Mara Wade, Professor of Germanic Languages and Literatures, will become the 41st president of the Renaissance Society of America (RSA) in April.
The Renaissance Society of America is the largest international academic society devoted to the study of the era 1300–1700. Founded in 1954, the RSA has approximately 5,000 members around the country and the world.
Professor Wade has been attending the RSA for decades and said that she has enjoyed watching it mature into a world-class scholarly organization. “It is an increasingly diverse organization which welcomes innovative scholarship,” she said, adding, “We welcome innovative approaches and global perspectives.”
Professor Wade’s research interests lie in visual culture, with particular emphasis on emblematica; digital humanities, court studies, gender studies, early modern literature and culture of German-speaking lands and Scandinavia.
She has been for more than a decade the principle investigator (PI) for Emblematica Online, an NEH funded multi-year, international digital humanities research project. For more about Emblematica Online: http://emblematica.grainger.illinois.edu/