Of Note

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Michael Kremer Wins Nobel Prize in Economics

Image of Michael KremerFaculty Associate Michael Kremer, Gates Professor of Developing Societies, Department of Economics at Harvard University, is one of three recipients awarded the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2019. He shares the prize with Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the three won “for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty.” 

The three Laureates use an experiment-based approach to fight global poverty, by breaking down larger problems into smaller and more precise questions. This approach allows them to design more specific experiments among the people most affected. From improving school results in western Kenya to introducing preventive health care subsidies in many countries, the research done by Kremer and his colleagues has measurably helped reduce poverty around the world. 

Constance M. Bourguignon Named Rhodes Scholar

Undergraduate Associate Constance Bourguignon, also an Undergraduate Research Fellow in the Canada Program, was one of seven Harvard seniors named Rhodes Scholars—and one of two Canadian Rhodes Scholars. Applicants are chosen for their strong academic excellence and commitment to make a difference in the world, among other criteria. Rhodes Scholarships provide all expenses for two or three years of study at the University of Oxford; Bourguignon, a native of Montreal, plans to study education at Oxford starting in September 2020. 

Naima Green-Riley Wins CPD Doctoral Dissertation Grant

Graduate Student Associate Naima Green-Riley is the recipient of the 2019–2020 CPD Doctoral Dissertation Grant. The grant, offered by the University of Southern California Center on Public Diplomacy, recognizes and supports the work of emerging scholars from around the world engaged in cutting-edge research on public diplomacy. Green-Riley studies US and Chinese public diplomacy through a lens of political science, communications, and psychology. She is also a former foreign service officer at the US Department of State. 

Yael Berda Receives Honorable Mention for APLA Book Prize

Former Academy Scholar Yael Berda, assistant professor of sociology and of anthropology at Hebrew University, received an honorable mention for this year’s APLA Book Prize for her book, Living Emergency: Israel's Permit Regime in the Occupied West Bank (Stanford University Press, 2017). Every year, the Association for Political and Legal Anthropology (APLA) recognizes a book that “best exemplifies creativity and rigor in the ethnographic exploration of politics, law, and/or their interstices.” 

Matteo Maggiori Wins Carlo Alberto Medal

Faculty Associate Matteo Maggiori, associate professor of economics at Harvard University, is the 2019 recipient of the distinguished Carlo Alberto Medal. The award, established in 2007 and given by the Centre for Economic Policy Research, recognizes an Italian scholar under the age of forty who has contributed significantly to the field of economics. Matteo’s research focuses on international economics, finance, and macroeconomics. 

Ieva Jusionyte Wins Third Place Victor Turner Prize In Ethnographic Writing

Faculty Associate Ieva Jusionyte, assistant professor of anthropology and of social studies at Harvard University, received third place for the Victor Turner Prize In Ethnographic Writing for her book Threshold: Emergency Responders on the US-Mexico Border (University of California Press, 2018). The annual award is given by the Society for Humanistic Anthropology (SHA) and recognizes innovative ethnographic works—from monographs to biographies to poems—written in the spirit of Victor Turner, who “devoted his career to seeking an accessible language that would reopen anthropology to the human subject.”

Pippa Norris is the 2019 Charles Merriam Award Recipient

Faculty Associate Pippa Norris, Paul F. McGuire Lecturer in Comparative Politics at Harvard Kennedy School, received the Charles Merriam Award, which “recognizes a person whose published work and career represent a significant contribution to the art of government through the application of social science research.” The American Political Science Association (APSA) gives the award biennially. 

David Howell Honored with Named Professorship

Faculty Associate David Howell, previously a professor of Japanese history at Harvard University, was awarded a named professorship: Robert K. and Dale J. Weary Professor of Japanese History. Howell is one of two faculty members in the Department of East Asian Languages and Civilization to be awarded a named professorship. He shares the honor with his colleague Wai-yee Li. 

Paul J. Kosmin Wins Runciman Book Prize 

Faculty Associate Paul Kosmin, assistant professor of the classics at Harvard University, is the corecipient of the 2019 Runciman Book Prize for Time and Its Adversaries in the Seleucid Empire (Harvard University Press, 2018). The award is administered by the Anglo-Hellenic League and is given to a book about Greece. According to the chair of the judging panel, Kosmin’s book touches upon fundamental concepts of how we understand ourselves and our place in the world. 

Quinn Slobodian Wins George Louis Beer Prize 

Former Visiting Fellow Quinn Slobodian, associate professor of history at Wellesley College, is the recipient of the 2019 George Louis Beer Prize for his book Globalists: The End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism (Harvard University Press, 2018). The prize, awarded annually since 1923, recognizes outstanding historical writing on any phase of European international history since 1895. 

Francesca Lidia Viano Receives Honorable Mention for Gilbert Chinard Book Prize

Weatherhead Research Cluster on Global Transformations Visiting Fellow Francesca Lidia Viano received an honorable mention for the Gilbert Chinard Book Prize for her book, Sentinel: The Unlikely Origins of the Statue of Liberty (Harvard University Press, 2018). Every year the prize is given by the Society for French Historical Studies to a new book published by a North American press in one of the two following fields: the history of French-American relations; or the comparative history of France and North, Central, or South America.  

Rabiat Akande Receives Harvard Law School 2019 Writing Prize

Academy Scholar Rabiat Akande received the Harvard Law School's 2019 Writing Prize of the Program on Law and Society in the Muslim World. She is a corecipient of the award, which she won for her dissertation “Navigating Entanglements: Contestations over Religion-State Relations in British Colonial Northern Nigeria, c. 1890–1977.” 

Jeffrey Kahn Awarded 2019 Avant Garde Book Prize

Former Academy Scholar Jeffrey Kahn, assistant professor of anthropology at UC Davis, has been awarded the 2019 Haitian Studies Association Avant Garde Book Prize for his book Islands of Sovereignty: Haitian Migration and the Borders of Empire (University of Chicago Press, 2019). This prize is given “to the best single-authored book in Haitian Studies in the social sciences, with broad application beyond the academy. The Haitian Studies Association provides a forum for the exchange and dissemination of ideas and knowledge in order to inform pedagogy, practice, and policy about Haiti in a global context.”

Photo used with permission from Michael Kremer