A&A Professor Beatrice Kitzinger has been named new Behrman Professor in the Humanities Council. The appointment recognizes distinguished humanities scholars and dedicated teachers from within the University community.

Behrman Professors coordinate the Interdisciplinary Approaches to Western Culture (HUM 216-219) and play a leading role in building community among humanities undergraduate students at Princeton.

Kitzinger specializes in the art of the western Middle Ages. Her current research focuses on the intersection of narrative and history in early medieval art, as well as the relationship between eighth-century book culture and law.

“Teaching in the Western Humanities Sequence always affirms the excitement of exploring history in community,” said Kitzinger, who will begin her three-year Behrman professorship in fall 2023. “I became an art historian because I was fascinated by the stories objects and images can tell, which are sometimes but not always the same stories told by texts. One reason I love teaching the Sequence is that its polyvocal format brings students into a community in which many cultural threads and disciplinary approaches intertwine. The course underscores a really fundamental aspect of humanistic study: works speak to each other across genres and time, and everyone approaches their reading with diverse commitments and questions.”

“I became an art historian because I was fascinated by the stories objects and images can tell...works speak to each other across genres and time, and everyone approaches their reading with diverse commitments and questions.” – Professor Beatrice Kitzinger