معرفی
Rebecca L. Walkowitz serves as the Claire Tow Professor of English and Provost and Dean of the Faculty at Barnard College, where she has established herself as a leading scholar of 20th- and 21st-century literature with a focus on global literary studies. Her dual administrative and scholarly roles position her at the forefront of academic leadership and literary innovation.
Dr. Walkowitz's educational background includes:
- Ph.D. in English and American Literature and Language from Harvard University (2000)
- A.M. in English and American Literature and Language from Harvard University (1997)
- M.Phil in English Literature and Critical Theory from University of Sussex (1995)
- A.B. in History and Literature from Harvard-Radcliffe Colleges (1992)
Professor Walkowitz's research explores the intersections of cosmopolitanism, multilingualism, and world literature. Her work examines how writers create texts intended for global audiences and how multilingual futures of works affect our understanding of local and global communities. She investigates narrative structure, typography, and media in modernist and contemporary literature, with particular attention to how literature navigates linguistic boundaries. Her current book project, The New Multilingualism: Knowing and Not Knowing Languages in Literature, Culture, and the Classroom, addresses the future of language studies in higher education.
Walkowitz's scholarly output reveals a consistent trajectory toward understanding literature's role in an increasingly interconnected world. Her publications demonstrate evolving interests from modernist studies to contemporary global literary phenomena, with a particular focus on multilingualism, translation, and the institutional frameworks that shape language education. Her work bridges theoretical literary criticism with practical concerns about language education and university administration.
Among her numerous accolades are:
- Senior Research Fellowship, Freie Universität Berlin
- Board of Trustees Award for Excellence in Research, Rutgers University
- Walter Jackson Bate Fellowship in World Literature at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard
- Hurford Family Fellowship, National Humanities Center
- Class of 1955 Distinguished Teaching Award, University of Wisconsin, Madison
- ACLS/Andrew W. Mellon Junior Faculty Fellowship
- Jacob K. Javits Fellowship
- Marshall Scholarship
- Phi Beta Kappa
As an academic leader, Walkowitz has held significant editorial and organizational roles that have shaped her field. She co-founded and co-edits the Literature Now series, which has published over 25 award-winning books in contemporary literary studies. Her leadership positions include serving as President of the Modernist Studies Association (2014-2015), Chair of MLA Divisions, and member of the American Council of Learned Societies Consortium Steering Committee. Her influential 2008 co-authored article 'The New Modernist Studies' helped redefine the field and remains one of the most-cited articles in PMLA.
Through her editorial work on collections like Bad Modernisms and A New Vocabulary for Global Modernism, Walkowitz has fostered important scholarly conversations about the global dimensions of modernist and contemporary literature. Her collaborative approach extends to her role as Provost, where she works to create institutional frameworks that support innovative research and teaching across disciplines.
