Annette Gordon-Reed Named Rutgers Board of Governors Professor of History
(Newark, NJ) — For Annette Gordon-Reed, professor of history, Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Rutgers University in Newark, the past eight months have been filled with prestige, honors and accolades. In November 2008, she received the National Book Award for nonfiction for her landmark account of an American slave family, The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family (W.W. Norton, 2008). This groundbreaking work painstakingly and eloquently chronicles and explores the history of the Hemings family, including the intimate relationship between Thomas Jefferson and his house slave Sally Hemings and their progeny.
The Hemingses of Monticello also garnered Gordon-Reed the Pulitzer Prize in history in April 2009 and the George Washington Book Prize in May 2009. Also in April 2009, Gordon-Reed received a Guggenheim Fellowship for her achievements and promise for continued success.
Today Gordon-Reed added a new honor to her growing list: Rutgers Board of Governors Professor of History.
“Because Rutgers Board of Governors professorships recognize excellence in scholarship, research and teaching among our most distinguished faculty, it is highly fitting for Annette Gordon-Reed to receive this much-deserved honor for her landmark achievement in American history,” said Rutgers President Richard L. McCormick.
“Annette Gordon-Reed continues to bring critical acclaim and distinction to Rutgers University,” commented Steven J. Diner, chancellor of Rutgers University, Newark. “Her contribution to American history extends far beyond U.S. borders to leave an indelible imprint on the world.”
In addition to her post at Rutgers University in Newark, Annette Gordon-Reed is a professor of law at New York Law School. The legal scholar and historian is also the editor of Race On Trial: Law and Justice in American History, and co-author with Vernon Jordan of Vernon Can Read: A Memoir. She is a graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School.
Media Contact: Helen Paxton
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Contact: Ferlanda Fox Nixon
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E-mail: ferlanda@andromed.rutgers.edu
