Thursday, December 11, 2008

Glen Harris, University of North Carolina Wilmington associate professor of history, has been appointed to the board of the North Carolina Humanities Council. NCHC is a 37-year-old statewide nonprofit affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities that nurtures the cultures and heritage of North Carolina.

One of six new members to join the Council board, Harris has taught in the UNCW department of history since 2002. He teaches courses in African American history, United States history, the Harlem Renaissance, the Civil Rights movement and Hollywood and black film. He was nominated by UNCW professor and associate dean Kathleen Berkley, former chair of the history department.

Harris attended his first full board meeting in Greensboro last week. He says he was "blown away by the breadth and depth and intellectual and social rigor" that the council represents and demands of its members. Harris says that community service is "natural to him" and points out that history is a huge part of the humanities, giving him a "natural kinship."

Harris is the author of numerous articles on topics ranging from African American-Jewish relations during the first decades of the twentieth century to postmodern slave narrative to interracial marriage. He is currently researching and writing a book-length manuscript, Intellectual Struggles Between Blacks and Jews From the 1940s Through the 1960s: A Prelude to the Ocean Hill-Brownsville Conflict.

Some of the numerous awards and fellowships Harris has received include the Library Resident Research Fellowship at The American Philosophical Society, the Rabbi Joachim Prinz Memorial Fellowship at The Jacob Rader Marcus Center of the American Jewish Archives and the UNCW Charles L. Cahill Award. A native of Fayetteville, N.C., Harris earned his bachelor's and master's degrees from North Carolina Central University and holds a Ph.D. from Florida State University.