Celebrated writer and Distinguished Professor of English elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters

Celebrated writer and Distinguished Professor of English elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters
USC Dornsife’s Percival Everett joins a select handful of notable figures in literature, music, art and architecture who were elected this year.
Darrin S. Joy May 05, 2023
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Percival Everett, Distinguished Professor of English at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Founded in 1898, the academy stands as an honor society of the country’s leading writers, artists, composers and architects.

Everett is one of just 19 individuals — only six of whom are in the literature category — elected as members this year.

He is the fourth USC faculty member elected to the academy and the second at USC Dornsife. (Distinguished Professor Emeritus of English and Writer in Residence Emeritus TC Boyle was elected in 2009.)

“I believe that the arts make us better, smarter,” Everett said. “I feel fortunate to be able to make a living as an artist and so participate in this ongoing discourse.”

Everett, whose research centers on American studies and critical theory, has authored 34 books as well as more than 70 shorter works including poems, essays and short stories.

His writing has garnered numerous awards, including the PEN/Oakland-Josephine Miles Award for Excellence in Literature for his novel Big Picture (Graywolf Press, 1996), the Pushcart Prize for his 1996 article “The Appropriation of Cultures,” and his first Hurston/Wright Foundation Legacy Award in 2001 for Erasure (UPNE, 2001).

Erasure also earned Everett an Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

He earned a second Hurston/Wright Foundation Legacy Award in 2010 for I Am Not Sidney Poitier (Graywolf Press, 2009), and a third in 2021 for Telephone (Graywolf Press, 2020), a novel that placed him among the 2021 finalists for a Pulitzer Prize.

He earned a National Endowment for the Arts Literature Fellowship in 2014 and a Guggenheim Fellowship a year later, and he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2016.

The National Book Critics Circle presented him with the Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award in 2022.

After earning an AB in philosophy at the University of Miami in 1977 and a master’s degree from Brown University’s Graduate Writing Program in 1982, Everett held faculty positions at the University of Kentucky, University of Notre Dame and the University of California, Riverside. He joined USC Dornsife’s Department of English in 1998 as a full professor and was named a Distinguished Professor of English by the university in 2007.

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Structural biologist Helen Berman elected to the National Academy of Sciences

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Structural biologist Helen Berman elected to the National Academy of Sciences

The USC Dornsife professor (research) of quantitative and computational biology is recognized for “distinguished and continuing achievements in original research.”
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Helen Berman, professor (research) of quantitative and computational biology at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, and a member of the Bridge Institute of the USC Michelson Center for Convergent Bioscience, has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences.

The academy is a private, nonprofit institution established during Abraham Lincoln’s term as U.S. President to recognize members’ achievement in science and advise the federal government and other organizations on matters of science, engineering and health policy.

Berman, a Professor Emerita at Rutgers University, joined USC Dornsife in January. She is among 120 members and 23 international members elected to the academy this year.

“This is a wonderful achievement that comes on top of many honors that Professor Berman received for contributions to the field of computational and structural biology,” said Remo Rohs, chair of the Department of Quantitative and Computational Biology and professor of quantitative and computational biology, chemistry, physics and astronomy, and computer science.

“The careers of most cell and molecular biologists have been enriched in amazing ways by the work that Helen has performed. Her co-founding of the Protein Data Bank has created the most important dictionary we use in studying the language of life,” said Scott Fraser, director of Bridge Institute and Provost Professor of Biological Sciences, Biomedical Engineering, Physiology and Biophysics, Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine, Pediatrics, Radiology, Ophthalmology and Quantitative and Computational Biology. “The field would be decades behind if not for her visionary efforts.”

Berman studies nucleic acids, such as DNA and RNA, and how proteins interact with them. She also studies collagen, a protein found throughout the body that provides structure and strength to muscles, bones and skin as well as the tissues that connect them.

She says she’s driven to pursue her research by a love of learning and discovery, and she tries to foster that drive in others, as well. “In my work, I try to balance time between conducting my own research with ways of enabling scientific discovery by others.”

She co-founded the Protein Data Bank archive, an international archive that stores all experimentally determined structures of molecules and their complexes. The PDB enabled the important, artificial intelligence-driven breakthrough, AlphaFold. Developed by Google’s DeepMind and openly available to the scientific community, AlphaFold can predict the three-dimensional structures or folds of all existing proteins using their amino acid sequence.

“This work would not have been possible without Helen’s groundbreaking contributions,” Rohs said.

