Dear colleagues,
June 30 marked my last day in office, and though I have now passed the GPD torch to Libby Cohen, I’d nonetheless like to thank you (faculty, staff, and students alike) for your support during my three years as grad director. It’s been a pleasure to observe and communicate so many notable achievements among current graduate students and recent alumni in particular. I have learned much from many and have appreciated the collegial atmosphere in both Department and Graduate Program alike.
Special thanks are due to Karen Dancy, grad program assistant, and Daniela Di Nunzio, grad program secretary, for helping to ensure the smooth running of the program. I’d also like to thank my predecessors (Anne Rubenstein, Marlene Shore, Marcel Martel, and Stephen Brooke) as well as the two History chairs I worked with (Jonathan Edmondson, and now Marcel) for their support, encouragement and advice, while a special word of thanks is due to my immediate predecessor, Carolyn Podruchny. Thanks also to all those of you who sat on graduate program committees as well as to the successive cohorts of GHSA co-presidents (Mark Dorsey, Carly Simpson, Joanna Pearce, Abril Liberatori, and Noa Yaari) with whom I worked.
The new grad director, Libby Cohen, is Professor of History and a member of the Graduate Programs in History, Humanities, and Gender, Feminist and Women’s Studies. Her full-time appointment came in 1996 through a conversion from CUPE 3903. Since 2004 she has been regularly active in the History Grad Program, teaching courses and supervising MAs and PhDs. Her own research, based in the criminal court archives of seventeenth-century Rome, has produced a book co-authored with Tom Cohen, Daily Life in Renaissance Italy, and a long string of articles and chapters on such themes as women, work, family, street rituals, rape, artists, self-representation, and orality.
I’m sure you’ll want to join me in wishing Libby all the best in her term of office. She can be contacted for graduate program-related issues at dgshist@yorku.ca.
Wishing you all a wonderful summer,
Willie