Hofstra Magazine

Faculty News

Winter 2010

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Habib M. Ammari, assistant professor of computer science, received a three-year, $400,000 federal grant to further his research in wireless sensor networks. This type of network consists of independent, battery-powered devices, called sensors, which communicate with a central base station that collects data. The networks can be used in a wide range of civilian and military applications to monitor conditions over a large geographic area. The grant from the National Science Foundation was awarded for Dr. Ammari’s research to build a theoretical foundation for the analysis and design of mobile wireless sensor networks and fi nd ways to increase their energy effi ciency. First developed by the military for tasks such as surveillance, wireless sensor networks now have many uses, including air monitoring, so-called “smart home” automation, and traffi c monitoring and control. “There’s a lot of potential real-world applications for this, including intruder detection and tracking,” Dr. Ammari said. “This project will give more visibility to Hofstra, and I would very much like to eventually introduce and involve graduates and undergraduates in my research, mentor them, train them, and provide them with the opportunity to conduct cutting-edge and successful research in wireless sensor networks.” Dr. Ammari also recently published his fi rst book, Challenges and Opportunities of Connected k-Covered Wireless Sensor Networks: From Sensor Deployment to Data Gathering.

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Dana Brand, professor of English, saw the fall 2009 publication of his book The Last Days of Shea: Delight and Despair in the Life of a Mets Fan. The book is a follow-up to 2007’s Mets Fan, about his lifelong experiences as a fan of the team. In 2012 he and Richard Puerzer, associate professor and chair, Department of Engineering, will co-direct a Hofstra Cultural Center conference titled The 50th Anniversary of the New York Mets, scheduled for April 26 to 28.

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John Bryant, professor of English, has received a grant for $175,000 over the next two years from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). The award is the largest humanities grant in Hofstra history and will be used to launch the Melville Electronic Library (MEL), a digital “critical archive” of the works of Herman Melville. MEL will become the primary online site for Melville research. Users of MEL, including scholars, critics, students, and general readers, will have unprecedented access to a searchable collection of interlinked versions of Melville’s manuscripts, print texts, sources, art works, and other research and secondary materials. Dr. Bryant says by the conclusion of the two-year grant period, Moby-Dick, Billy Budd, and Battle-Pieces, Melville’s collection of Civil War poems, will be the fi rst works to populate MEL. It will take approximately 15 years to complete the digital archive. Once completed, Dr. Bryant says it will be “an intellectual playground” for Melville scholars and students. One key feature of MEL, presently under development by Hofstra’s Web development team, is the innovative software program TextLab, which will enable users to compare varying manuscript stages and published versions of Melville’s writings, or what Dr. Bryant calls “fl uid texts.” This unique digital research “tool” will also allow scholars and readers to work collaboratively in developing “revision narratives” that explain Melville’s revisions and his evolving creative process.

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Marilyn Buono, adjunct assistant professor of English, was a presenter at the annual conference of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) in 2008 in San Antonio, Texas. In November 2009 she again presented at the conference, this time in Philadelphia. The title of her panel was “Reading Is Believing: Agency and Identity Through Reading and Writing,” and her co-presenters were fellow Hofstra faculty Elizabeth Hynes-Musnisky, adjunct instructor of literacy studies, and doctoral student Melinda Smith.

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Russell Burke, associate professor of biology, is participating in a consortium of professors from fi ve other universities to study why the risk of Lyme disease is much higher in the northern United States than in the southern part of the country. The research has received funding from the National Science Foundation, and fi ndings will help public health agencies develop better prevention strategies for Lyme disease, which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports infects more than 20,000 people in North America each year. Lyme disease, fi rst identifi ed in Connecticut in the mid-1970s, has become a major public health issue in the northeastern United States. Blacklegged ticks occur in both northern and southern states. However, 93 percent of all Lyme disease cases occur in only 10 northern states. Researchers and public health providers are puzzled by the lack of human cases in the South. A number of hypotheses have been put forward to explain why the disease agent at this time is rare in southern tick populations. Dr. Burke has been investigating the role of lizards in the transmission of Lyme disease since 2002 as part of his research program on the ecology of native and non-native lizards and their parasites. Some of these lizards live in habitats ranging from natural woodlands to downtown urban areas, and thus could be important to human health issues in both positive and negative ways.

