Newsmakers

Awards, honors and new opportunities are marked.

For the third time in a decade, a Brandeis doctoral dissertation has been judged best in the nation by the Society of American Historians. Noelani Arista, Ph.D. ’10, won the 50th annual Allan Nevins Prize for her thesis, which explores some of the first encounters among Hawaiian natives and New England missionaries. Arista teaches at the University of Hawaii at Manoa.
Professor of Economics Chad Bown, an expert in international trade, will serve as a senior economist on President Barack Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers. Bown has taught in Brandeis’ Department of Economics and International Business School since 1999. Chad Bown
Mick Watson, George and Frances Levin Professor of Psychology, became dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences on July 1. Responsibilities include nurturing new programs Brandeis has started in the last several years, carrying out the initiatives of the Curriculum and Academic Restructuring Steering Committee and the Brandeis 2020 committee for the graduate school, and exploring additional innovative ways to maintain and enhance the stature and fiscal position of the school. Mick Watson
Eve Marder ’69, Victor and Gwendolyn Beinfield Professor of Neuroscience and a member of the Volen National Center for Complex Systems, has been appointed 
head of the newly formed division of science. In this job, she will lead efforts to coordinate and integrate science curricula and strategic planning and to re-examine organizational and research practices and resources. 
She is a past president of the Society for Neuroscience and a member of the 
National Academy of Sciences. Eve Marder
Professor Seyyed Hossein Nasr, a prominent  Islamic philosopher specializing in religion and science, will be awarded Brandeis University’s second Joseph B. and Toby Gittler Prize. Nasr, the University Professor of Islamic Studies at George Washington University, will receive the $25,000 prize for outstanding and lasting contributions to racial, ethnic and religious relations on Nov. 30. The prize is a legacy of Joseph B. Gittler, a sociologist by training who taught at Cardozo Law School and several of the nation’s leading universities. Seyyed Hossein Nasr