Fall
1999
Crossing linguistic and cultural boundaries
Super-power sense and sensibility
Soundings is a publication of the School of Humanities and Social Science at MIT
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Bullets & bytes
Alec Marantz
heads Department of Linguistics and Philosophy
Professor Alec Marantz has been named the new head of the Department of Linguistics and Philosophy. Taking over the post from Robert Stalnaker, the Laurence Rockefeller Professor of Philosophy, Marantz is considered one of the world's leading linguists. The main creator of the subfield of morphosyntax and author of On the Nature of Grammatical Relations, he has been developing in recent years the theory of distributed morphology.
Prior to arriving at MIT in 1990, Professor Marantz taught at Brandeis University, the University of California, Irvine and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He was a junior fellow in Harvard University's Society of Fellows between 1981 and 1984. In 1981 he earned a PhD in linguistics from MIT; he received a BA from Oberlin College in 1978.
Marantz is currently research director of the KIT/MIT MEG Joint Research Laboratory, which houses the world's only magnetoencephalography (MEG) brain-imaging system within a linguistics department. MEG offers an advanced technology for measuring human brain activity underlying language and other cognitive functions. Aside from unifying the studies of linguistics and brain science, Marantz is also interested in the relationship between linguistics, philosophy and literary theory, and the general problem of neural coding. In addition, he says, "I hope to ensure that everyone on campus will be able to answer the question we in linguistics and philosophy get asked most often by undergraduates: ‘Why are linguistics and philosophy in the same department?'"
Harriet Ritvo
appointed head of History Faculty
Taking over the position filled by Professor Peter C. Perdue, Professor Harriet Ritvo has been appointed head of the History Faculty. Ritvo is an internationally known scholar of the Victorian period and an accomplished essayist who has written widely on the humanities and social sciences. Her first book, The Animal Estate: The English and Other Creatures in the Victorian Age, is considered a seminal work in British cultural history, taking what once had been regarded as a marginal topic"—animals"—and casting new light on the values and tenets of British culture. Her most recent book, The Platypus and the Mermaid and Other Figments of the Classifying Imagination, has received worldwide praise for its originality in exploring the cultural significance of animal classification in 18th- and 19th-century Britain. She has received numerous fellowships and honors, including the Whiting Writers' Award and Guggenheim Foundation and National Humanities Center fellowships.
Professor Ritvo came to MIT as a lecturer in writing in 1979, became an assistant professor in the Writing Program in 1980, and was promoted to tenured associate professor of writing in 1987. In 1991 she was appointed to a joint position in the History Faculty and Program in Writing and Humanistic Studies and was promoted to full professor of history and writing in 1992. She served as Associate Dean of the School of Humanities and Social Science between 1992 and 1995. In 1995 she was selected the inaugural holder of the Arthur J. Connor Professorship. She earned an AB from Harvard University, attended Girton College at Cambridge University in England and received a PhD from Harvard in 1975.
Josey Twombly
appointed new assistant dean for development
Josey Twombly has joined the School of Humanities and Social Sciences at MIT as the new assistant dean for development. Prior to coming to MIT she was director of major gifts at Harvard Medical School. Previously she served as associate director of special gifts at Williams College during its Third Century Campaign, which raised $173.6 million on a goal of $150 million.
Twombly began her development career as a volunteer, serving on a number of boards in the Albany, New York area. She later joined Ketchum, Inc., then one of the country's largest fundraising consultancies, where she worked five years as capital campaign director. She is an alumna of Skidmore College and received a master's degree from Russell Sage College in Troy, New York.
Anne
McCants honored with Levitan Prize
The 1999 Levitan Prize in the Humanities has been awarded to Associate Professor Anne McCants of the History Faculty. The $20,000 prize supports innovative and creative scholarship in the humanities by faculty of the School of Humanities and Social Science. McCants, who has been at MIT since 1991, is researching the economic and social history of early modern Europe, particularly demographic change, social welfare, labor-market participation and material culture. Her winning proposal was entitled, "Accounting for Taste: Consumer Cultures of the Dutch Republic."
John
Corley retires
At the helm of the MIT Concert Band for 50 years, John Corley retired from the post last spring. During his tenure, he oversaw the commission of 50 new works, developed a repertoire of more than 350 pieces and worked with more than 1,000 MIT students.
The MIT Concert Band was one of the first ensembles to devote itself entirely to original works for band and often presented the Boston premiere of works by well-known 20th-century composers, such as Hindemith, Copeland and Schoenberg. Mr. Corley's retirement plans include continuing the Oxford University Press project, which publishes many of these commissioned pieces, and remaining active as conductor of his professional group, the Boston Brass Ensemble.
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Institute of Technology