English Department Recognition
Dawn Coleman Named AAAS Visiting Scholar for 2009-10
Dawn Coleman, Assistant Professor of English, has been named an American Academy of Arts and Sciences Visiting Scholar for 2009-2010. The purpose of the Visiting Scholars Program is to support the work of younger public policy analysts, humanists, and social scientists who show promise of becoming leaders in their field, especially those who work on multidisciplinary topics.
Dawn was awarded the fellowship for a book project entitled “Preaching and the Rise of the American Novel,” which draws on her expertise in American literature, religious studies, and American studies. The project examines Protestant preaching as a dynamic and immensely authoritative religious practice in nineteenth-century American culture and argues that a range of antebellum authors—male and female, black and white, popular and literary—sought to capture for novels the spiritual authority of the pulpit.
Dawn will spend the next academic year in residence at the House of the Academy, an active research center for intensive scholarship by individuals from diverse disciplinary, institutional, and geographic backgrounds.
Located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences was founded during the American Revolution by John Adams, James Bowdoin, John Hancock, and other leaders who contributed prominently to the establishment of the new nation, its government, and its Constitution. Its purpose was to provide a forum for a select group of scholars, members of the learned professions, and government and business leaders to work together on behalf of the democratic interests of the republic. The Visiting Scholars Program is one way the AAAS aims to help invest in the future of the next generation of scholars. We would like to congratulate Dawn for being selected to participate in this prestigious program.