February 27, 2013
TO THE CAMPUS COMMUNITY
Dear Colleagues:
I am pleased to announce that Professor Carol Genetti has graciously agreed to serve as the next Dean of our Graduate Division, effective March 1, 2013.
This appointment follows a national search and the recommendation of our search advisory committee, chaired by Vice Chancellor Michael Witherell. On behalf of our campus, I extend our sincere thanks to Dr. Witherell and to all of our search committee members, listed below, for their devoted and diligent work. I also would like to thank our Executive Vice Chancellor, Academic Senate Chair, Deans, and other administrative and faculty colleagues who participated in the search and consultation process.
Dr. Genetti has done a superb job as the Acting Dean of our Graduate Division for the past eight months. Prior to taking on this role, she served for seven years as the Associate Dean of Humanities and Fine Arts in our College of Letters and Science. She has been a distinguished member of our Linguistics faculty since 1990, and has contributed to our campus community in numerous ways over the past two decades. She chaired our Department of Linguistics from 1999 to 2005, served as a graduate advisor for Linguistics, and has been an active member of various campus committees, including our National Research Council Advisory Committee and Graduate Outreach Advisory Committee.
Professor Genetti's primary research focuses on the description, historical development, and theoretical characterization of languages of the Himalayan region. She is a specialist in TibetoBurman languages and is particularly known for her work on the syntax of complex sentences. In 2009 she was awarded the inaugural Georg von der Gabelentz Prize from the international Association for Linguistic Typology for her monograph A Grammar of Dolakha Newar. Through her work on endangered languages of the Himalayas, Professor Genetti became involved in broader activities related to the documentation and conservation of the world's linguistic diversity, with recent research focused on models of language conservation, training programs, and ethics. She served as the founding Director of the Institute on Field Linguistics and Language Documentation, is founding Co-Director of the international Consortium for Training in Language Documentation and Conservation, and was chair of the Linguistic Society of America's Committee on Endangered Languages and their Preservation. Her work has been supported by grants from the National Science Foundation and Wenner-Gren, and she has received distinguished fellowships from the Research Centre for Linguistic Typology and James Cook University in Australia.
Carol is an experienced and dedicated leader for our Graduate Division, with a deep commitment to advancing the excellence and diversity of graduate education at UC Santa Barbara. Please join me in extending our warmest congratulations to Dean Genetti.
Sincerely,
Henry T. Yang
Chancellor
Search Advisory Committee for Dean of the Graduate Division
Michael Witherell, Chair; Vice Chancellor, Research
Adebisi Agboola, Professor, Mathematics
Elizabeth Belding, Professor and Vice Chair, Computer Science
Sharon Farmer, Professor, History
Patricia Holden, Professor, Bren School of Environmental Science and Management
Pei-te Lien, Professor and Graduate Program Director, Political Science
Medina Price, Graduate Advisor, Mathematics
Laura Romo, Associate Professor, Education; Director, Chicano Studies Institute
Torrey Trust, Graduate Students Association representative and Ph.D. student, Education
Ex officio:
Ricardo Alcaíno, Director and Title IX Officer, Office of Equal Opportunity & Sexual
Harassment/Title IX Compliance