Two faculty named MacArthur professors

Prof. Jennifer Matsue

Prof. Andrew Morris

Jennifer Matsue, assistant professor of performing arts and East Asian Studies, and Andrew Morris, assistant professor of history, have been named John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Assistant Professors, a fellowship that supports new and promising faculty members.

Matsue is an ethnomusicologist who specializes in Japanese popular and traditional music. She teaches courses on Japanese popular music and culture, East Asian traditional music, world music, gender and sexuality in music, and global popular music. She has held teaching posts at the University of Chicago, Sophia University in Tokyo and Dartmouth College. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of Chicago with a dissertation on underground bands in Tokyo. She is working on a book titled Mamonaku Tokyo Desu! (Next Stop Tokyo!): Underground Music-Making in Contemporary Tokyo.

Morris specializes in 20th-century American political history, public policy, welfare state and philanthropy. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Virginia with a dissertation titled "Charity, Therapy and Poverty: Private Social Service in the Era of Public Welfare." He is working on a manuscript titled "The Limits of Voluntarism: Private Social Service and the Expansion of the Welfare State." Last fall, he made a presentation at the Miller Center for Public Affairs at the University of Virginia titled "World War Two and the Revival of Voluntarism." He has authored an article, "The Voluntary Sectors' War on Poverty," to be published in the Journal of Policy History.

The College has recognized a total of  28 MacArthur Assistant Professors since 1982, after it received a grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Last year's recipients were Anupama Jain of English, and Erica Ball of history.