Faculty News

Sometimes, you just want a guaranteed good read. When you’re far from home, adventuring in a new place—as Bennington students will be over Field Work Term—that may be especially true. Fortunately for them, director of library and information services Oceana Wilson has it covered. A few years ago, she began a tradition with Bennington faculty, of "looking for winter reading recommendations for students—the kind of books you would recommend to a friend.” 

Ecology faculty member Kerry Woods contributed to a study finding that forests with dense canopies create a microclimate that protects a variety of vulnerable plant species from warming air temperatures. The study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, was picked up by several media outlets, including BBC News.

A public art installation by music faculty member and TED Senior Fellow Susie Ibarra offers a musical pilgrimage through 12 culturally significant locations in lower Manhattan, each featuring an original composition inspired by the history of the site itself.

History faculty member Carol Pal has been named winner of the American Historical Association's 2013 Joan Kelly Memorial Prize for her book Republic of Women: Rethinking the Republic of Letters in the Seventeenth Century.

Faculty member Barbara Alfano’s new book, The Mirage of America in Contemporary Italian Literature and Film, examines the use of images associated with the U.S. in Italian novels and films released between the 1980s and the 2000s. The book explores how the individuals portrayed in these works—and the intellectuals who created them—confront the cultural construct of the American myth.