October 2014 Accolades

Spencer R. Crew, Robinson Professor of American, African American, and Public History, with Lonnie G. Bunch and Clement A. Price, had a new publication, “Slave Culture: A Documentary Collection of the Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers’ Project,” published by Greenwood Publishing Group, 2014. He also lectured on the Underground Railroad to teachers from Fallsburg, N.Y., in April, and lectured and conducted a panel discussion on Henrietta Lacks at the New York Brooklyn Public Library in May. In addition, Crew lectured on the comparisons between the Civil Rights Movement and the Gay Rights Movement at the Depository Trust Company and the National Securities Clearing Corporation in Jersey City, N.J., in June.

Robert Hazen, Robinson Professor of Earth Sciences, presented the D. Foster Hewett Lecture at Lehigh University on origins of life. He also was named the 2014 Ingerson lecturer of the Geochemical Society, the 2015 Leibniz lecturer of the University of Pottsdam (Germany), and the 2015 Utrecht symposium lecturer at the University of Utrecht (The Netherlands).

Carma Hinton, Robinson Professor of Visual Culture and Chinese Studies, served as a judge on the second Washington, D.C., International Chinese Film Festival, in September.

John Paden, Robinson Professor of International Studies, in September briefed the United Nations’ Department of Political Affairs on the current situation in Nigeria; gave a presentation to senior U.S. government officials on violent extremism in northern Nigeria; gave a presentation to Nigerian higher education officials comparing U.S. and Nigerian approaches to higher education; gave a presentation to a U.S. State Department conference on future political projections in Nigeria; continued linkages with Usmanu Danfodiyo University, Sokoto, regarding peace studies; and worked with the U.S. Institute of Peace on a report focusing on interfaith cooperation in Nigeria.

Laurie O. Robinson, Robinson Professor of Criminology, Law, and Society, presented “Importance and Impact of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994” (20 years after enactment) to policy makers, criminal justice constituent groups and federal agency representatives hosted by the Pew Charitable Trust Public Safety Performance Project. Also commemorating this crime legislation, she contributed to the Vera Institute of Justice’s multimedia initiative, Justice in Focus: Crime Bill@20, with a piece describing how appropriations under the act unexpectedly gave a big boost to science, supporting the greatest spending on crime-related research in the nation’s history.

James Trefil, Robinson Professor of Physics, presented “Scientific Methodology and Expert Testimony” at the Economics Institute for Judges, sponsored by the George Mason University School of Law’s Law and Economics Center in May and September.