Acting Associate Dean for Graduate Studies and Research
As acting associate dean, Stephen Carr will continue to strengthen the Kenneth P. Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences' ability to produce the next generation of high quality researchers and university educators. He is committed to increasing the diversity of the graduate student body, advancing the academic and research components of Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences graduate programs, and increasing the competitiveness of graduate admissions and funding.
Carr received his BA in English, magna cum laude, from Williams College in 1972. He was awarded a PhD in English Language and Literature from the University of Michigan in 1980. Carr was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. In 2009, he received an award for Service in the University Senate in recognition of long-standing work on the Senate Budget Policies Committee and several other Senate and University committees. His research focuses on William Blake, the history of the book, and literacy and the history of instruction. His Archives of Instruction: Nineteenth-Century Rhetorics, Readers, and Composition Books in the United States (2005; coauthored with Jean Ferguson Carr and Lucille Schultz) won the MLA's Mina P. Shaughnessy Prize. Current research interests include the emergence of literature in the vernacular as a field of study and the uses of new digital tools and platforms in archival research.
Carr came to the University of Pittsburgh in 1980. He served as Director of the Literature Program in the English Department for almost a decade, and as Acting Chair in 1992-93 and 2005-2006. He was Assistant Dean of Graduate Studies from January 2007 to his recent appointment as Acting Associate Dean. He is also co-captain of the Masters Men crew team at Three Rivers Rowing Association.