Philip F. Gura, a professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has received the 2008 Distinguished Scholar Award from the Modern Language Association (MLA).
Philip F. Gura, a professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has received the 2008 Distinguished Scholar Award from the Modern Language Association (MLA).
The association’s division on American literature to 1800 tapped Gura for the award for career-long distinction in his field. The award will be presented at the organization’s convention in San Francisco in December.
Gura, at UNC since 1987, is the William S. Newman Distinguished Professor of American Literature and Culture in the College of Arts and Sciences. He teaches English, American studies and religious studies.
In 2007, Gura was a nonfiction finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award for “American Transcendentalism: A History.” The book is a history of the Transcendentalists, American notables in literature, religion, philosophy and more who emerged in the early to mid-19th century.
Publisher’s Weekly said of the book: “Gura’s fresh penetrating analysis will reshape our understanding of American intellectual history and the nineteenth century.”
Gura, a fellow of the Society of American Historians, researches early American literature, American renaissance, the history of the book in America, 19th-century popular culture and the history of American music.
Gura’s Web site: http://www.unc.edu/~gura
Modern Language Association Web site: http://www.mla.org
College of Arts and Sciences contact: Kim Spurr, (919) 962-4093, spurrk@email.unc.edu
News Services contact: L.J. Toler, (919) 962-8589