MALS graduate Karen
McKinnon’s first book Narcissus Ascending
The antagonist in Narcissus Ascending, Callie is based on people in Karen McKinnon’s own life and Anne Sexton, although she describes Callie as “Anne Sexton with her art.”
In contrast, the protagonist, Becky is saved by her work. As a collage artist, Becky learns something important about herself and her life through her work. McKinnon says that it was a huge challenge to transform visual art in words, and she enjoyed every moment of writing about Becky’s pieces. McKinnon is now in the process of writing her second novel, the story of an epidemiologist who goes to the Ecuadorian Andes to eradicate a parasite.
McKinnon came to the MALS program after working as an AIDS researcher at Columbia /New York State Psychiatric Institute where she finished her graduate work in psychology. As an undergraduate, McKinnon was steered away from literature courses and instead specialized in psychology. Feeling that she had missed something intellectually, she applied to the MALS program intending to catch up the great books. "Psychology relies one empiricism, and I was longing to immerse myself in subjectivity, in language that wasn’t about evidence and hypothesis testing, in ideas and way of thinking about life that weren’t reductive.” For McKinnon it was a transforming experience. After a course with Rossete Lamount on portrait and self portraits of artist, McKinnon began writing fiction. Another important experience for her was Louis Menand’s course that introduced her to modernism and set her on a path of “trying to render consciousness in language.”
Karen reflects: “Writing this book allowed me to integrate so much of what I learned ion the MALS Program and I’ve come to view that task as a lifelong process”
NEWS
We would like to thank the following recent contributors to the Liberal Studies Program:
Adriana Bennett-Bernstein
Janet Brof
Zohra Lampert
Michael Newton
Alice Harrison
Sandra Waldman
Edwin Weber
Their contributions demonstrate the importance of the MALS program and its unique place at the Graduate Center.
Faculty Profile:
Distinguished Professor
Joseph W. Dauben
Joseph W. Dauben, Executive Officer of the Liberal Studies Program, and member of Lehman College's and the Graduate Center's History faculty, has just been named Distinguished Professor by the CUNY Board of Trustees. He is one of the world's leading scholars in the history of mathematics.
Last summer, Professor Dauben became an Honorary Professor of the Institute for the History of Natural Science, a part of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. He is only the eighth scholar – and third Westerner – to earn this distinction in the Institute’s 46-year history. The honor recognizes his contributions to the history of mathematics, as well as to the history of Chinese mathematics in particular. His studies in this field, which began 15 years ago, have demonstrated the extent to which the structure of language and writing can influence the methods of mathematical proof. He is now considered one of the world’s leading historians in this area.
Professor Dauben’s scholarly achievements have led to visiting professorships and election to numerous learned societies, academies and institutions. He has been a visiting member of the Institute for History of Natural Science in Beijing, has taught at Qing Hua University and at the National Normal University in Taiwan, and was a visiting professor at the Institute of Mathematics and keynote speaker at the Academia Sinica in Taipei on the future of Chinese science.
A prolific author, Professor Dauben has published his research in over 30 publications and served as editor of several reviews and journals, including Historia Mathematica, an international journal for the history of mathematics. His biographies of Georg Cantor and Abraham Robinson are considered classics.
Among other international honors, Professor Dauben was elected as a visiting Fellow and Life Member of Clare Hall, Cambridge University, and as a foreign member of the Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina, the oldest scientific academy in Europe.
Current Student Profile:
Joel Rogers
Last spring, MALS student Joel Rogers was sitting in a Brooklyn diner lamenting the demands of a particularly arduous Philosophy of Science exam. His friend and now business partner Jeff Gross wondered aloud whether he might not have more fun working on one of the many entrepreneurial projects that they had been knocking around for a long time. Jeff had become interested in revisiting idea for a board game that he called "Litigation,” which would lampoon the American penchant for lawsuits. “So Sue Me!” was born.
After the fateful lunch, Joel began sketching out some rules. The foundation of the game is that lawsuits are filed by one player against another. Outcomes are determined by odds that are known only to the plaintiff. The defendant, in turn, can influence those unknown odds through draws such a ‘Judge preside after 3 martini lunch.” These basic elements never changed during the ensuing months of around-the-clock development and design of the game, although name did evolve from “Litigation” to ‘So Sue Me!”
The game is now in production and Joel and Jeff are developing a nation-wide distribution program. They are also in the process of negotiating an exclusive deal with Australian distributor. “So Sue Me!” emerged from February's Toy Fair at the Javitz Center as the most talked about new game of the year. Joel and Jeff have been seen on Fox and Friends, CBS, and Bloomberg TV, heard on NPR and feature in the NY Sun. They encourage everyone to visit www.sosuemegame.com and pick up a copy!!!