Two College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences faculty members were honored with a 2021 Albert Lee Sturm Award from the Mu of Virginia chapter of Phi Beta Kappa.

Cara Daggett, an assistant professor in the Department of Political Science, received the Sturm Award for Excellence in Research for her book The Birth of Energy: Fossil Fuels, Thermodynamics, and the Politics of Work (Duke University Press, 2019). In the book she explores the history of energy as a scientific term and how the emergence of thermodynamics in the 19th century influenced the way people think about efficiency and industrialization and by extension the meaning and value of work.

Thomas Gardner, an Alumni Distinguished Professor in the Department of English, received the Sturm Award for Excellence in Performance and Creative Arts for his book of essays titled Sundays (Tupelo Press, 2020). Everyday life is the focus of Gardner’s lyric essays, written over a year’s-worth of Sundays in improvisatory prose; the book tells the story of Gardner and his wife along with the events that transpired in 2016 and 2017.