August 2012

Linguistics and TESOL grad student Carolyn Jones was selected as the 2012 Literacy Texas Volunteer of the Year. The statewide honor was announced at the state Literacy Texas Conference in Austin.

July 2012

Two College of Liberal Arts alumni participated in the 2012 Olympic Games in London. Jared Connaughton (’08) represented Canada in several track and field events and Derrick Obasohan played for the Nigerian men’s basketball team.

May 2012

Nearly 800 students graduate in the first combined College of Liberal Arts commencement ceremony at the university’s new College Park Center.

April 2012

Four Political Science students wrapped up a week-long trip to Vienna, Austria, where they represented UT Arlington in an international moot court competition. They were the only undergraduates to compete in the event.

Two College of Liberal Arts faculty members were announced as 2012-2013 Fulbright Scholars. Dr. Ritu Khanduri (Anthropology) and Dr. Alusine Jalloh (History) won the prestigious awards.

The College of Liberal Arts introduces “acCOLAdes,” a new awards ceremony for students and faculty. More than 100 people were honored for their academic achievements.

March 2012

Cultural identity and interaction during medieval times is the focus of the Department of History’s 47th annual Walter Prescott Webb Memorial Lectures. The theme was “Muslims, Christians, and Jews in the Medieval Mediterranean.”

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is the keynote speaker at the “LGBT Conference of Safe Schools and Communities” conference at UT Arlington. The event was sponsored by the White House, the U.S. Department of Justice and the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice, among others.

Animals and humanity were central themes in the Department of English’s annual Hermanns Lecture Series.

February 2012

Six UT Arlington students represented the Czech Republic at the 2012 International Model NATO Conference in Washington, D.C. The team was led by Assistant Professor Dr. Brent Sasley (Political Science).

January 2012

Associate Professor Dr. Charles Knerr passes away, leaving a legacy of teaching political science for 35 years and creating an award-winning student moot court organization.

December 2011

A new Center for African American Studies is announced, a joint venture by the College of Liberal Arts and the School of Social Work. It is the first center of its kind in North Texas.

Alumna Dr. Nada Shabout continues to recover lost treasures of Iraq with her website and ongoing catalog research project. The University of North Texas professor created an online database, Modern Art Iraq Archive, at artiraq.org/maia with a grant from the National Endowment for Humanities.

Two California scientists publish research based on plant samples identified by retired Anthropology professor Dr. Joe Bastien. The work reviewed a Bolivian plant that one day might provide a cure for HIV and AIDS.

November 2011

The Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice hosts a regional conference on investigating and prosecuting hate crimes for local law enforcement, attorneys general and members of the FBI.

Associate Professor Dr. David Narrett is featured in C-SPAN’s “American History TV” series. His class lecture on precolonial America is taped and aired in late January.

October 2011

Five College of Liberal Arts faculty members are honored with an Alicia Wilkerson Smotherman Faculty Award: Dr. Andrew Clark (Communication), Dr. Sasha Grant (Communication), Dr. Charla Markham Shaw (Communication), Dr. David Silva (Lingustics & TESOL) and Dr. Michael Varner (Music).

A public service announcement produced by students for UTARadio.com wins the student category of the prestigious Radio Mercury Awards.

Several College of Liberal Arts alumni were feted in the 2011 Distinguished Alumni awards ceremony: Al Ellis (’65), the Honorable Lon Burnam (’79), Mustaque Ahmed (‘81) and Dr. Karin McCallum.

Anthropology graduate student William Nutt discovers an ancient image of a woman giving birth on a small ceramic fragment in Etruscan, Italy. The rare find could be the first representation of childbirth in Western art, researchers say.

The Department of Linguistics & TESOL hosts Endangered Languages Week, a week-long series of events designed to look at speech diversity and highlight those languages that are in danger of becoming extinct.

September 2011

The 10-year anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorism attacks in New York City, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania was remembered with “Threnody for 9/11,” a student-composed concert by music education major Jesus J. Martinez. The event featured UT Arlington students and faculty, as well as members of community groups.

The Gallery at UTA celebrated 25 years with a five-week retrospective exhibition. Featured artists included Celia Alvarez Muñoz, Hung Liu, Mel Chin and Vincent Valdez. Special events honored artists and former curators.

