Women's Studies Director Valerie Traub Receives a John H. D'Arms Faculty Award for Distinguished Graduate Mentoring in the Humanities

Valerie Traub, Professor of English and Women’s Studies and Director of Women’s Studies received a 2006 John H. D’Arms Faculty Award for Distinguished Graduate Mentoring in the Humanities. The D’Arms Awards annually honor scholars of exceptional depth and breadth who generously share their wealth of knowledge and experience with their students and who accord them a tremendous level of support during their graduate programs and beyond. These awards are made annually to up to three nominees who are tenured faculty members in the humanities and who have directed a substantial number of dissertations over the past several years.

Here is a portrait of Valerie Traub in the words of some of those who wrote in support of her nomination.

The Chair of the English Department, Sidonie Smith, notes:

“…Professor Traub selflessly nurtures and consistently demands the highest intellectual rigor from her students. She continually inspires them to do their best, to see that they have something substantial and important to contribute if they only persevere.…She is an immensely effective teacher in the classroom and a truly remarkable mentor to the graduate students who work with her over long periods of time on their examinations and dissertations.”

And from her former and current students:

“Because of the nature of the support, advising, and professional development Valerie offers each and every one of her students, those who work with her often feel that they are part of a very lucky, very special group. We know that Valerie works for us—generously and hard.”

“She is the person who most significantly shaped my understanding of what it means to be an intellectual when I was a graduate student, and the person on whom I self-consciously model myself as a Director of Graduate Studies and mentor to my own graduate students.”

“Valerie has been the driving force in my career, shepherding me through my preliminary exams, my doctoral dissertation, the job market, and my early years as an assistant professor. She has been an unwavering source of intellectual, professional, and even emotional support and a model for my own engagement in the profession.”

Professor Traub received her Ph.D. in English from the University of Massachusetts–Amherst and came to the University of Michigan from Vanderbilt University in 1996. In addition to serving as Director of the Women’s Studies Program since 2003, she previously served as Graduate Chair for the Department of English Language and Literature. Her research primarily concerns gender and sexuality in early modern England. She is the author of The Renaissance of Lesbianism in Early Modern England (2002), which won the Best Book of 2002 Award from the Society for the Study of Early Modern Women. She also is author of Desire & Anxiety: Circulations of Sexuality in Shakespearean Drama (1992) and co-editor of Feminist Readings of Early Modern Culture: Emerging Subjects (1996) and Gay Shame (forthcoming).

Created in honor of John H. D’Arms, Vice Provost for Academic Affairs and Dean of the Graduate School (1985–1995), these awards celebrate the abiding love he held for the humanities and the intellectual and pedagogical values he cherished and championed during his tenure as Vice Provost and Dean.