Studies Prof. Charles Marsh, one of the University’s newest Guggenheim fellows, said the large number of fellowships awarded to University faculty this year is remarkable.
“It simply reminds us of the creative energies of the Academical Village,” he said. “It is a community that is very supportive of intellectual work and taking risks.”
Marsh said he will use his fellowship grant to take a year off and finish a biography about German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Winning the fellowship is “great encouragement,” he said, as he has “felt some frustration trying to get the lay of the land with this biography, and the challenge of writing a biography.”
Assoc. English Prof. Lisa Spaar, also a Guggenheim fellowship recipient, said she will use her grant to work on a similar challenge.
“For me, it’s going to mean an opportunity to have some focused writing time,” she said.
Law Prof. Risa Goluboff, meanwhile, is the only faculty member outside of the College to win a fellowship. She will use her grant to research a new book about the effect of culture wars during the 1960s on vagrancy laws during the same decade.
“It’s a validation of my past work and it also means they think there is promise in my next book,” she said. “My books are about marginal people, and it’s nice to know that other people care about them, too.”
Assoc. Environmental Sciences Prof. Deborah Lawrence said she plans to work away from her Virginia home, using her grant to visit Thailand next year and study land use change in tropical forests. By actively working with social scientists in her field of research, Lawrence said the fellowship gives her a chance to “get out of my traditional natural science box.”
“The Guggenheim sponsors research that is not just traditional,” she added, “but also kind of risky.”
Assoc. Art History Prof. Francesca Fiorani, who plans to use her grant to go to Italy to study Leonardo Da Vinci’s work on shadows, said the recent influx in the number of awards shows that the University has made significant strides in terms of research.
“It is interesting that it was given to the five of us in five different fields across the College and across the University,” Fiorani said. “It’s an occasion of pride for everyone here.”
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