A fall series, “The War Next Door,” is in full swing with photography exhibits, faculty lectures and guest filmmaker talks that focus on daily violent turmoil on the U.S.-Mexico border. The series is sponsored by the Center for Greater Southwestern Studies, the Center for Mexican American Studies, the Department of History, the Department of Art & Art History, and many others.

August 2011

Four Department of English faculty — Dr. Stacy Alaimo, Dr. Ken Roemer, Laura Kopchick and Dr. Peggy Kulesz — received the University of Texas System’s 2011 Regent’s Outstanding Teaching Award.

After two years of rigorous coursework, the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice graduated 31 students from its cohort master’s program. The new graduates represent several law enforcement and criminal justice agencies throughout North Texas.

Leadership changes over the summer find new chairs in several College of Liberal Arts programs: Dr. W. Marvin Dulaney (History), Dr. Antoinette Sol (Modern Languages) and LTC Lora Rimmer (Military Science).

July 2011

A new Arabic language course is launched for ROTC cadets. The departments of Modern Languages and Military Science created the summer session class for UT Arlington students serving in the U.S. armed forces in the Middle East.

June 2011

Professor Benito Huerta, curator of The Gallery at UTA, opens a solo retrospective exhibition of his paintings at the National Museum of Mexican Art in Chicago.

May 2011

Dr. Colleen Fitzgerald, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Linguistics and TESOL, and Dr. Mary Linn from the University of Oklahoma win a National Science Foundation grant for the documentation of endangered Native American languages.

April 2011

Dr. Ken Roemer, Professor of English, is named a 2011 Piper Professor, one of 10 from a field of 140 Texas educators. The award was established by the San Antonio-based Minnie Stevens Piper Foundation in 1958 to annually recognize outstanding college professors across Texas.

March 2011

Department of Linguistics and TESOL graduate student Josh Jensen wins an $11,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to finish his dissertation research on Jarai, an Austronesian language spoken mostly in Vietnam and northeast Cambodia.

Academicians and students from across the nation attend the Department of History’s annual Walter Prescott Webb Lecture Series. The 46th annual series examines how the Soviet Union made political and cultural impacts on the rest of the world during the Cold War.

In the annual Women’s History Month Lecture Series, Major Jean Deakyne, Assistant Professor of Military Science, offers her perspective on serving as a female soldier during war time. The four-week series, sponsored by the Women’s and Gender Studies program, examined “Women and War.”

Professor Emeritus of Art Andy Anderson is awarded the Indie Pioneer Award at the Kansas City FilmFest. He is also the 2010 recipient of the Morgan Woodward Distinguished Professorship in Film and Video.

February 2011

Dr. Dennis Maher, Associate Professor of Theatre Arts, resurrects his one-man show “The Trouble Begins at Eight,” a look at the life and wisdom of celebrated American author, Mark Twain.

UTARadio.com and students from the Department of Communication are invited to broadcast and serve as interns during Super Bowl Week at Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, TX.

Led by Sociology professor Dr. Bob Kunovich, six students from the College of Liberal Arts represent UT Arlington at the annual Model North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) conference in Washington, D.C.

January 2011

Dr. Mary Vaccaro, Professor of Art History, wins a grant from the Texas Fund for Curatorial Research (in collaboration with the French Regional & American Museum Exchange, a collaboration by museums in 12 cities in France) to study collections of Italian drawings of the 14th–16th centuries in preparation for an exhibition.

December 2010

Darryl Lauster, Assistant Professor of Art, is named a winner of the 2010 Painters and Sculptors Grant Program by the Joan Mitchell Foundation. The prestigious award is given to only 25 artists nationally.

November 2010

Dr. Ritu Khanduri, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, is awarded the Richard Carley Hunt Postdoctoral Fellowship by the Wenner-Gren Foundation. The highly competitive grant recognizes the professor’s research into newspaper cartoons and the formation of social knowledge in colonial and postcolonial India.

UTA News in Español, a weekly, student-run television newscast, debuts on Time Warner Cable Channel 99 and utanews.com. Broadcast lecturer Julian Rodriguez says the Spanish-language broadcast offers students a unique experience and benefits the local Hispanic community. The newscast is featured on local Telemundo and Univision stations and leads to internships for UT Arlington students.

