Honorary Degrees 2014-15
Dr Stanley Quek, The Provost, Dr Patrick Prendergast, Professor Grigory Kruzhkov, Professor Margaret Murnane, The Chancellor, Dr Mary Robinson and Dr Camille Souter
On Friday 26 June 2015 at 3 pm, honorary degrees of the University of Dublin were conferred on Grigory Kruzhkov, Margaret Murnane, Stanley Quek and Camille Souter at a Commencements Ceremony in the Public Theatre (Orations PDF)
Grigory Kruzhkov (Litt.D.)
Grigory Kruzhkov is a man of extraordinary talents across a range of disciplines: poet, translator, essayist and literary historian of links between English-language and Russian-language cultures. He currently teaches English and American literature at the Moscow State University for the Humanities. He has published several collections of poetry. Among his numerous translations are selections of Wyatt, Donne, Keats, Tennyson, Lear, Carroll, Yeats, Joyce, Frost, Stevens and Heaney. His awards include the State Prize of the Russian Federation and the Bunin Prize. Professor Kruzhkov has also written many children’s books and holds an Honorary Diploma from the International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY). He was one of six collaborators, translators and promoters nominated by Seamus Heaney to join him in the launch of the Centre for Literary Translation in April 2013. His talents have been deployed with great integrity to positioning Irish culture on the world stage and to making accessible to Russian readership the works of some of our major poets.
Margaret Murnane (Sc.D.)
Margaret Murnane, a UCC graduate, is Distinguished Professor at the University of Colorado. She is one of the leading optical physicists of her generation. Her ground-breaking work has transformed the field of ultrafast laser and x-ray science, covering the full range from fundamental research to start-up formation. She has a very strong publication record with an h-index of 65 and has won many prizes for her pioneering work, including the RDS Boyle Medal in 2011. She has been an icon for female physicists all over the world. Professor Murnane has twice served as external reviewer for the School of Physics and during her visits to Trinity has provided encouragement to Trinity’s female physicists.
Stanley Quek (LL.D.)
Stanley Quek, a Trinity medical graduate, is founder and Executive Chairman of Region Development Pte Ltd. He is more widely known as a diplomat, developer and designer with business interests in Singapore, Australia and the UK. He served as Ireland’s Honorary Consul General in Singapore from 1994-2000 and is Chair of the Singapore Ireland Fund. He has made a considerable contribution to medical education in Singapore and has been instrumental in organizing recruitment of Singaporean students to Irish universities. Over a thirty year period he has devoted an extraordinary amount of time to promoting Trinity in Singapore and across the world. He was key to the success of the 2011 Tercentenary of the School of Medicine, was involved in the Quatercentenary celebrations and helped realize the Trinity Biomedical Sciences Institute. He is also a member of the Trinity Foundation Board and President of the Singapore chapter of the TCD Medical Alumni Association.
Camille Souter (Litt. D.)
Camille Souter, HRHA (Honorary Council of the Royal Hibernian Academy) is an exceptional painter. She has worked independently from her studio home in Achill, Co Mayo, since 1956. She is one of the most revered living artists in Ireland. Often hailed as a ‘genius’, she was elected Saoi of Aosdána in 2008, the first woman painter, and only the second woman ever to achieve this rare honour. Any comprehensive collection of Irish modern art would be incomplete without her inclusion. Souter’s work is invariably included in modules on Modernist Irish art at the Department of History of Art and Architecture/Triarc in Trinity at both undergraduate and postgraduate level. She is primarily interested in articulating the reality of her experience of the world around her. Souter is admired not just for her exceptional creativity but also for her uncompromising commitment to her vision.
On Friday 5 December 2014 at 3 pm, honorary degrees of the University of Dublin were conferred on Nancy Hopkins, Mary Lawlor, Paul Muldoon and David O'Sullivan at a Commencements Ceremony in the Public Theatre (Orations PDF).
To view a video clip of the Honorary Degree Ceremony please click here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YjgSMDj7QwE
Nancy Hopkins (LL.D.)
Amgen, Inc. Professor of Biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, member of the US National Academy of Sciences (2004), the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1998) and the Institute of Medicine (1999), Professor Hopkins has made ground breaking contributions in both cancer genetics and in her pioneering work as an advocate for women in science. In 1999 she published what came to be known as the ‘MIT Report on the Status of Women Faculty in Science’, which summarised work of a committee she led. She Co-Chaired the first Council on Faculty Diversity in MIT. The resulting efforts by MIT were recognised by President Clinton and have had a major impact both in the US and internationally. Professor Hopkins played an important and very generous role in providing advice and expertise to WiSER, and maintains a strong link with the Centre’s activities.
