Two profs elected fellows to British Academy

Professors Michael Storper of urban planning at the Luskin School of Public Affairs and Michael J. B. Allen, recently retired distinguished professor of English and Italian studies, are among the 53 scholars who were elected July 19 to the British Academy in recognition of their outstanding research. Only 15 of this year’s new fellows are from outside the U.K.

 
Established by royal charter in 1902, the British Academy champions and supports the humanities and social sciences. Its purpose is to inspire, recognize and support excellence in the humanities and social sciences throughout the U.K. and internationally and to inspire public interest in these disciplines.

With joint appointments at the Institut d'Études Politiques de Paris in Paris and the London School of Economics and Political Science, Storper is a leading theorist in economic geography and the development of regional economies. His research focuses on the tensions between regional specialization and economic globalization, and the technological, sociological and political drivers of development. He has received research grants from the Haynes Foundation, the French Ministry of Urbanism and Housing and the German Marshall Fund, and he holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Utrecht. He has been recognized as one of the most widely cited scholars of urban planning in the U.S.

 

 

Allen taught Beowulf, Chaucer, Shakespeare and Milton for 41 years before recently retiring. The main focus of his scholarly research, however, has been the philosophical, theological, magical and mythological issues explored by the 15th century Florentine Platonists Marsilio Ficino and Pico della Mirandola. The author or coauthor of some 16 books, he has served as director of UCLA's Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies (1988-93); as senior editor of Renaissance Quarterly, the premier American journal in the field (1993-2001); and as president of the Renaissance Society of America (2006-08).