October 2010

Dr. Gerald Saxon (History), Natalie Gaupp (Theatre Arts), Seiji Ikeda (Art and Art History) and Dr. Jason Shelton (Sociology) are honored with the 2010 Alicia Wilkerson Smotherman Faculty Award. The awards, established in 2007 by Thad and Alicia Smotherman, recognize faculty within the College of Liberal Arts whose expertise and teaching abilities have inspired students to create work of exceptional merit.

UT Arlington alumna and DFW television personality Karen Borta is the keynote speaker at the Department of Communication’s Communication Day 2010, an annual event that connects undergraduate and graduate students with professionals in journalism, marketing, advertising and other related fields, including department alumni.

Celebrity chef Rick Bayless, a Maverick Speaker, and Williams College professor Darra Goldstein, editor of “Gastronomica” are two of several invited speakers on hand for the Department of English’s annual Rudolph Hermanns Lecture Series. This year’s theme reviews the impact of food in literature and culture.

Four weeks of historical and cultural lectures lead up to the Department of Theatre Arts’ presentation of the Tony Award-winning musical, “Cabaret.” Directed by department chair Kim LaFontaine, the musical features Theatre Arts majors Britney Hudgins and Kyle Sharp in leading roles.

September 2010

Department of History professors, led by Dr. W. Marvin Dulaney, help Fort Worth ISD win a three-year, $1 million federal teaching grant from the U.S. Department of Education. UT Arlington professors helped train local educators in American History classes.

August 2010

Dr. Joanna Webb Johnson, Senior Lecturer of English, is one of seven UT Arlington faculty members honored with Outstanding Teaching Awards by the UT System Board of Regents.

Anthropology graduate student William Nutt is awarded a three-year graduate research fellowship from the National Science Foundation to study the collapse of Bronze Age kingdoms.

July 2010

The Department of Philosophy hosts the Summer Seminar in Mind, Cognition and Neuroethics, part of a series of events planned by a newly formed consortium of North Texas area professors and scientists.

Dr. David Silva, Professor of Linguistics, delivers the keynote address at the 2010 Biannual Meeting of the International Circle of Korean Linguistics at the University of the Humanities in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia.

June 2010

Art professor Seiji Ikeda and MFA student Collin Hover present ideas on gesture-based interactive art at the 2010 New Media Consortium conference in Anaheim, Calif.

Political Science professor Dr. Joseph Ignagni presents at the 2010 International Conference on Social Sciences in Paris, France, which is sponsored by the World Academy of Science, Engineering and Technology. The research -- the United States and U.S. Supreme Court -- was a joint project, teaming Ignagni and Dr. Rebecca Deen, chair of the Department of Political Science.

May 2010

A gift of $580,000 by longtime university supporters helps to establish a $1.16 million endowment for the creation of the Charles T. McDowell Center for Critical Languages and Area Studies. Dr. Mark Cichock (Political Science) is named Interim Director.

English doctoral candidate Toni Holland is awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to research poets laureate from the U.S. and Canada.

April 2010

More than 1,000 pieces were sold at the second annual World-Class Glass Art Sale with proceeds benefitting the university's Glass Studio. More than 800 people attended the two-day event.

Actor Morgan Woodward ("Gunsmoke"), graduate of North Texas Agriculture College, donates $250,000 to establish a new professorship in the Film and Video program of the Department of Art and Art History.

The 10th Annual Ben and Trudy Termini Distinguished Anthropologist Lecture is held with Dr. Lawrence Cohen of University of California-Berkley delivering the key note address on organ transplants in India. The series is coordinated by the Department of Sociology and Anthropology.

Public relations students Gina Garza, Kristine Behrhorst, Brandi Foy and Fabiola Salinas win first place in the Texas Public Relations Association annual contest for their work on the President's Sustainability Committee projects.

MFA student Shannon Brunskill places third in emerge2010, an international kiln-formed glass competition. More than 1,200 artists submitted entries.

Dr. Desiree Henderson, Assistant Professor of English, is named Interim Director of the Center for Women's Studies.

The Department of Art and Art History announces game theory and game design will be available in its Digital Media Track beginning in Fall 2010.

Forty Liberal Arts faculty members are honored for their published work and research in the university's annual Celebration of Faculty Creative Works event.

March 2010

The Department of History and the Center for Greater Southwestern Studies commemorates the centennial of the Mexican Revolution during the 45th annual Walter Prescott Webb Memorial Lectures. The series looks at how the Mexican Revolution was responsible for creating the modern Mexican nation-state, leading to broader democratization, land reform, anticlericalism and sweeping changes in Mexican business practices.

