4 named honorary academic fellows

Author Kurt Vonnegut, late photographer Ansel Adams and former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger are among the many distinguished recipients of a Guggenheim fellowship in its 80-year history. \nNow, four IU professors can add their names to that list, as the Guggenheim Foundation announced them as 2004 fellows April 8. The winners are Professor of Central Eurasian Studies Christopher Beckwith, Folklore and Ethnomusicology Professor Mary Ellen Brown, Biology Professor Ellen Ketterson and Biology Professor Loren Rieseberg.\n"(The fellowships) are awarded to men and women who have already demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship," said Liz Gurl, assistant secretary of the Guggenheim Foundation.\nGurl said the Foundation awards fellowships based on accomplishments and potential as judged by the applicants' peers. The fellowships are highly selective, as the Foundation awarded fellowships to only 185 out of approximately 3,200 candidates in 2004. The average award in 2004 was $37,352. \nWhile the majority of 2004 fellows are university scholars, other fellows include composers, writers, poets, photographers and artists.\nWith four fellowship winners in 2004, IU trails only Harvard University (7), The University of California-Los Angeles (6), New York University (6) and the University of Pennsylvania (6).\nThe IU biology department has the special distinction of having two fellows, Ketterson and Rieseberg.\n"It is unusual to have two from the same department (in one year)," Gurl said.\nElizabeth Raff, chair of the biology department, said having two Guggenheim fellows this year is a reflection of the department's reputation as one of the nation's best biology departments. \n"Ellen and Loren are world-class scientists who have made enormous contributions," Raff said.\nKetterson said she will incorporate works from scholars in gender studies to determine to what degree sex and gender in humans apply to animals.\n"I am interested in how hormones in general, and testosterone in particular, affect bird behavior, especially mating and parental behavior," Ketterson said.\nRieseberg said he will use the fellowship to work on an eleven-chapter monograph titled "The Origin and Evolution of Plant Species." He said he is writing the monograph to provide updated information to Verne Grant's 1981 text "Plant Speciation," to educate botanists, many of whom hold misconceptions regarding speciation and to reduce the influence of misguided theories.\n"He's the forerunner right now in the world in understanding the process of species formation." Ketterson said.\nBrown said her project entails deconstructing a collection of English and Scottish ballads edited by Francis James Child in the late 19th century titled "The English and Scottish Popular Ballads (1882-1898)."\n"This collection has remained in some ways the standard, certainly a place to begin exploring this kind of vernacular literature," Brown said.\nBrown said some of this literature remains vital in the performing world, including the folksong revival.\nFor the second consecutive year, the IU department of Central Eurasian studies has a fellow. This year's winner is Beckwith. In 2003, Devin DeWeese, associate professor of Central Eurasian studies, and poetry Professor Kevin Young represented IU as fellows. Beckwith said his research project is about the history of Central Eurasia.\nIU has had a total of 113 fellows, with at least one being named each year since 1998. The four fellows this year represent the most IU has had since 1994, when there were also four fellows named.\n-- Contact staff writer Steven Chung at stchung@indiana.edu.