Mentors for Faculty
Humanities Mentor Program
Are you looking for someone outside your department to talk with about career issues? These experienced colleagues have agreed to make themselves available to faculty members at any stage of career who would like to gain perspective on the various challenges of academic life.
Mentors will not offer to resolve conflicts, nor will they provide specific advice about your department’s expectations for tenure, promotion or merit. They can, however, listen to your concerns, provide feedback based on their own experience, and suggest where to turn for advice on a variety of questions when sources outside the mentor program are more appropriate.
You should feel free to consult a mentor for a single meeting, or for an ongoing relationship. Please note that no records or reports of meetings will be kept.
Mentors
Dr. Sikata Banerjee
| Sikata Banerjee received her Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Washington, Seattle WA. Before joining the Women’s Studies department at the University of Victoria in 2000, she taught for four years at the University of Lethbridge. Her research focuses on urban violence, gender, and nationalism with an area focus on India. She is the author of two books and several articles. The research informing her various publications has been facilitated by grants/fellowships from the Social Science and Humanities Research Council, Canada; the Rockefeller Foundation; and the University of Victoria Internal Research Grant Program. She has served as Chair of the Women’s Studies department as well as on several university level committees and is currently serving on Senate, the Senate Budget Committee, and the Planning Priorities Committee (second term, she was involved in revising the 2005 University Strategic Plan). She is the Associate Dean of Humanities for the period from July 2009 to June 2014. |
Contact Information Phone: (250) 721-6158
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Dr. Claire Carlin
Claire has been at UVic since 1989, and served as Associate Dean of Humanities from 2004-2009. In that role, she had the opportunity to work with faculty members from across the disciplines on issues such as developing a research profile, balancing teaching, research and service, and having a life outside the University. The author of two monographs, over 30 articles and the editor of four collective volumes, the subject of Claire’s research is seventeenth-century France. Around 2000, she shifted her the focus of her scholarship from theatre studies to early modern marriage, which meant looking at a variety of texts outside the traditionally literary. Her current SSHRC-funded project is the electronic scholarly edition of an anthology of images and other documents about conjugal life in Bourbon France. Her major publications are listed at http://web.uvic.ca/french/professors/carlin/carlin_cv.php |
Contact Information Phone: (250) 721-7259
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Dr. Evelyn Cobley
| Evelyn Cobley received her training in Comparative Literature and is now a Professor of English teaching critical theory and modernist literature. She is the author of Representing War: Form and Ideology in First World War Literature (Toronto 1993) for which she was awarded the Raymond Klibansky book prize. More recently, she published Temptations of Faust: Postmodern Archaeologies of Modernity and the Logic of Fascism (Toronto 2002) and is now in the process of publishing Modernism and the Culture of Efficiency: Ideology and Fiction (forthcoming Toronto 2009). Her articles on high theory and twentieth-century English and comparative literature have appeared in a variety of journals. Her administrative duties have included two three-year terms as Chair of English and two one-year terms as Chair of two other departments (Sociology and French). |
Contact Information Phone: (250) 721-7249
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Dr. Lloyd Howard
| Lloyd Howard was appointed to the Department of Hispanic and Italian Studies in 1977 as the only member of the Italian Section at that time. Over the years he has helped develop first a Minor then a Major Program in Italian Studies and lastly an interdisciplinary MA Program in Hispanic and Italian Studies. His area of research comprises Medieval Italian Literature and Dante Studies in particular. As an administrator he has served a total of 11 years as Chair of the Department of Hispanic and Italian Studies, 3 years as Director of the Medieval Studies Program, and two 6-month terms in 1997 and 2000 as Acting Dean of the Faculty of Humanities. |
Contact Information Phone: (250) 721-7411 |
Dr. Richard King
| Richard King is in the Department of Pacific and Asian Studies, where he teaches the Chinese language at all levels, Chinese literature from the seventeenth century to the present day, and theory and methodology for students of Asian literature and culture. He is a recipient of the Alumni Award for Excellence in Teaching. His research is on twentieth-century literature, and he has also published a number of translations of Chinese fiction from the 1950s to the present day. Richard has been at the University since 1986, with a three-year absence as Cultural Counsellor at the Canadian Embassy in Beijing; since his return from China in 1996, he has served as Department Chair and Director of a research centre. As a mentor to new faculty and sessional colleagues, he has advised on syllabus preparation, visited classes and reviewed teaching effectiveness, discussed career management, and given information about services available at the university and in town. |
Contact Information Phone:(250) 721-8708 |
Dr. Eric Sager
| Eric Sager (PhD, UBC, 1975), a member of UVic’s History Department since 1983, is a historian of Canada and author or editor of nine books and over forty articles. He was Director of the Canadian Families Project, a SSHRC Major Collaborative Research Initiative, and is a co-investigator with the CFI-funded Canadian Century Research Infrastructure Project. Chair of the History Department from 2000 to 2005, he has also served on the Faculty Association Executive, the University Review Committee, the Campus Development Committee, and the Humanities Faculty Advisory Committee. He is currently an elected faculty representative on the UVic Board of Governors. Eric’s departmental web page is located at http://web.uvic.ca/history/faculty/sager.html |
Contact Information Phone: (250) 721-7401 |
Dr. Leslie Saxon
Leslie Saxon joined the Department of Linguistics at UVic in 1991. An Associate Professor, she chaired her department from 2003-2008 in a period of considerable change. She has served on many hiring and promotion committees, and the Humanities Faculty Advisory Committee three times. Her research areas include documentation and syntactic analysis of Dene languages, particularly the Tłįchǫ language. She has participated as a learner and instructor in community-based research and teaching in the Northwest Territories with the Tłįchǫ Nation and Aurora College since the 1980s, and has mentored students, colleagues, and two recent SSHRC postdoctoral fellows. She has contributed in UVic's Certificate program in Aboriginal Language Revitalization. Leslie has received research and conference funding from SSHRC and First Nations organizations. She served as the president of the Society for the Study of the Indigenous Languages of America in 2007 and is currently the vice-president / president-elect of the Canadian Linguistic Association | Association canadienne de linguistique.
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Contact Information Phone:(250) 721-7433 |
Dr. John Tucker
Having recently achieved the distinction of being the longest-surviving member of the English Department (John has been at UVic since 1979), he notes that he can at least offer the benefits of antiquity, a possible advantage despite the continuing evolution of the university. His experience includes 3 years as Chair of English; 6 years as Director of Medieval Studies; 5 years on the Faculty Advisory Committee, including 3 in the days of Arts and Sciences; 2 years on the Review Committee; countless RPT Committees and so on. John says that “colleagues seeking a decisive response should doubtless look elsewhere; a sympathetic ear better describes what I can offer.” Anyone wanting to read John's scholarly profile should go to the English Department's website: http://english.uvic.ca/faculty/john_j_tucker.html |
Contact Information Phone: (250) 721-7247 |
