Two Valpo Faculty Members Receive University Research Professorship

George Potter, Ph.D., and Allannah Karas, Ph.D., will serve as University Research Professors at Valpo for the 2021–2022 academic year. The grants recognize and encourage scholarly accomplishments and will afford Potter and Karras the opportunity to continue creative and original work through one semester of full-time leave with pay or two consecutive semesters with a half-time schedule, plus a $4,000 stipend.

Potter, an associate professor of English, will examine the ways in which dramatic works performed in Arabic and English have attempted to resist the policies of the war on terror. His research will help shape his intended book, “Liberal Islamophobia: Theater, the War on Terror, and the Limits of Resistance,” which will contribute to the fields of Middle Eastern studies, theatre studies and political theory.

Potter, who joined the Valpo faculty in 2014, is also editing a collection, “Arabs, Politics and Performance,” for Routledge, a multinational publisher. While at Valpo, he has taught 13 different courses, directed three plays (two at the University and one professionally) and written four articles for peer-reviewed publications.

Karas, an assistant professor of world languages and cultures, will address the barriers between Black Americans and the classics: cultures, myths, religions, art and philosophies of ancient Greece and Rome. She will write an article and book proposal that views this topic through the work of Bob Thompson, an African American artist of the civil rights era.

Karas has taught on a variety of topics relating to the classics since she joined the University in 2017. During her tenure, she has also advised two students in research projects that focused on the classics.

The Creative Work and Research Committee selects University Research Professors on the basis of their proposal’s originality and significance and the applicant’s capacity to execute the program of study.