Precis | Spring 2004

Earl Lewis, dean of the Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studies and vice provost for academic affairs/graduate studies at the University of Michigan, will become Emory’s executive vice president for academic affairs and provost on July 1. Lewis (left) will be Emory’s first African American provost and the highest ranking African American administrator in University history. Lewis, who is also the Elsa Barkley Brown and Robin D. G. Kelley Collegiate Professor of History and African American and African Studies, has served as dean of the Rackham School since 1997 and became vice provost in 1998.

Dozens of outreach programs have benefitted from the assistance of fellows and alumni from Emory’s Kenneth Cole Fellowship Program in Community Building and Social Change, now in its third year. “The program is really taking off,” says Sam Marie Engle ’90C, director of the program. “What we’re really proud of is that many of our students have continued their relationships with their community partners through internships.”

Merle Black, Emory’s Asa Griggs Candler Professor of Political Science, and his twin brother, Earl Black, Herbert S. Autrey Professor of Political Science at Rice University, have won the prestigious V.O. Keyes Award for their most recent book, The Rise of Southern Republicans (Harvard University Press, 2002). The award is given each year by the Southern Political Science Association to the most outstanding book on Southern politics.

Assistant Professor of Dermatology Jack L. Arbiser was out walking near his home when he happened upon a common magnolia seed cone, picked it up, and decided on the spot it should be examined from a pharmacological point of view. Arbiser took the cone home, boiled it, filtered the substance, and tested the extract. As it turned out, his hunch was right.

For most Southerners, the word “moonshine” conjures up an image of a toothless hillbilly in overalls swilling from a crockery jug. But old-fashioned notions about moonshine consumption cease to be funny when drinkers turn up with lead poisoning from the illegally brewed liquor, as Emory researchers at Atlanta’s Grady Hospital recently discovered.

When the first Iraqi counterattack missile flew over his head in Kuwait last year, it took CNN correspondent Sanjay Gupta a few minutes to figure out what was happening. An Emory neurosurgeon who covers medical affairs for CNN, Gupta was in Kuwait to document the work of the U.S. Navy’s front-line medical unit, the “Devil Docs.”

Philosophy majors go on to become lawyers, doctors, corporate executives, teachers, historians, and authors. “You can teach data and techniques, but they become outmoded,” says Charles Howard Candler Professor of Philosophy Rudolf Makkreel, who chairs Emory’s department. “However, if you prepare students to really think, they can deal successfully with changing circumstances.”

The University celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of the “feminine touch” at Emory this year with an exhibit documenting the history of coeds on campus and two special events.

Mark Ravina spent years researching and writing a just-published biography, The Last Samurai: The Life and Battles of Saigo Takamori (2004, John Wiley and Sons), about the samurai leader who inspired the movie.

The flat roof and faulty skylights in the George W. Woodruff Physical Education Center have caused trouble in the building for years. Now a major capital project to fix the problems is underway, and construction will likely continue through the fall.

Notorious for its often violent, mysogynistic, and sexually explicit lyrics, rap music has always gotten a bad rap for its potential effect on young, impressionable listeners. A recent study led by an Emory public health researcher bolsters the case for the allegations of rap’s bad influence.