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David C. Cassidy, professor of chemistry, published the biography Beyond Certainty: Heisenberg, Quantum Physics and the Bomb in February 2009 about Werner Heisenberg. Dr. Cassidy is also the author of 1992’s groundbreaking Uncertainty, also about Heisenberg. For Uncertainty, Dr. Cassidy became the only author to receive both the Science Writing Award from the American Institute of Physics and the Pfi zer Award from the History of Science Society. Lynn Cohen, adjunct assistant professor, School for University Studies, presented a lecture on Gerard Manley Hopkins in Ireland on July 28, 2009, at the 22nd Gerard M. Hopkins International Literary Festival. The title of her lecture was “The Kingfi sher as a Symbol for Hopkins and Later Poets.”

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G. Thomas Couser, professor of English and director of disability studies, presented a lecture on what disability studies has to offer medical education at the College of Physicians & Surgeons of Columbia University on September 2. Dr. Couser’s books include Recovering Bodies: Illness, Disability, and Life Writing; Vulnerable Subjects: Ethics and Life Writing; and Signifying Bodies: Disability in Contemporary Life Writing. He is currently writing a book about contemporary American “patriography,” memoirs of fathers by sons and daughters, and a memoir of his own father.

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John DiGaetani, professor of English, saw the publication of his new book, titled Wagner Outside the Ring, an edited anthology of essays on the non-Ring operas of Richard Wagner. Included in this book are interviews with Ben Heppner, tenor, and Michelle De Young, mezzosoprano, of The Metropolitan Opera. Gregory Kershner of the Department of Comparative Literature and Languages and Richard Harris of the English Department have written essays for this anthology. The book includes more than 40 photos from The Metropolitan Opera and the Bayreuth Festival. The book is published by McFarland Press and is also available on Kindle.

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Simon Doubleday, associate professor of history, is founding and executive editor of the Journal of Medieval Iberian Studies (JMIS), a new, peer-reviewed interdisciplinary journal for innovative scholarship on the multiple languages, cultures, and historical processes of the Iberian peninsula, and the zones with which it was in contact. The inaugural issue of JMIS was published in January 2009 by Taylor and Francis, and has an editorial board of 40 international experts from countries such as Japan, Argentina, France, Portugal, the United Kingdom, United States, and Spain.

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Laurie Fendrich, professor of fine arts, spent fi ve weeks in April and May 2009 as a Brown Foundation Fellow, which allowed her to travel to France to live and work in the historic Dora Maar House in Ménerbes, a small village located in the Luberon mountains. The fellowship program, coordinated by the Museum of Fine Arts of Houston, Texas, provides writers, artists and others in the arts and humanities with an opportunity to step away from their daily obligations to concentrate on their fi elds of expertise. The retreat allowed Professor Fendrich to complete a portfolio of drawings that was featured in a solo exhibition at the Gary Snyder Project Space in New York City from November 4 to December 19, 2009. Professor Fendrich has also been working on her retrospective, scheduled to open in fall 2010 at the Williamson Art Gallery at Scripps College in Claremont, California. The exhibition will include 30 paintings and 30 drawings dating back to 1992 and will be accompanied by a full-color catalog with an essay by Mark Stevens.

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Jean Giebel, associate professor and chair, Department of Drama and Dance, started the theater company Fat Melon Productions in summer 2009. She also directed its inaugural production, The Smoking Diary, written by Loretta Dillon, which ran through the end of July and August at the ATA American Theatre of Actors Chernuchin Theater in Manhattan. Professor Giebel founded Fat Melon Productions as a not-for-profi t organization whose mission is to support emerging artists. Works developed by the company present contemporary social or cultural themes in a context that is entertaining and enlightening.

