Three SU Faculty Earn Prestigious Welcome Fellowships
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| Dr. James King | Dr. Peggy Proudfoot-McGuire | Dr. Kelli Randall |
Recipients are Drs. James King and Kelli Randall of the English Department and Peggy Proudfoot-McGuire of the Social Work Department.
“The Welcome Fellowship is an excellent resource for our new faculty as they begin their careers at Salisbury University,” said Provost Tom Jones. “I congratulate Drs. King, Randall and Proudfoot-McGuire and look forward to their contribution to the education of our students.”
Earning his Ph.D. in English literature from the City University of New York’s Graduate School and University Center in Manhattan, King began teaching at SU in 2007. Specializing in 20th century African-American literature and the literature of slavery, he plans to use his award to assist students enrolled in his International Study and Literature course.
“This course will have a component of one-week travel to Ghana, Africa, and the fellowship will help offset the cost of the trip for students,” he said, adding that he also hoped to use some of the funds to secure a graduate assistant to help with research for an upcoming book. The project will examine the connections between NAACP founding father W.E.B. Du Bois, past Ghanaian President Kwame Nkrumah and Encyclopedia Africana between 1961 and 1963.
Earning her Ph.D. in English from Emory University, Randall also came to SU in 2007. Specializing in 18th and 19th century African-American literature, slave narratives and American women writers of color, she sees her role as “opening up students’ minds to the authors who were marginalized or never heard of” during those eras. She plans to use her award to purchase several volumes of African-American literature for SU’s Blackwell Library, including the Shomberg Library of 19th Century Black Women Writers.
Randall also will use part of the fellowship to further research a book based on her dissertation, Depictions of Marriage: Fictions of Race and Gender in the Age of Realism and travel to the Popular Culture Association’s American Cultural Association Conference in New Orleans to present on her recent article “Corrupted by Skin Color: Racist and Mysoginist Perceptions of Hoodoo in Maryse Conde’s I, Tutuba, Black Witch of Salem,” published in Women Writers: A Zine.
Proudfoot-McGuire earned her Ph.D. in social work from the University of Louisville. Coming to SU from Ohio University, where she taught for 12 years, she brings a wealth of experience to Salisbury. She has worked in many areas of social work, including drug and alcohol counseling, child welfare and home health in many parts of the United States, including West Virginia, New York, Ohio and Alaska.
“I’ve seen the gamut of social work,” she said. “I wasn’t just an observer.”
She plans to use her award to further her research on the heritage of Native Americans not listed on the Dawes Rolls census. Through the mid-20th century, many Native Americans, including Proudfoot-McGuire’s grandmother, a Cherokee who came to West Virginia on the “Trail of Tears” following exile from Tennessee, kept their heritage hidden in an effort to stay off reservations and own land in the United States. The new SU faculty member would like to develop a standard research methodology beyond official government documents that others may use to track their own Native-American heritage: “It’s something I’ve wanted to do for a long time.”
Presented by MHEC, this competitive incentive program helps eligible Maryland universities recruit and retain diverse and accomplished faculties. For more information call 410-543-6030 or visit the SU Web site at www.salisbury.edu.