Seven University of Michigan faculty members have been awarded 2008 Guggenheim Fellowships, a national honor recognizing distinguished achievement in many fields.
This year's fellowship winners include 190 artists, scholars and scientists selected from nearly 3,000 applicants in the United States and Canada for awards totaling $8.2 million.
The U-M fellows and their projects are:
• Geri A. Allen, associate professor of music, for music composition. Allen's project celebrates humanity and embraces the continuity of innovation as personified by three artists - pianist-composers Herbie Hancock, McCoy Tyner and Cecil Taylor.
• Sheldon Danziger, H.J. Meyer Distinguished University Professor of Public Policy, Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy, for work examining four decades of antipoverty policies. Danziger will write a book that will evaluate the changing views about the causes of poverty that led first to the expansion of social welfare policies after the war on poverty and later to the 1996 welfare reform that cut benefits to the poor.
• Phoebe Gloeckner, assistant professor of art, School of Art & Design, for a graphic narrative about a Mexican girl murdered at the turn of this century in Ciudad Juarez, a major U.S.-Mexico border crossing adjacent to El Paso, Texas. Gloeckner developed a three-dimensional technique, teaching herself to use tools and to construct nearly everything she would normally draw.
• David M. Halperin, W.H. Auden Collegiate Professor of the History and Theory of Sexuality, Department of English, for a book, "How to Be Gay," that will follow on a class he has taught at U-M. The fellowship, Halperin said, "affirms the judgment of the administrators and colleagues at the University of Michigan who supported my controversial class on the same topic despite strong opposition from many quarters."
• Paul Christopher Johnson, associate professor of history, Afroamerican and African Studies, director of the Doctoral Program in Anthropology and History, for a project entitled, "To Be Possessed: 'Religion' and the Purification of Spirits." Johnson's project examines civil religion in the Americas, especially in the wake of the emancipation of slaves and the perceived dangers of their civil integration.
• Richard Primus, law professor, for a book he will write on constitutional authority in the wake of cvil war, focusing on American constitutional decisionmakers in the courts, Congress and elsewhere in the years after the Civil War, between 1870 and 1885.
• Ashutosh Varshney, political science professor, for "Cities and Ethnic Conflict: a Multicountry Study." Varshney will analyze ethnic conflict in 15 cities from four countries: Indonesia, Nigeria, Malaysia and Sri Lanka. His work concentrates on cities that used to be violent but have become peaceful, cities that used to be peaceful but have become violent, and peaceful cities that remained riot-free.
Guggenheim Fellows are appointed based on distinguished achievement in the past and exceptional promise for future accomplishment. Since 1925, the foundation has granted more than $265 million in fellowships to more than 16,500 people.
"To have faculty members recognized for their scholarly work in such an array of fields is a testament to the depth and breadth of the Michigan faculty," U-M Provost Teresa Sullivan said in a press release announcing the U-M selections.
For more information on the Guggenheim Fellows, go to http://www.gf.org.