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Raymond N. Greenwell, professor of mathematics, was a guest lecturer at various secondary schools and universities in Uganda in June 2009 through the Teach And Tour Sojourners program. His article “Statistical Signifi cance of Ranking Paradoxes,” with Anna E. Bargagliotti of the University of Memphis, was accepted by the journal Communications in Statistics, and his article “Solving Linear Diophantine Matrix Equations Using the Smith Normal Form (More or Less),” written with

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Stanley Kertzner, Hofstra professor emeritus of mathematics, was accepted by the International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics.

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Scott Kovar, adjunct assistant professor of chemistry and director of the Forensic Science Program, was chosen as the 2009 recipient of the Nassau County Police Department’s Detectives’ Association, Inc. Career Achievement Award. Over the years, Professor Kovar has received a number of police service awards for his forensic work. He has presented scientifi c papers at professional forensic science conferences, has moderated or taught many workshops on specialized forensic science methodologies, and has been a television guest to discuss careers in the forensic sciences. Professor Kovar has been “court qualifi ed” as a forensic expert more than 100 times in the examination of many types of evidence, including gunshot residue, controlled substances, footwear and tire track impression evidence, hairs and fi bers, physical jigsaw-type matches, paint and polymers, glass, and even serological fl uids. He has been certifi ed by the American Board of Criminalistics as a diplomate since 2004 and a fellow since 2005 in the specialty areas of hairs and fi bers and paints and polymers. He is past-president and a fellow of the New York Microscopical Society.

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Zachary Lazar, adjunct assistant professor of English, has been awarded a fellowship from the Guggenheim Foundation, which supports emerging talents in the arts and sciences. He also received a Hodder Fellowship at Princeton University, where he is working on a new novel through 2010. Guggenheim Fellowships are intended for men and women who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the arts. The Hodder Fellowship is awarded to individuals during that crucial period when they have demonstrated exceptional promise but have not yet received widespread recognition. Hodder Fellows spend an academic year at Princeton pursuing independent projects. At press time, Professor Lazar was working on his third book, Evening’s Empire, a nonfi ction novel. Sway, his second novel, was a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice and was named a Best Book of 2008 by Publisher’s Weekly, The Los Angeles Times and Rolling Stone.

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Phillis Levin, professor of English and poet-in-residence, presented a number of readings and participated in several panel discussions and literary workshops over the summer and fall 2009. From June 22 to 26 she was the poet-in-residence at the Manhattanville Summer Writers’ Week, a fi ve-day intensive poetry workshop and conference. On July 4 she gave a reading at the Ledbury Poetry Festival in Herefordshire, England. This was followed on July 9 by a reading at London’s renowned Poetry Society. On September 24 she gave a reading at the launch of The Best American Poetry 2009 at The New School, and on October 10 she was a panelist on “The Once and Future Sonnet” at the Annual Convention of the Association of Literary Scholars and Critics in Denver.

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Greg Maney, associate professor of sociology, has been elected chair of the Peace, War and Social Confl ict Section of the American Sociological Association (ASA). Much of Dr. Maney’s current research explores peace and war rhetoric, confl icts over day labor markets, and strategies for sustaining peace processes in divided societies. Along with two colleagues, Dr. Maney has received grants from the National Science Foundation and the American Sociological Association’s Fund for the Advancement of the Discipline to conduct a longitudinal and comparative organizational study of discourses by the U.S. peace movement. Findings from this research have recently appeared in a book titled Contesting Patriotism: Culture, Power, and Strategy in the Peace Movement, published by Rowman & Littlefi eld.

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Martha McPhee, associate professor of English, had an article featured in the May issue of More magazine, “Unforgotten Italy,” about her recent visit to Italy, a country she fell in love with as a teenage exchange student. She writes about how her re-immersion in Italian culture and language helped her better understand and appreciate the girl she once was and the path her life has since followed. Professor McPhee has recently completed her fourth novel, Dear Money, which will be published by Houghton Miffl in Harcourt in spring 2010.

