Tyson Retiring As Institute Director, to Continue Teaching

Posted on April 4, 2006

Ruel Tyson, the founder of the University’s Institute for the Arts and Humanities, is retiring from that position on June 30 after nearly 20 years at the helm.

Tyson, who has been at Carolina since 1967, will continue as professor of religious studies. John McGowan, a UNC professor of English and comparative literature, will become institute director on July 1 and has been appointed the Ruel W. Tyson Jr. distinguished professor.

The institute, established in 1987, is based in the College of Arts and Sciences and has grown to provide a range of fellowships, seminars, workshops and facilities to develop faculty teaching, scholarship, leadership and service.

In 2002, the institute moved into Hyde Hall, a new 15,000-square-foot building designed to reflect the historic architecture surrounding it on McCorkle Place.

McGowan joined the UNC faculty in 1992 and has been recognized repeatedly for outstanding teaching and scholarship. Last year, he won the University’s J. Carlyle Sitterson Freshman Teaching Award and an Association of English Graduate Students Mentoring Award. He also received the University’s Distinguished Post-Baccalaureate Teaching Award (2002), the Institute of the Arts and Humanities’ Chapman Family Teaching Award Fellowship (1999) and Pardue Family Fellowship (1994).

McGowan co-directed two National Endowment for the Humanities summer seminars for college teachers, in 2001 and 1997.

An expert on 19th-century British literature, critical theory and cultural studies, McGowan has written or edited six books. He previously taught at the University of Rochester and the University of Michigan.

In 39 years at UNC, Tyson has taught and written extensively about humanistic education, religious and public ethics, and the philosophy and anthropology of religion. He chaired the religious studies department from 1975 to 1980. In 2002, the University honored him with the Thomas Jefferson Award, given to faculty who exemplify Jefferson’s ideals and objectives. In 1996, he was inducted into the Order of the Golden Fleece. In 2000, he received the General Alumni Association’s Faculty Service Award.

Under his leadership, the institute has become a vital hub for faculty fellowship and engagement across disciplines. More than 300 UNC faculty members have benefited from semester-long fellowships at the institute.

The Ruel W. Tyson Jr. Distinguished Professorship in the College of Arts and Sciences was created in 2000 with gifts totaling $666,000 from alumni. Those gifts, with $334,000 in state funds from the Distinguished Professors Endowment Trust Fund, created the $1 million professorship.

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