SAS Welcomes 32 New Faculty Members
The School of Arts and Sciences has appointed 32 new members to its standing faculty for the 2008-09 academic year. The new hires join the faculty at the junior and senior levels across the natural sciences, social sciences and humanities.
This year’s new senior appointments are:
Carolyn Abbate, who joins the faculty as the Christopher H. Browne Distinguished Professor of Music. She comes to Penn from Harvard, and she studies the history of music, with a focus on opera. Other current interests include film music and sound technology.
Paul Cobb, who joins the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations as an associate professor. He comes to Penn from the University of Notre Dame, and he is a scholar of medieval Middle Eastern social and cultural history, with special interests in early Islam and the Crusades.
Joshua Esty, who comes to the Department of English as an associate professor. He studies twentieth-century British, Irish and postcolonial literature; Modernism; and the Victorian novel. He comes to Penn from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Robert Ghrist, who comes to Penn under the PIK initiative as Andrea Mitchell University Professor. He holds a joint appointment between the Departments of Mathematics in SAS and Electrical and Systems Engineering in the School of Engineering and Applied Science. His research focuses on topological methods with applications to dynamical systems, robotics and sensor networks.
Sarah Gordon, who joins the Department of History as a full professor. She holds a joint appointment in Penn Law as Arlin M. Adams Professor of Constitutional Law. Her research interests include religion in American political life; the separation of church and state; and Mormonism.
Andrea Goulet, who comes to Penn from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
She is an associate professor in the Department of Romance Languages, where she studies nineteenth- and twentieth-century French literature; science and literature; detective fiction; and the nouveau roman.
Kathryn Hellerstein, who joins the Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures as an associate professor. Her research focuses on Yiddish literature, with a special interest in women’s poetry and Jewish studies.
Joshua Klein, who comes to Penn from the University of Texas at Austin. He is an associate professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, where he conducts research on experimental particle physics, with a special interest in solar neutrinos.
Annette Lareau, who joins the Department of Sociology as the Stanley I. Sheerr Term Professor in the Social Sciences. Her research interests include the sociology of education and the ethnography of race and class. Lareau comes to Penn from the University of Maryland.
Emilio Parrado, who comes to Penn from Duke University. He is an associate professor the Department of Sociology, and his research focuses on demography, with an emphasis on international migration and Hispanic immigrant adaptation.
Mark Trodden, who will join the Department of Physics and Astronomy as a full professor in January 2009. He conducts research on cosmology and theoretical particle physics. Trodden will come to Penn from Syracuse University.
Click here to view the entire list of new standing faculty members.