How to Determine the Meaning of a Sacred Text, a collection of 22 essays by Walcott-Bartlett Professor of Religion Jay Williams ’54, was recently published by Edwin Mellen Press. The essays, written over a period of almost 40 years, cover a variety of subjects including mythology, the Hebrew scriptures, Confucian texts, Buddhist texts, gospels and classical spiritual poetry.

Associate Professor of Art Rebecca Murtaugh has 11 works in the exhibition titled "Fluidity" at the Estel Gallery in Nashville, Tenn. For the pieces in "Fluidity," confetti and watercolor are used as vehicles on paper, wood and aluminum. These abstract works ask the viewer to engage with shifting perceptions of one's reflection. The show is open though August 27.

Visiting Assistant Professor of Biology Ashleigh Smythe gave an invited talk titled “Molecular Phylogeny of Enoplia: Implications for Classification and Stoma Evolution” at the 50th anniversary meeting of the Society of Nematologists held July 17-20 at Oregon State University in Corvallis, Ore. Her talk was presented in the symposium “Freshwater and Marine Nematodes.”

Assistant Professor of Religious Studies Erich Fox Tree presented “La Importancia de los Idiomas de Señas Indígenas para el Desciframiento de la Iconografía Mayas Antigua” (“The Importance of Indigenous Sign Languages for the Decipherment of Ancient Maya Iconography”) at the 25th Symposium on Archaeological and Ethnohistorical Research in Guatemala, July 18-22.

Associate Professor of Art History Stephen J. Goldberg presented a poster titled “Constraint interaction in the inscription of Chinese characters” on July 20 at the 33rd Annual Cognitive Science Conference in Boston. The poster was co-presented with his son Ariel Goldberg, assistant professor of psychology at Tufts University, during a workshop on “Optimality Theory as a General Cognitive Architecture.”

WAMC/Northeast Public Radio in Albany will feature a reading by Visiting Associate Professor of Religious Studies S. Brent Plate on Friday, July 29, as part of the public radio station’s Academic Minute. Plate’s topic explores the point at which art becomes blasphemy. Plate was last heard on the program in December 2010 when he discussed the persistence of myth.

Hamilton has received notification from the SunUp Foundation of a $16 million donation, the single most generous act of philanthropy in the college’s history. Edward ’46 and Virginia Taylor, directors for the foundation, recently informed the college of the commitment, which will establish Hamilton’s largest financial aid endowment and provide support for faculty research in the sciences and new arts facilities.

Douglas Weldon, the Stone Professor of Psychology, presented a poster at the International Brain Research Organization’s (IBRO) Eighth World Congress of Neuroscience on July 15, in Florence, Italy. “Effects of Anpirtoline Administration on Acoustic Startle Responses and Sensorimotor Gating in Rats” presented three experiments based on initial work by the poster’s co-author Caroline Briggs ’10 for her senior thesis in neuroscience.

The fourth edition of America Divided: The Civil War of the 1960s, written by Maurice Isserman, the Publius Virgilius Rogers Professor of American History, and Georgetown Professor of History Michael Kazin, has been published by Oxford University Press.

Hamilton’s Jazz Archive was the source for a story about Duke Ellington that appeared on NPR’s A Blog Supreme on July 18. “Duke Ellington Has His Way” tells the story of how Ellington “poached” trumpeter Clark Terry from Count Basie. The article credits the jazz archive and Monk Rowe, the Joe Williams Director of the Jazz Archive and Lecturer in Music Performance.