The Bowdoin Orient

This fall, there are 46 new faculty members, several of whom hold newly created leadership positions. Recently added positions include a director of the Africana Studies Program, a director of the Environmental Studies Program, and a full-time director of the Bowdoin Scientific Station on Kent Island. There is also a lecturer in Arabic for the first time and a new chair for the Theater and Dance Department.

Olufemi Vaughan comes to Bowdoin as the new director of Africana Studies and the first Geoffrey Canada Professor of Africana Studies and History. He has spent the last 18 years in various teaching and administrative positions at the State University of New York (SUNY), Stony Brook. He characterized his position's main objective as exploring ways "of extending and deepening" the interdisciplinary pursuits of Africana, African American, and African Diaspora Studies.

Vaughan said that while he was visiting the campus during the hiring process, his discussions with faculty members and students centered on ways in which they could work together to create a "coherent and cohesive" Africana Studies department. He explained that his own approach to the complex, interdisciplinary nature of Africana Studies aligned with the sort of department the College was looking to create.

"[It is] essential to find ways to make connections [between departments] and to find faculty colleagues to be a part of [an] interdisciplinary dialogue," Vaughan said.

Philip Camill arrives on campus as the new director of Environmental Studies and the Rusack Associate Professor of Biology and Environmental Studies after nine years of teaching at Carleton College. In explaining the role of his new position, Camill said he "will be involved with sustaining and building on the successes of the ES program and helping to develop synergies among other affiliated programs on campus, such as Arctic Studies and Coastal Studies."

This semester, Camill is teaching "Global Change Ecology," a course that shares the same name as his field study. He described the discipline as an examination of "how humans impact ecosystems," and his specific area of research as looking at "how rising global temperatures affect things like permafrost thaw and carbon cycling in boreal and Arctic ecosystems in northern Canada."

Damon Gannon began his work as the first full-time Director of the Bowdoin Scientific Station on Kent Island May 1, 2008, and he is now also serving as an adjunct assistant professor in the Biology Department. Previously, he was employed as a staff scientist at the Mote Marine Laboratory in Sarasota, Florida. This semester, Gannon brings together his work on Kent Island and his expertise as a marine ecologist through the course he is teaching, "Ecology of the Gulf of Maine and Bay of Fundy."

Although he will spend his summer at the scientific station, Gannon will work during the academic year fundraising for the facilities and programs on Kent Island and planning the type of research he would like the station to conduct during its next summer session.

Resulting largely from student-led efforts during the past two years, Bowdoin is offering instruction in Arabic for the first time. Russel Hopley, who is working toward a Ph.D. in Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University, is teaching "Elementary Arabic" as a post-doctoral fellow in the Religion Department.

Hopley called the desire of colleges to have programs in Arabic and Islamic studies a "country-wide phenomenon." While on campus, he also plans to finish his dissertation, as well as write and present two articles exploring different aspects of his studies on 12th-Century Islamic Spain.

Roger Bechtel is the new chair of the Theater and Dance Department and an associate professor in the department. He arrives after holding comparable positions at Miami University in Ohio, where he worked with graduate students.

This semester, Bechtel is teaching two courses: a senior theater seminar and "Performance in the 21st Century."

In his personal work, Bechtel said his interests as an artist can be characterized as an "amalgam of traditional and experimental." In his scholarly pursuits, he said that he "work[s] with a certain amount of political and cultural critique."

Photos contributed by Bowdoin Orient staff, Damon Gannon, and the Bowdoin College Office of Communications and Public Affairs.

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