Berman has also pursued an interest in sharing her work with the public through film and digital arts. She was executive producer of the documentary series Target Zero, which uses high-quality animation to illustrate how anti-HIV drugs work. At USC Dornsife, she is contributing to the World in a Cell project, a collaboration between the Bridge Institute and the USC School of Cinematic Arts that uses virtual reality to provide a view of the inside of a pancreatic beta cell, where insulin is made.

“Scientists need to analyze and weigh in on issues as they relate to the public good,” she said. “We have a responsibility to help educate not only our students but the public at large.”

Renowned among her peers, Berman is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the International Society for Computational Biology among other organizations. She is the recipient of numerous awards including the Benjamin Franklin Award for Open Access in the Life Sciences, the Distinguished Service Award from the Biophysical Society and the DeLano Award for Computational Biosciences from the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.

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8347 https://rossier.usc.edu/news-insights/news/we-built-place

Natalia Molina, a historian, award-winning author and Distinguished Professor of American Studies and Ethnicity at USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, will deliver remarks at USC Rossier’s doctoral hooding ceremony on May 10. Molina’s work examines the historical roots of narratives about race and citizenship, how they shaped public policy and how they continue to play a role in today’s racial inequities. Much of her writing, which earned her a MacArthur Fellowship in 2020, also focuses on sharing the stories of the under-documented. Here, she discusses the art of the commencement speech, the importance of the humanities and offers advice to the Class of 2023.
As you prepared your remarks for USC Rossier’s doctoral ceremony, were there any commencement addresses that inspired you?
Commencement addresses mark the end of a journey. But actually, the speech that I remember best was from the beginning of a journey, when I was a freshman at UCLA. At orientation, they said, “Look to your left. Look to your right. One of those people won’t be there at graduation.” They were trying to emphasize how difficult this process is. But when I went through the orientation for students of color, they said, “Look to your left. Look to your right. Hold their hands and make sure they’re there at graduation.” And all these years later, I still remember that because I think that is the mentality we need to get through our programs and life.
What are the essential elements of a commencement address?
I imagine the commencement address as a Venn diagram, where I’m bringing myself, my life experience and my research, and I’m seeing where it lines up with not just where the graduates are at but where they’re going and their hopes of them feeling seen.
Recently I was listening to the remarks by President Biden marking the 25th anniversary of the Belfast Good Friday Agreement–and he was talking about George Mitchell, who was the American statesman who brokered that agreement. George Mitchell often said he had “700 days of failure and one day of success.” In a commencement speech, you’re trying to give a message of hope that maybe one of those days of failure–or challenges–will actually get them through to that day of success.
Commencement addresses often reflect on the unique challenges that today’s graduates face. What are some of the challenges that the Class of 2023 will face, particularly those working in education?
As we come out of the pandemic, many of us have seen challenges. But USC Rossier graduates are entering one of the fields that we most need now, and yet one that is most challenged. This has always been a difficult job, whether you’re an educator or a leader in education, and it’s even more daunting now as they lead into the unknown. Yet, that’s what makes it so exciting, right? You can use a crisis as an opportunity. You don’t have to do things like you’ve always done them. As much as the pandemic was challenging, it did away with these restraints that people said we could never do away with. It’s both a time of tremendous challenge and tremendous opportunity. The pandemic really showed us how adaptable and resilient we all are.
There has been a troubling decline in students majoring in the humanities. As a historian, does this trouble you, and if it does, why does it?
I was in a public space and told somebody that my son had recently graduated with a BA in history, and that he was working in this field. Somebody overheard it, interrupted the conversation, and said, incredulously, “How is he using a history degree?” We have this sense that the humanities aren’t like other fields, where you take the skills you learn and apply them directly to the situation you’re in. People that major in humanities and social sciences are also thinking about social issues. They’re looking at examples of how we’ve done things in the past, or through novels, through fiction. They are asking how we can study this in other cultures, and see how we can make the world a better place. I hope we always have people doing that.
I don’t see it as a crisis in the humanities, but a scarcity crisis. People feel that they need to major in something they will use, and where they can readily imagine what that means. I get it! A lot of that started with the 2008 recession. As the cost of education has escalated so much, we tend to think, “What is our ROI?” But imagine how bankrupt we would be without these tools of imagination, tools that allow us to connect with one another, and imagine the journey of someone different than ourselves. That’s when we’re really talking about scarcity–when we can’t empathize.
You coined the term “racial scripts.” Can you tell us a little bit about what that means, and the importance of recognizing the deployment and redeployment of these scripts?
This dovetails nicely with what we’re talking about in terms of empathy. Racial scripts are essentially a way for us to see our experience in others. The usual way that we learn the experience of groups other than ourselves is in a series of silos. Traditionally, we learn about Latino studies, African American studies, Asian American studies and Indigenous studies separately. My theoretical framing and research unearth visible connections between these groups and also the more hidden links. Racial scripts highlight the ways in which the lives of racialized groups are linked across time and space, and thereby affect one another, even when those groups don’t directly cross paths. The central goal of racial scripts is to expose those connections.
Could you give us an example?
