The Global Arts + Humanities Discovery Theme is thrilled to announce three new faculty fellows for 2019-2020. These faculty fellows join us from the Departments of Design, English and Dance and will advise on priorities and opportunities for advancing initiatives in our focus areas as follows:

Associate Professor Susan Melsop
Faculty Fellow for Community
Susan Melsop is an associate professor in the Department of Design. Prior to this appointment, she taught design studios and graduate seminars at the Knowlton School of Architecture. Though her formal training is in architecture, Melsop’s work mediates between the scale of building, installations, furniture and sculpture. Her research interests include design pedagogy and reflective practices, sustainable building practices and environmental aesthetics. Meslop is the creator of Design Matters, a service-learning course that brings together urban youth with Ohio State students to co-design and build small-scale structures, furniture pieces and landscape elements for a community art center on the east side of Columbus. Each project is completed by university students and youth from the Transit Arts program, an arts-based development program for urban teens. As faculty fellow for the Community, Creative Practices and Civic Engagement Focus Area, Melsop will work in collaboration with GAHDT leadership on strategic planning for the development of community and civic engagement initiatives, with particular attention to creative practice.

Professor Dorothy Noyes
Faculty Fellow for (Humanities) Methods and Practices Amplifier
Dorothy Noyes is a professor with a joint appointment between the Departments of English and Comparative Studies and courtesy appointments in the Departments of Anthropology, French and Italian and Germanic Languages and Literatures; she also teaches in the Program in International Studies. She is a research associate at the Mershon Center for International Security Studies and served as director of the Center for Folklore Studies from 2005 to 2014. Noyes’ ethnographic and historical research addresses the traditional public sphere in Romance-speaking Europe; she also writes on folklore theory and on the international policy careers of culture concepts. Elected fellow of the American Folklore Society in 2005, Noyes is serving as president in 2018-2019. Her interdisciplinary projects have included a six-year stint as fellow of the Göttingen Interdisciplinary Working Group on Cultural Property. As faculty fellow for Humanities Methods and Practices, Noyes will work in collaboration with GAHDT leadership to define the parameters of the Amplifier Focus Area and contribute to strategic planning with special attention to opportunities for integration of cross-disciplinary methods and creative practices.

Professor Susan Petry
Faculty Fellow for (Arts) Methods and Practices Amplifier
Susan Petry is a professor in the Department of Dance, teaching contemporary technique, composition, pedagogy, professional practices and improvisation. She has a background in Erik Hawkins technique, Iyengar Yoga, Contact Improv, Bartenieff Fundamentals and Alexander Technique. From 2006-2015, she was chair of the department. Prior to that, she was assistant dean in the College of the Arts. Petry co-founded the Alliance for Dance and Movement Arts in Columbus and helped develop the Third Avenue Performance Space in Columbus’ Short North. She has served as President of OhioDance, Ohio’s statewide service organization, and has been treasurer of the national Council of Dance Administrators. She is currently serving as secretary on the Board of Directors of the National Association of Schools of Dance. Petry serves as a consultant and panelist for local, state and national schools and organizations, and she was on the advisory board of the Strategic National Arts Alumni Project (SNAAP). As faculty fellow for Arts Methods and Practices, Petry will work in collaboration with GAHDT leadership to define the parameters of the Amplifier Focus Area and contribute to strategic planning with special attention to opportunities for integration of cross-disciplinary creative practices.