Author: Jim Patterson
Jarred Amato, BA’09, Watering ‘Book Deserts’
May. 23, 2019—Reading, and a child’s access to books, is a precursor to success by all yardsticks. But the lack of reading materials in many neighborhoods across America—regions known as “book deserts”—threatens the educational achievements of countless students. English teacher Jarred Amato decided to do something about it. In 2016 he and students at Nashville’s Maplewood High...
Accolade: Nafissa Thompson-Spires, MA’05, PhD’09, one of 10 Whiting Award winners
May. 23, 2019—Nafissa Thompson-Spires, MA’05, PhD’09, was announced as one of 10 Whiting Award winners March 20 at a ceremony at the New York Historical Society. Thompson-Spires’ short story collection Heads of the Colored People (2018, Atria/37 INK) has been honored with a PEN Open Book Award, longlisted for the 2018 National Book Award and Aspen Words...
Student–Alumni Programs and Board Celebrate 10 Years
May. 23, 2019—For 10 years the Vanderbilt Alumni Association’s Student–Alumni Programs have helped thousands of students build class traditions and connect with alumni. The Student Alumni Board has been there every step of the way. Newton Adkins, BS’14, joined the Student Alumni Board during his first year at Vanderbilt. “I was excited to do something meaningful that...
Alumna Pays It Forward Through Advocacy
May. 23, 2019—Karen White, BA’11, was born to be an advocate. Her first experience in advocacy was for herself at the age of 15, when she left a volatile home life and struggled to support herself through periods of homelessness. “I remember sleeping on the couch in the tattoo parlor I worked at and thinking, ‘This can’t...
Barbara Tsakirgis, Renowned Scholar of Classical Archaeology
May. 23, 2019—Barbara Tsakirgis, a noted scholar on ancient Greek domestic architecture as well as a strong community advocate for Nashville’s Parthenon, died Jan. 16. Tsakirgis, 64, had been diagnosed with ALS three years ago and died at her home. She was a professor of classical studies, emerita, and history of art, emerita, who joined the Vanderbilt...
Everett H. Erlick, BA’42, ABC’s Chief Lawyer
May. 23, 2019—Everett H. Erlick, a distinguished veteran of the broadcast industry and longtime public servant, died March 8, 2019, at his home in Stuart, Florida. He was 97. As executive vice president, general counsel and director of the American Broadcasting Cos. Inc. for 25 years, his expansive portfolio of responsibilities included oversight of all legal aspects...
Yvonne Young Clark, MS’72, First Lady of Engineering
May. 23, 2019—Yvonne Young Clark, the first woman to earn a bachelor of science in mechanical engineering from Howard University, the first woman to earn a master’s degree in engineering management from the Vanderbilt University School of Engineering, and the first woman to serve as a faculty member in the College of Engineering and Technology at Tennessee...
Harold Bradley, ’49, Hall of Fame Guitarist
May. 23, 2019—Harold Bradley, member of the Country Music Hall of Fame, famed guitarist, and cog in the family that led the ascent of country music in Nashville, died Jan. 31. He was 93. Bradley grew up in Nashville and took up the banjo as his first instrument. His older brother, Owen Bradley, who also earned enshrinement...
Recent Books, Winter 2019
Feb. 20, 2019—Gastronomic Judaism as Culinary Midrash (2018, Lexington/Rowman & Littlefield) by Jonathan Brumberg-Kraus, MA’86, PhD’91 This book is about who and how one makes food Jewish. Brumberg-Kraus questions Jewish identity in particular, and identity generally as something fixed, stable, singular and unintentional and Jewish food choices as situational, often temporary, expressions of Jewish identity. The book...
Recent Books, Fall 2018
Feb. 20, 2019—Encounters at the Edge of the Muslim World: A Political Memoir of Kyrgyzstan (2018, Rowman & Littlefield) by Eugene Huskey, BA’74 Holder of the William R. Kenan Jr. Chair in Political Science at Stetson University, Huskey’s research first took him to Kyrgyzstan in 1992, six months after Kyrgyzstan’s emergence as an independent state. His memoir...
Accolade: Shadle wins inaugural Cohen/RIPM Award
Feb. 19, 2019—Douglas Shadle, assistant professor of musicology, was presented with the American Musicological Society’s inaugural H. Robert Cohen/RIPM Award at this year’s annual meeting in San Antonio for his book Orchestrating the Nation: The Nineteenth-Century American Symphonic Enterprise (2015, Oxford University Press). The award honors a work of scholarship of exceptional merit based upon 18th-, 19th-,...
Pro Performance: New commissioning project gives Blair composition students a taste of professional life
Feb. 19, 2019—The composer Michael Slayton can’t remember the first time an ensemble performed one of his pieces. That’s perhaps not surprising, since Slayton’s works, especially his chamber music, are now frequently commissioned and performed the world over. But Slayton is certain of one thing: His music was never performed professionally during his undergraduate years. “In those...