Because my first book focused on the way public health and science inform how we shape categories of race, I was called on to do a lot of consulting and interviews during the pandemic to shed light on anti-Asian racism. I was asked, “Are you surprised by this?” I wasn’t because we’ve seen anti-Asian racism in the past. We can trace it back into the late 1800s and the fact that the first anti-immigrant exclusion law was directed at Chinese immigrants, forward to Japanese internment camps and 100 other data points in between. But what if we look at the ways that other groups were racialized along the way? The forced sterilizations of Latinos here in our own LA County Hospital, the forced sterilizations of African American women, and the way that public health shaped border policy to make certain immigrants–including those that we consider White now, like Eastern Europeans–seem more susceptible to disease. If we broaden it in that way, we see that reinforcement of that othering is not just about a specific group, but various groups. The exclusion of one group serves to reinforce the exclusion more broadly.
Your most recent book A Place at the Nayarit, How a Mexican Restaurant Nourished a Community, traces the history and impact of your grandmother’s iconic Echo Park restaurant. You write about how places like this, urban anchors–neighborhood cafes and restaurants–were and are incredibly important to immigrant communities in Los Angeles. What do these spaces offer the marginalized?
We tend to think about public space as being the most democratic kind of space–that everybody has access to it. But we know by studying history that buses, public schools, beaches, schools–even if they’re public–aren’t always readily accessible to everyone. By turning to the semi-public spaces–what I call urban anchors, places that immigrants create for their own communities–people are able to find a sense of safety and recognition. When they go about their lives, especially working-class immigrants, they go around kind of in one dimension as a worker. But in these urban anchors, they can come into a space where they can unfold into three dimensions. They can speak their language, dress in clothes that they choose, enjoy good food, and enjoy that sense of connection and community. We see why these semi-public spaces, these urban anchors, are central to communities, especially as people are trying to gain a foothold in a new homeland. Think about when you go to a place, and then they have some kind of food that you grew up with, and you have that moment. Proust called it the madeleine moment. Urban anchors are a way of bringing home there.
With the gentrification of areas like Echo Park, what do you think is at stake as these Los Angeles neighborhoods change?
The impetus to tell this story at this time was that people kept suggesting that gentrification was bringing progress to an area that had no story or history of its own. The book is trying to show that, even if they don’t have a $9 latte, these places, with their immigrant place makers, establishing their urban anchors, were establishing a powerful sense of community. The book offers a kind of warning of what happens if we don’t actively work to tell the stories of these folks. If we don’t even see how they’re represented in their past, how are we going to see them, account for them and plan for them in the future?
The Latinx workforce that built the Huntington Library is the subject of your next book. How did you go about selecting this topic and why, in this forthcoming work and A Place at the Nayarit, have you chosen to focus on workers?
I’ve been going to the Huntington Library for over 25 years. And while it is a rich place to study in terms of the resources that they have and the community of scholars, when I first started going there, it could also be an alienating place for a woman of color. One of the times that I was there, I invited my dad–a Mexican immigrant–to have lunch with me. He was saying how beautiful the place was, and I said it can also be intimidating when you’re the only person of color in a reading room with 70 people. He leaned over and said, “Why would you ever be intimidated? We built this place.”
It was such a jolting reminder that we tend to tell the stories of certain institutions, of certain events, from the top down. As a historian, I’ve always worked to tell stories from what we call the bottom up, or the perspective of the community. Community histories can tell us so much about how people find space and belonging. And yet, for the Huntington, in our present I hadn’t quite thought about it in those terms. For a long time, there were no archives to tell that story, and there still aren’t. But as a historian, I have 20 years of experience under my belt of using different tools to get at these little shards that can be pieced together to archive and build a story about the history of this well-known cultural institution, but from the perspective of the people who built it.
Looking back at your schooling, from kindergarten to your graduate studies, is there an educator who was particularly influential?
Do you know the story of Roger Bannister? When he was 25 years old, in 1954, he was able to break the 4-minute mile barrier. Nobody had broken it before. Once it was broken, 46 days later, somebody broke that barrier again. And then, a year later, three other runners broke that barrier in a single race. And so, to me, there’s something to be said about following in the footsteps of people who have broken those barriers.
I’m the 22nd Chicana to receive a PhD in U.S. History. That shows you how new we are to this field; how little we’ve been represented. But once you know that somebody did it, you can do it, too. It was the community of women who actually showed me the list of 21 Chicana PhDs that they had written down. And when I was a graduate student they told me, “You will be number 22.” And I thought, “Oh, how could I let them down?” There’s something in that, being part of the community, being seen. Sometimes we find it in one single educator, and sometimes we find it in a community.
USC Rossier’s doctoral students include leaders in education, business, government agencies, and nonprofit organizations. Despite the wide and varied next steps our graduates will make, achieving educational equity is at the center of their studies at USC Rossier, and so is addressing disparities that affect the historically marginalized. As these grads continue or enter new positions in their professional lives–often in leadership positions–what would you urge them to remember as they lead their respective organizations and make decisions that affect the workforces they manage?
I think the keyword there is lead. As a leader, you’re breaking new ground. When you’re breaking new ground, you’re not necessarily going to please everybody. And so, it’s remembering your why, which is based on your training, your education, and your life experience. When I’m faced with these situations, I think of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who was fighting not just for civil rights, but also against the Vietnam War, against economic disparity and for wage equity. Seventy-five percent of Americans disapproved of his viewpoints. If we look for approval on what we’re doing when we’re engaging in breaking new ground, that’s not always going to happen. Heavy is the head that wears the crown. When you’re a leader, that is part of the responsibility that you must shoulder.