Commemorating a similar march 50 years before, members of the ROTC Cadet Corps participate in a five-day, 126-mile trek from The University of Texas at Arlington to Fort Hood.

February 2010

"Book One" by the New Orleans Jazz Orchestra, which includes UT Arlington jazz artist-in-residence Adonis Rose, wins a Grammy award in the category for Best Large Jazz Ensemble Album.

Dr. Martha Walvoord, Assistant Professor of Music (Violin), is named the Marjorie Keller Young Teacher of the Year by the Texas chapter of the American String Teachers Association.

January 2010

Several Department of Communication students are among groups honored with the Barbara Jordan Media Award issued by the State of Texas. UT Arlington Media Relations, University Communications and The Shorthorn staff are recognized for their coverage of the Movin' Mavs men's wheelchair basketball team.

December 2009

Assistant Professor of Music Daniel Cavanagh is named one of 13 winners of the 2009 International Music Prizes for Excellence in Composition in a competition sponsored by the National Academy of Music of Greece last year. The former Smotherman Award winner, who released a jazz record in 2008, competed with more than 80 international composers.

The Department of History's Transatlantic History program is the subject of a mini-documentary by the American Historical Association. UT Arlington is one of 14 universities featured by the organization at its January 2010 conference.

Associate Professor of Sociology Dr. Robert Kunovich presents a conference paper on anti-immigrant prejudice at a conference on ethnic tension in Warsaw, Poland.

November 2009

Masters of Fine Arts student Rachel Gibson-Shepherd wins a completion grant from Women in Film.Dallas (WIF.D) for her feature film, "Traveling." She also has a short film screened at the organization's annual festival.

Linguistics professor and chair Dr. Colleen Fitzgerald participates in a program that receives a $106,000 grant from the Administration for Native Americans to preserve the Comanche language.

October 2009

Two College of Liberal Arts alumni - Somsonge Burusphat and Linda Watson - are honored in 2009 as Distinguished Alumni by UT Arlington. Burusphat, who received her Ph.D. in Humanities with a concentration on Linguistics in 1986, is Professor of Linguistics for the Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia at Mahidol University in Salaya, Thailand. Watson -- chief executive officer of LYNX, the Central Florida Transportation Authority -- received her bachelor's degree in Political Science and her master's degree in Urban and Regional Affairs.

The UT Arlington Innocence Network, led by Assistant Professor John Stickels and Criminology and Criminal Justice major Natalie Ellis, works to free two Dallas County men who were wrongly convicted of capital murder in 1997 and sentenced to life in prison.

The Society of Utopian Studies establishes the name of its teaching award after English professor Dr. Kenneth Roemer.

Professor of Art Kenda North is selected as the Honored Educator for the South Central Region at the Society for Photographic Education conference.

The Department of Music opens Studio 301, a professional recording studio for Music Media and Music Business students.

September 2009

Included in UT Arlington's record-breaking fall enrollment is a seven percent jump in 2009 for the College of Liberal Arts. More than 5,000 students are pursuing Liberal Arts degrees.

The 2009 Alicia Wilkerson Smotherman Faculty Awards winners are Laurel Stvan, Associate Professor of Linguistics; Stacy Alaimo, Associate Professor of English; Darryl Lauster, Assistant Professor of Art; and John Garrigus, Associate Professor of History.

UT Arlington alumnus Mustaque Ahmed endows the Festival of Ideas Global Research Institute, which co-hosts six programs during the 2009-2010 school year. The Festival of Ideas Global Research Institute provides a venue for research into the world's significant cultural and intellectual issues, integrating the scholarship and creative activity of UT Arlington's faculty and graduate students with the insights gained from presentations by world-renowned experts who visit the UT Arlington campus.

Dr. Harry Reeder, Associate Professor of Philosophy, is inducted into the University of Texas at Arlington's Academy of Distinguished Teachers. He is one of seven Liberal Arts faculty inducted since 1996.

August 2009

The UT Arlington Marching Band open the new Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, performing at halftime during the Dallas-San Francisco preseason game in August 2009.

Liberal Arts professors Dr. Elizabeth Morrow (Music) and Dr. David Silva (Linguistics and TESOL) are among nine University of Texas at Arlington faculty to win the inaugural UT System Board of Regent's Outstanding Teaching Award.