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Catherine Soussloff named to Presidential Chair

By Scott Rappaport

History of art and visual culture professor Catherine Soussloff has been appointed to a Presidential Chair on the UCSC campus. The three-year appointment is effective July 1, 2006, through June 30, 2009.

Catherine Soussloff

The president of the University of California supports Presidential Chairs on each of the 10 UC campuses through an endowment established in 1981 by the UC Regents.

The positions are offered to distinguished members of the university's faculty and are intended to encourage new or interdisciplinary program development or to enhance quality in existing academic programs.

Soussloff received the award in recognition of her “distinguished scholarship and continuing efforts in the areas of interdisciplinary teaching, research, and publication activities on performance and the visual arts."

Annual support for a Presidential Chair is $45,000. Soussloff said she would use the funding to conduct a series of graduate and faculty seminars, conferences, courses, and her own research on topics concerning performance history and theory in art and visual culture, from the early modern period to the present.

The Santa Cruz campus has appointed eight Presidential Chairs in the past: Edmund Burke III, History (2003-07); Barbara Rogoff, Psychology (2003-07); Helene Moglen, Literature (2003-06); David Haussler, Bioinformatics (2000-03); David Hoy, Interdisciplinary Critical Thinking (2000-03); Angela Davis, African American and Feminist Studies (1995-97); Richard Wasserstrom, Moral Philosophy (1988-91); and Hayden White, Historical Studies (1983-88).