Marc Robinson appointed FAS humanities dean
Marc Robinson, a longtime member of the Yale faculty and a leading theater critic whose work has illuminated the history of drama and performance in the United States, has been named the next dean of humanities for Yale’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS), FAS Dean Tamar Gendler announced in a message to the FAS community.
He will begin a five-year term, effective July 1, 2024, pending formal approval by the Yale Corporation.
Robinson, who joined the Yale faculty in 1993, is the Malcolm G. Chace ‘56 Professor of Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies and English and professor of American Studies in the FAS, and professor in the practice of Dramaturgy and Dramatic Criticism at the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale.
Robinson will succeed Kathryn Lofton, the current FAS dean of humanities, who will return to full-time teaching and research in the FAS when her term as dean concludes on June 30, 2024.
Since becoming FAS dean of humanities in 2019, Lofton has overseen a period of significant growth and change for the Division of Humanities, Gendler said.
“During her term, 18 units moved into the newly renovated Humanities Quadrangle [formerly known as the Hall of Graduate Studies]; faculty members articulated a vision for the future of graduate education in the humanities and advanced changes to practices and policies pertaining to instructional faculty; and new faculty members joined every academic unit in the Humanities,” Gendler wrote. “I am grateful to Katie for her leadership.”
Marc Robinson is a noted scholar of drama and theater in the United States. He joined the Yale faculty as assistant professor adjunct of theater studies and of drama in 1993, and was appointed professor of theater studies and of English in 2005.
From 1993 to 2005 he was the director of Theater Studies, served as chair of Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies three times, and as acting chair of English in 2022-2023. In addition, he has served on numerous FAS- and university-wide bodies, including the University-wide Committee on Sexual Misconduct; the Whitney Humanities Center Executive Committee; the FAS Creative Arts Advisory Committee; the FAS COVID-19 Task Force on Studio-, Performance-, and Collection-based Teaching; and the Yale College Committee on Admissions and Financial Aid.
“Marc Robinson is a scholar of uncommon breadth and a seasoned leader who led the departments of Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies and English with wisdom and unfaltering integrity,” Gendler said. “With his expansive vision and collaborative ethos, Marc will be an exemplary leader for the humanities. I look forward to working with him to continue building on the FAS’s considerable strengths in the division.”
Across his many publications, Robinson narrates a definitive history of theater in the United States. He is the author of “The Other American Drama” and the award-winning “The American Play: 1787-2000,” and the editor of volumes of plays by noted playwrights David Greenspan and Adrienne Kennedy. He is completing a new book on avant-garde performance, “American Performance in 1976,” focusing on works by Meredith Monk, Robert Wilson, Adrienne Kennedy, Cecil Taylor, and the Wooster Group.
He has held fellowships from the Bogliasco Foundation, the New York Institute for the Humanities, and the MacDowell Colony, and he is the winner of a Lambda Literary Award, the George Jean Nathan Award in Dramatic Criticism, and numerous other prizes.
At Yale, he also mentors undergraduate and graduate students in English; Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies; American Studies; and Dramaturgy and Dramatic Criticism, and he teaches courses on theater history, dramatic literature, and criticism. He is also a sought-after lecturer and panelist at institutions in the United States and abroad.
“Marc is a transformative leader already at Yale, having spent three decades strengthening the curriculum and faculty in literary criticism, theater studies, dance studies, and performance studies,” Lofton said. “He now brings to the Division of Humanities his intellectual acuity, gargantuan kindness, and ease with the avant-garde. We are so fortunate to have his experience at the leadership of the humanities.”
In her message to the community, Gendler expressed gratitude to members of the FAS Dean of Humanities Search Advisory Committee, particularly committee chair Joanne Meyerowitz, the Arthur Unobskey Professor of History and American Studies.
“They consulted with a broad range of faculty and staff from across the FAS and the university, and their guidance was not only instrumental to this appointment decision but also served to catalog the extraordinary work of so many of our faculty and the vibrancy of FAS humanities at Yale,” she said.
Gendler added: “I look forward to working with Marc to continue strengthening our outstanding humanities departments and programs, and to advance the initiatives, begun by his predecessors, Amy Hungerford and Katie Lofton, that build the FAS’s capacity across and beyond the humanities.”
