By Tyler White | Staff Writer
Dr. Richard Rankin Russell, professor and graduate program director of English, will lead a lecture on Nov. 13 for winning the Cornelia Marschall Smith Professor of the Year Award. This award is given to professors who contribute to Baylor’s learning environment, are involved in research and are committed to service.
Dr. DeAnna Toten Beard, vice provost for faculty affairs, said via email that the award is named after Dr. Cornelia Marschall Smith, a former biology professor and chair of the biology department who modeled the values of Baylor. She said even after retiring, Smith remained in close contact with the university and made a great impact.
“She was a scientist, scholar, and thoughtful Christian,” Toten Beard said via email. “Faculty honored with an award her name carry forward this great legacy.”
Toten Beard said this is the 20th year the award will be given. This award is meant to both honor and commend great teaching and involvement in the Baylor community of Baylor faculty, Toten Beard said.
Russell said he’s honored to receive this award alongside other faculty he respects who have won in years prior. He said it’s more than just a professor of the year award; it’s a lifetime achievement award.
“I’m really tickled, too, that former undergraduates and graduate students apparently wrote letters for my nomination,” Russell said. “I got into this profession because I love to read and because I love to teach. I’ve really enjoyed my research here too, and since teaching and research go hand in hand for me, it’s a huge honor to be recognized for both as well as for my service to the university.”
He said his upcoming lecture for the award is called “Poetry of Witness, Poetry of Wonder.” In his lecture, he said he wants to share part of his academic expertise to show that people can learn from poetry and how it applies to themselves, similar to how he teaches his courses.
“A lot of what I do in teaching is to help my students think about how imaginative literature helps us make sense of our own lives,” Russell said.
He will be sharing lessons from three poems in his lecture. The poems include “Casualty” by Seamus Heaney, “God’s Grandeur” by Gerard Manley Hopkins and “Musée des Beaux Arts” by W. H. Auden.
“I’ll be talking about those three poems and maybe some other ones thinking about how poems not only give us language to help us recall our witnessing of horrific events but also give us space and language to wonder, to ponder, the greatness and majesty of God and how we can care for others as well,” Russell said.
He encourages everyone to attend the lecture because he believes people can learn valuable lessons from poetry. He wants to bring his expertise in teaching to the Baylor community, allowing them to interact with poetry in an inspirational way.
“We’ll explore these worlds of witness and wonder together,” Russell said. “And it’s not a stiff, formal lecture; it’s meant to be interactive, just a glimpse into what I do. So I think it should be fun — that’s what I’m hoping anyway.”
Beyond the lecture, Russell said he wants to continue to do what got him the award in the first place by continuing to be excellent in teaching and involved in service at Baylor and living out the same leadership that granted him the opportunity to win the Professor of the Year award.
“My prayer would be that I continue to be a servant leader at Baylor and that I would teach people how to seek and value the presence of the Lord, not only in life but also in literature, and to understand that reading great literature gives us new glimpses of that wonder and of that joy,” Russell said.