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How their mother’s love helped scholars bloom

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How their mother’s love helped scholars bloom

In celebration of Mother’s Day, USC Dornsife faculty reflect on the ways their moms encouraged and inspired their academic careers.
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In honor of Mother’s Day, five faculty at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences share how their mom inspired and encouraged their academic pursuits, from teaching them to code to modeling collaborative relationships.

Michael Campbell, assistant professor of biological sciences, writes about his mother, Nellie Campbell:

My parents were born in Jamaica, independently moved from their home country to England in pursuit of a better life, and then met in Canada where I was born.

My parents possess very different gifts that complemented each other, and they harnessed these gifts to shape me into who I am today (a scientist, scholar and responsible human being). My parents continue to inspire me every day, and their immigrant story is a testament to what is possible with patience, faith and hard work.

My mother in particular is an incredibly resourceful, savvy and independent person who taught me to persevere and to never give up finding ways to overcome obstacles. She was also unwavering in her dedication to my personal and academic development. My mother was the parent who took me to my first day of school and helped me with my homework in the evening (after a full day of work). She attended every one of my award ceremonies in high school, took me to piano lessons, encouraged my interest in science and proudly accompanied me to my freshman orientation at the University of Toronto.

In addition, she introduced me to the world of computers to enhance my education at a relatively early age, laying the groundwork for my interest in computation, which is the backbone of my research.

My mother has supported me unconditionally my entire life, and she taught me not to be deterred by anti-Black racism but to passionately pursue a life and career that were meaningful to me. Without a doubt, my mother, who infused me with grit and modelled compassion, is a key part of my life’s journey, which has now led me to the West Coast of the United States and to my current position at USC Dornsife.

The love, security, safety and guidance that my mother provided me during my childhood serve as the foundation upon which I build my life, and because of her I am able to offer these qualities to others as an adult.

Peter Kuhn, Dean’s Professor of Biological Sciences and professor of medicine, biomedical engineering, aerospace and mechanical engineering, and urology, writes about his mother, Rosi Kuhn:

I am the youngest of four children and grew up on a fruit orchard in southern Germany. My mom was always there for us, every day, every morning, every lunch and every dinner. Still to this day, when any one of us is stopping by home, there is a meal on the table seemingly emerging out of nowhere or a piece of cake with a cup of coffee.

I had just turned 17 when my dad sat us all down and explained to us that our mom had been diagnosed with breast cancer. While I had no idea what it really meant, somehow it was clear that everything had changed from one moment to the other. I also had no idea what to do, but it was clear that it now had to be us who had to be there for her, every day.

