We're pleased to share that professor Robert Michael Morrissey is among five University of Illinois professors who have been named University Scholars in recognition of their excellence in teaching, scholarship, and service.
The scholars program recognizes faculty excellence and provides $15,000 to each scholar for three years to enhance their academic careers. The money may be used for travel, equipment, research assistants, books or other purposes.
“The University Scholars program celebrates the remarkable achievements of the named individuals,” said Nicholas Jones, the University of Illinois System’s executive vice president and vice president for academic affairs. “Our faculty represent the strong foundation of the world-class academic experience that contributes to the betterment of society and draws students and researchers to the U. of I. System universities from across the globe. The University Scholars are exemplars of that faculty excellence.
“When you consider the diversity of scholarship across all three of our universities and the standards of academic excellence that we nurture and grow through our recruitment of esteemed educators and researchers, all of our University Scholar recipients should be deservedly proud of the honor.”
Professor Robert Morrissey has established a national and international reputation that places him alongside major scholars in the highly competitive field of early American history. In addition to being designated a Helen Corley Petit Scholar and earning a 2016 Campus Distinguished Promotion Award, he was named a Conrad Humanities Professorial Scholar in 2016 and was chosen as the Mellon-Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities Faculty Fellow in Environmental Humanities in 2018.
Since earning tenure in 2016, he has published nine articles and book chapters including the introduction of a volume he coedited, an article on Native Americans in the “Cambridge History of the American Revolution,” and an article on the French Midwest in the “Oxford Handbook of Midwestern History.” Morrissey advised and helped publish an online student-edited book of undergraduate writing in “Environmental Humanities, Defining Environments: Critical Studies in the Natural World” and edited an online interdisciplinary publication, “Flatland: New Directions in Environmental Humanities.”
Morrissey has been on the List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent by Their Students almost every semester and received the department’s George and Gladys Queen Excellence in Teaching Award. His successes as a mentor for environmental humanities projects, senior theses and honors projects were recognized in 2020 when he received the Undergraduate Mentor of the Year award from the Campus Honors Program for his work advising James Scholars.
In 2020, he helped launch a new collaborative partnership around art history and practice among Illinois-descended tribal communities. In 2021, he received a major grant from the Mellon Foundation through the Humanities Without Walls Consortium for the project, “Reclaiming Stories,” which provides an opportunity for community members and tribal artists and cultural officers to travel to Europe to reconnect with 18th-century animal hide paintings in museum collections there.
Editor's Note: This story originally appeared on the University of Illinois News Bureau website