Ruppert Named President’s Professor of Alaska Native Studies and Culture

Submitted by Carla Browning
Phone: (907) 474-7778
10/20/03

James Ruppert, professor of Alaska Native studies, English and northern studies, has been named a president’s professor of Alaska Native studies and culture at the University of Alaska Fairbanks.

Ruppert has been with UAF since 1988. He has been the faculty advisor for the Festival of Native Arts for 14 years and was instrumental in a number of curriculum changes in the Alaska Native Studies department where he served as chair for a number of years. Ruppert taught at the University of Erlangen-Nurnberg in Germany as a Fulbright Scholar in 2002. He received his bachelor’s degree from the State University of New York in 1970, his master’s from Purdue University in 1972 and his Ph.D. from the University of New Mexico in 1981. He is the author of "Mediation in Contemporary Native American Fiction," "Our Voices: Native Stories from Alaska and the Yukon" and "Nothing But the Truth: An Anthology of Native American Literature," which won the Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers Anthology of the Year Award.

Ruppert joins President’s Professors Thomas Marr in bioinformatics, John Walsh in global climate change, Gordon Kruse in fisheries and oceanography and Buck Sharpton in remote sensing.

"This latest assignment is yet another example of funding that has further enhanced programs that for some time have distinguished UAF from other universities," said Paul Reichardt, UAF provost. "These are areas in which UAF faculty have made significant contributions."

UA President Mark Hamilton proposed the president’s professor positions to support the university’s capacity to assist the state with its most important challenges.

Areas identified as opportunities for study include global climate change, fisheries and ocean sciences, Alaska Native languages and culture, global logistics, bioinformatics, satellite data retrieval and analysis, behavioral health sciences and education technology. The president’s professors are funded through the University of Alaska Foundation with private funds.

CONTACT: Carla Browning, UAF public information officer at (907) 474-7778 or e-mail: carla.browning@uaf.edu for more information.