UW Women's Studies Professor Named Seibold Award Winner

May 21, 2003 -- Women's Studies professor Susan McKay is the recipient of the Seibold Professorship awarded through the University of Wyoming College of Arts and Sciences for the 2003-2004 academic year.

McKay will use the professorship to learn more about women's spirituality with an emphasis on understanding their perspectives. She wants to concentrate on women from diverse backgrounds, geographic regions, ethnicities, religious and secular orientations and sexualities. She plans to begin her work in Laramie and throughout the Rocky Mountain region by listening and learning from women's conversations and reading about the region's religious and spiritual culture and history.

Established by the late Clarence Seibold of Cheyenne, the annual award is presented to tenured UW faculty members in social sciences, humanities or fine arts who have a demonstrated commitment to teaching. Seibold professors are provided one year's salaried leave to pursue studies or develop projects that will enhance their teaching performance and professional careers. The bequest provides the recipient's department with funds to replace the faculty member or to meet other departmental needs.

A member of the UW faculty since 1966, McKay left UW in 1975 to earn her Ph.D. and to later open an independent psychology practice. She rejoined the UW faculty in 1986. McKay teaches classes in women, war, and health; gender, women, and health; and women's bodies and minds. She will offer a course on gender and society after completing her year-long research.

During her career, McKay's research has taken her to numerous countries such as Japan, Denmark, China and Africa. She has traveled to Africa more than a dozen times the last five years to conduct studies about women peace building and girls associated with fighting forces in war-torn nations.

"I really like being on the cutting-edge of opening new fields of inquiries that have not been looked at before," McKay says. She likes to draw attention to critical issues, bring other people into the work and then develop new research initiatives.

Posted on Wednesday, May 21, 2003