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John Moore, professor emeritus of history, saw the publication of his biography Pope Innocent III (1160/61-1216): To Root Up and to Plant, in paperback in January 2009.

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Robert Papper, professor and chair, Department of Journalism, Media Studies and Public Relations, was installed as Hofstra’s Lawrence Stessin Distinguished Professor in Journalism on March 18, 2009. Professor Papper is recognized nationally for his outstanding research examining the state of American radio and television news departments. His research efforts include reports that detail the status of minorities and women in the news industry. These reports, now known as the RTDNA/Hofstra University Annual Survey on the state of radio and television news in the United States, are published annually by the Radio Television Digital News Association (RTDNA) and considered required reading for news practitioners and administrators.

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Connie Roberts, adjunct instructor of English, was nominated for the prestigious Hennessy X.O Literary Award. Now in its 38th year, these awards provide the undiscovered writer and poet with an opportunity to break through the barriers to see their work published. Ms. Roberts attended the awards ceremony in April 2009 at the Four Seasons Hotel in Dublin, Ireland. Ms. Roberts, an Offaly native, immigrated to the United States in 1983. Her poetry has appeared in journals in the United States and Ireland. She was a fi nalist in the Strokestown Poetry Competition in 2001 and the Dana Awards in 2003, as well as a semifi nalist in the “Discovery”/ The Nation Contest in 2000 and 2002. Her book-length manuscript Not the Delft School, a memoir in verse inspired by her experiences growing up in an orphanage in Ireland, placed second in the 2007 Patrick Kavanagh Awards. Ms. Roberts teaches in Hofstra’s Creative Writing Program and Irish Studies Program.

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Blidi S. Stemn, assistant professor of curriculum and teaching, and Behailu Mammo, assistant professor of mathematics, have been awarded $898,976 from the National Science Foundation, for the Noyce Scholarship Program, a four-year research project for Hofstra students studying to teach mathematics. Professors Stemn and Mammo, in collaboration with Westbury, Uniondale, Roosevelt and Brentwood School Districts on Long Island, will recruit, prepare and retain 16 undergraduate mathematics students. These students will receive $20,000 per year when they enroll in the secondary mathematics teaching program at Hofstra. For every year they receive scholarship funding, these students, upon graduation, will be required to teach two years in a high-needs middle or high school. The scholarship program is named for Robert Noyce, nicknamed “the Mayor of Silicon Valley,” who is the co-founder of Intel and also credited with the invention of the microchip.

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Gayl Teller, adjunct associate professor of writing studies and composition, was named Nassau County poet laureate, 2009-2011, by the Nassau County Poet Laureate Selection Committee. Professor Teller’s poetry collections are At the Intersection of Everything You Have Ever Loved, Shorehaven, Moving Day and One Small Kindness – a fi nalist for the Blue Light Poetry Prize. Her most recent poetry book, Inside the Embrace, was selected in national competition to be published by WordTech/Cherry Grove. She is director and founder of the Poetry Reading Series, under the auspices of the New York State Council on the Arts at the Mid-Island Y JCC for the past 14 years. Her work has received the Edgar Allan Poe Prize, the Peninsula Library Poetry Prize, a National Federation of State Poetry Societies Prize, a National League of American PEN Women Prize, and The Connecticut Writer Prize.

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Nanette Wachter-Jurcsak, associate professor of chemistry, serves as program director for Hofstra’s annual Summer Science Research Program (HUSSRP). For the summer of 2009, through a generous grant from National Grid, HUSSRP was able to offer “green” research projects ranging from household energy demand and alternative fuels to environmental engineering. Since 2002 HUSSRP has offered high school students opportunities to conduct individual scientifi c research projects under the direction of Hofstra faculty in the physical and natural sciences, psychology and mathematics. HUSSRP draws high school juniors and seniors from all over Long Island, but Dr. Wachter-Jurcsak receives inquiries about it from students across the country and Canada. Students are selected for this program on the basis of their high school science experience, a personal interview and a high school teacher’s recommendation.

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