01/15/08 - French history professor receives National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship

Lauren Clay, assistant professor of history, received a NEH Fellowship to finish her first book.

French history professor receives National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship Lauren Clay, assistant professor of history, received a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship for the summer and fall of 2008. The fellowship will provide Clay funding for seven months to complete her first book.

“These fellowships are extremely competitive and it is a significant honor to win one,” said Walter Buenger, professor and head of the Department of History. “This fellowship is an indication that Lauren’s book will be a major contribution to the field.”

Clay was awarded the fellowship to finish a book, tentatively entitled The Commercialization of Culture: Theater in France and the Colonies, 1680-1789, which discusses the establishment of professional public theater in urban life throughout France and its empire. Clay’s research found that between 1680 and the beginning of the French Revolution in 1789, public theaters were inaugurated in at least seventy-one French cities and nine of France’s colonial cities. These public theaters quickly became the most prominent and prestigious new cultural institutions of the century. They allowed spectators to regularly enjoy dramatic entertainment and participate more directly in the literary and cultural networks that increasingly unified the French cultural sphere.

Clay earned her Ph.D. in history from the University of Pennsylvania in 2003. She joined Texas A&M University as a visiting assistant professor in 2003 and became an assistant professor in 2004. Clay specializes in the social and cultural history of modern France. She teaches courses on the Enlightenment, France, Europe, and modern world history.

Clay’s research was previously supported by a NEH Summer Stipend, as well as by the Glasscock Center for Humanities Research, the College of Liberal Arts, and Texas A&M University.

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Erin Wood

Contact: Blair Williamson, bwilliamson@libarts.tamu.edu, 979.458.1347