Very quickly my main job was to bring sunshine into her hospital room (and carefully block dark voices from entering). All the while, my mom enjoyed bossing me around telling me what needed to be done at home. Although my mom recovered, her roommate wasn’t so lucky and relapsed from her cancer early on. During one of our last conversations, the roommate told me, “Keep doing what you are doing in physics, and one day you will help other moms to not suffer from this disease anymore.”

This set me on the journey that eventually brought me to USC and is the very foundation of the USC Michelson Convergent Science Institute in Cancer.

Jazlyn Mooney, Gabilan Assistant Professor of Quantitative and Computational Biology, shares memories of her mother, Sonya McKeown, and her grandmother, Gloria Madrid:

My mother and grandmother have been my best friends my entire life. They have inspired me and my work in too many ways to count.

My mother taught me how to code, which is the foundation of my work as a computational biologist. She was one of maybe 10 women to graduate with a bachelor’s degree in computer science in 1998.

My grandmother received her PhD in administration of higher education shortly before that, in 1997.

My mother became a software engineer and my grandmother remained in academia as a professor at a local community college until she retired. I guess you could say I have turned into both as a new assistant professor in quantitative and computational biology at USC Dornsife.

My mother showed me how much was possible if you know how to code and ask questions. My grandmother’s doctoral thesis was about disparities and barriers in higher education for women of color. Her work motivated me to start a group in graduate school for diverse students to build a community and support each other.

They both inspire me to continue to support my students and make academia a more inclusive space for minoritized people.

Neither ever told me I could not achieve something that I was passionate about, and they have comforted and encouraged me through every high and low.

My favorite memories with my mom and grandmother when I was young were my mom taking me to the pool every day during summer break. Then, we would split a Happy Meal together on the way back to my grandparents’ house. On days when my mom worked, my grandma would take me out to the zoo or the library, or make up stories with me.

Now, the thing I look forward to most when I am home is going on walks with my grandparents and running with my mom.

Gayla Margolin, professor of psychology, pays tribute to her mother, Grace Ann Margolin:

My mom has been my longest and most steadfast fan. “I’m behind you all the way,” she recently whispered. Beyond her unwavering support, my mom gave me two other gifts that contributed to my career.

First was her love of books. As a young child, my mom’s goal was to read every book in her local library — shelf by shelf. It thus was a rude wakening when she realized that the library constantly acquired new books.

Accompanying her each week to the library and carefully selecting an armload of new books was one of my favorite activities as a child. Her enthusiasm for reading clearly spread to me.

Second, my mom epitomized a collaborative spirit. My dad ran his building business out of our home and my mom was always right by his side. She speaks in the language of ‘we’ rather than ‘I’ and she showed me the value of doing things collectively. Perhaps this sparked my scholarly interests in the salutary value of close relationships.

Relatedly, what I have experienced throughout my career is that personal relationships are at the heart of innovative work. The synergy of learning from others — especially from students — when planning and writing up research or doing clinical supervision is the joyful part and the only way to produce meaningful and interesting results.

My mom never wanted to be a teacher like her mother and others in our family — but I am so grateful for her life lessons.

Darby Saxbe, professor of psychology, writes about her mother, Georgia Newman:

My mom went to Harvard Medical School in the late 1960s as one of very few women in her class, facing overt sexism from faculty and classmates who told her she was taking a spot from a man who needed it. But she genuinely loves medicine, is still working full-time at age 77, and will probably never retire.

Her small-town Ohio practice serves many elderly Medicare patients on fixed incomes, which means she is the worst paid doctor on the planet (an accountant once told her that her practice was an “expensive hobby”), but she is also the least materialistic person I know, so it works out.

When I was a kid, I used to complain that I wanted a traditional mom who’d greet me when I came home from school with a plate of fresh-baked cookies. Of course, the one time she actually met me at the door with cookies, I was totally weirded out. It must have been an April Fool’s joke.

Now, I’m grateful that I got a nontraditional mom who loves her work and exudes intellectual curiosity. She loves to learn languages and toggles between Spanish novels and Latin texts on her Kindle. She reads trashy sci-fi novels and once fixed her Nordic Trak by hand. When the cat dragged in a dead possum a few years ago, she dissected it just for fun. She is always busy and never boring.

In the late ’90s, she diagnosed herself with adult ADHD, which explained a lot. She is a nut, or, to borrow one of her favorite phrases, “a real character.” I can’t really keep up with her, but I admire her more than anyone.

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