DSPs, named professorships awarded

Another six faculty members have received endowed professorships: Bruce Cumings, Robert Fefferman, Cornell Fleischer, Bennett Leventhal, Sidney Nagel and Randal Picker, with Fleischer, Leventhal and Picker the first recipients of their chairs.

Lars Peter Hansen, the Homer J. Livingston Professor in Economics and the College, is now the Homer J. Livingston Distinguished Service Professor.

Hansen is an economist whose work combines econometrics with macroeconomics. His work has led to new developments in dynamic economic theory and to improved methods of estimation and testing of economic models. His research has also been applied to the determination of exchange rates, securities pricing and consumer savings behavior, as well as other areas of economics. He is the author of numerous papers and book chapters and the editor of the Journal of Political Economics. Hansen joined the Chicago faculty in 1982.

Robert Pippin, Professor in the Committee on Social Thought, Philosophy and the College, has been named the Raymond W. and Martha Hilpert Gruner Distinguished Service Professor.

A scholar of 19th- and 20th-century European philosophy and ancient philosophy, Pippin is one of the foremost interpreters of Kant and Hegel. He is the author of Kant's Theory of Form: An Essay of the "Critique of Pure Reason" (1982) and Hegel's Idealism: The Satisfaction of Self-Consciousness (1989), as well as Modernism as a Philosophical Problem: On the Dissatisfactions of European High Culture (1991) and Idealism as Modernism: Hegelian Variations (1997). Pippin is also considered influential among Nietzsche scholars. He has been a University faculty member since 1992.

Jose Scheinkman, the Alvin H. Baum Professor and Chair of Economics and Professor in the College, is now the Alvin H. Baum Distinguished Service Professor.

Scheinkman, a Chicago faculty member since 1973, has made wide-ranging contributions to the field of economics, beginning with his research on the theory of economic growth and mathematical economics. He has contributed to the study of non-linear dynamics in economics and in the fields of macroeconomic fluctuations, urban economics and finance. He is currently involved in research on finance and on the economics of social interactions.

Michael Turner, Professor and Chair of Astronomy & Astrophysics and Professor in Physics, the Enrico Fermi Institute and the College, is the first to be named the Bruce V. Rauner Distinguished Service Professor.

Turner is a world-renowned cosmologist who is a leading proponent of the theory of the origin of the universe known as the "Cold Dark Matter Theory." A popular lecturer and author, he has spoken about cosmology to audiences around the world and has written articles for the academic as well as the popular press, including Physics Today, Beamline, Physics World and Mercury. Turner came to the University as an Enrico Fermi Fellow in 1978 and won the University's Quantrell Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in 1983.

The Bruce V. Rauner Distinguished Service Professorship was established by Bruce Rauner, a principal with Golder, Thoma, Cressey and Rauner Inc. and a member of the Visiting Committee to the Division of Physical Sciences. His wife, Diana Rauner (A.M.'95), is a Ph.D. candidate and Research Associate at the Chapin Hall Center for Children.

Bruce Cumings, Professor in History and the College, has been named the Norman and Edna Freehling Professor.

A scholar of East Asian political economy and international history, Cumings is currently completing a major study on the political economy of Northeast Asia. An authority on Korea, he is the author of Korea's Place in the Sun: A Modern History (1997) and a widely acclaimed series of books on the Korean War: The Origins of the Korean War: Liberation and the Emergence of Separate Regimes, 1945-1947 (1981), Korea: The Unknown War (1988) and The Origins of the Korean War, II: The Roaring of the Cataract, 1947-1950 (1990). A University faculty member from 1987 to 1994, he rejoined the Chicago faculty in the fall.

Robert Fefferman, Professor and Chair of Mathematics and Professor in the College, has been named Louis Block Professor in the Physical Sciences. Fefferman's research interests center around three main areas of mathematics, all of which are related: real variable theory and harmonic analysis, partial differential equations and probability theory. He is also active in mathematics and science educational outreach programs for elementary and high school students, and for the past 12 years has taught in a campus summer program for inner-city students and teachers. Fefferman joined the Chicago faculty in 1975 and won the Quantrell Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in 1982.

Cornell Fleischer, Professor in Near Eastern Languages & Civilizations, History and the College, has been awarded the first Kanuni Sueleyman Professorship in Ottoman and Modern Turkish Studies.

Fleischer, a University faculty member since 1993, is an expert on the Ottoman Empire and has written extensively on subjects related to Turkey and the Ottoman Empire. He is currently completing two book manuscripts, A Mediterranean Apocalypse: Imperialism and Prophecy, 1450-1550, and Master of the Age: Sueleyman the Lawgiver and the Remaking of Ottoman Sovereignty (1520-1566). He is also the author of Bureaucrat and Intellectual in the Ottoman Empire: The Historian Mustafa Ali (1541-1600).

The Kanuni Sueleyman Professorship was made possible in part through the generosity of the people of the Republic of Turkey and many friends of Turkey in the States and abroad. The professorship is named in honor of Sueleyman the Magnificent, whose 16th-century reign as sultan is considered a high point in Ottoman history.

Bennett Leventhal, Professor and Interim Chair of Psychiatry and Professor in Pediatrics, has been named the first Irving B. Harris Professor of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.

Leventhal, a faculty member since 1978, is an active clinician and investigator and a leading authority on child and adolescent psychiatry, particularly the genetic and biochemical factors that cause early onset disorders such as mental retardation, autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. He is a fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, a member of the National Board of Medical Examiners (NBME) and chair of the NBME committee that oversees the United States Medical Licensing Examination.

The Irving B. Harris Professorship was established by a longtime benefactor of the University, Chicago philanthropist and Life Trustee Irving Harris.

Sidney Nagel, Professor in Physics, the James Franck Institute and the College, has been named Louis Block Professor in the Physical Sciences.

Nagel, who is also Master of the Physical Sciences Collegiate Division and Associate Dean in the Physical Sciences and the College, is an experimental physicist specializing in the physics of condensed matter: solids, liquids and granular materials. He is noted for his work on the physics of droplets and the physics of convection rolls in granular materials. His recent work has investigated the physics of coffee stains. Nagel joined the University faculty in 1976 and won the Quantrell Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching in 1996.

Randal Picker, Professor in the Law School, is the first to be named the Paul and Theo Leffmann Professor of Commercial Law.

Picker (A.B.'80, A.M.'82, J.D.'85) is an expert in law and economics, particularly bankruptcy issues and the use of game theory to understand legal issues. In his most recent research, Picker applies game theory to understanding how norms change in society, and he has developed a computer program to map these changes in society's unwritten rules. He joined the Chicago faculty in 1989.

The Leffmann Professorship was established with a gift from the Leffmann Foundation. The chair honors alumnus Paul Leffmann (Ph.B.'27, J.D.'30), a longtime Chicago attorney, and his wife, Theo, who died in 1996.