Mary Lawlor (LL.D.)
Previously Executive Director of Amnesty International, Irish Section, Mary Lawlor has for the last 13 years been Executive Director of Front Line Defenders, the International Foundation for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders which she founded in January 2001. She swiftly established it as a respected, trusted and effective nongovernmental organisation (NGO) providing round the clock practical support and delivering fast and effective action to human rights defenders at risk. Under her leadership, Front Line was awarded the King Baudouin Foundation 2006-07 International Development Prize and in 2014 Mary was awarded the Legion d'Honneur by the French Government. Front Line Defenders works on behalf of over 1000 HRDs in 70 countries every year through security grants, personal and digital security training and advocacy. She has had many speaking engagements in Trinity, including for the MBA course, and continues to engage Trinity students in Front Line events as volunteer organisers and translators.
Paul Muldoon (Litt.D.)
Paul Muldoon, born and raised in County Armagh, is the Howard G.B. Clark ’21 University Professor in the Humanities, Princeton University, founding Chair of the Lewis Center for the Arts, and Poetry Editor of The New Yorker. He is one of the most distinguished Irish poets writing today, a distinction acknowledged in his election to the Oxford Professorship of Poetry in 1999; he has been described by the TLS as ‘the most significant English-language poet born since the Second World War’. In 2003 he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry. Although based in the US since 1987, his poetry continues to be very much concerned with Ireland. He is probably the only Irish poet besides Seamus Heaney to have built up a major reputation in the United States. He has set up links with the School of English and was a consultant on the Creative Arts, Technologies and Culture project.
David O’Sullivan (LL.D.)
David O’Sullivan, a Trinity graduate, is the EU Ambassador to the United States. Formerly Chief Operating Officer of the European External Action Service (EEAS), he has been an outstanding European public servant who has dedicated his career to the practical promotion of the European ideal. His contributions to Europe's external relations have had an immensely positive impact on the citizens of Ireland, the EU and beyond. As the top civil servant at the EU's diplomatic corps, David O’Sullivan has helped bring greater coherence and efficiency to the EU's international presence, defending our values and interests in the world. He has maintained his links with Trinity, acting as a consultative board member for the IIIS and participating as a speaker in the School of Social Sciences and Philosophy Henry Grattan public lecture series.
Related Events:
To celebrate Nancy Hopkins’ award of an Honorary Doctorate by Trinity College on Friday 5 December, the Centre for Women in Science & Engineering Research (WiSER) hosted a coffee morning and Q&A session with Professor Hopkins on:
Date: Thursday 4 December 2014
Time: 10.30 to 12 noon
Venue: Global Room, Watts Building
Fellow Emeritus, Professor Jane Grimson, former Dean of Engineering, Pro-Dean of Research and Vice-Provost of the University moderated the Q&A session.
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To celebrate Mary Lawlor’s award of an Honorary Doctorate by Trinity College on Friday 5 December, a public interview with RTE’s Paul Cunningham took place on:
Date: Thursday 4 December 2014
Time: 4 – 5.30 pm
Venue: Upper Lecture Theatre (Lecture Theatre 2.57), School of Nursing and Midwifery, Gas Building, D'Olier Street
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To celebrate Paul Muldoon’s award of an Honorary Doctorate by Trinity College on Friday 5 December, Paul Muldoon gave a poetry reading on:
Date: Thursday 4 December 2014
Time: 6 pm
Venue: Edmund Burke Theatre, Arts Building
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David O’Sullivan gave the keynote address at the Inaugural China-Europe School of Law/Trinity College Dublin Symposium on the China EU Investment Treaty on:
Date: Friday 5 December 2014
Title: China-EU Investment Treaty: Towards a China-EU Investment Agreement: Challenges, Themes and Competences
Time: 9 am to 5.30 pm
Venue: Trinity Long Room Hub
The symposium was hosted by: Professor Louis Brennan, School of Business, Professor Diarmuid Phelan S.C., School of Law, Professor Rosemary Byrne, School of Law and Nick McIlroy, Visiting Professor, ESSCA Shanghai.