College of Arts and Science Faculty Elected to American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Two members of the College of Arts and Science faculty—Distinguished University Professor Houston A. Baker and University Distinguished Professor George Hornberger—have been elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences (AAAS). Founded in 1780 by John Adams and John Hancock, among others, the AAAS has previously elected luminaries and leaders such as Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Martha Graham, Margaret Mead, and Martin Luther King, Jr. Present-day members collaborate on interdisciplinary, non-partisan research and outreach to inform policymaking, business endeavors, and philanthropy in six fields: Arts & Humanities, Democracy & Justice, Education, Energy & Environment, Global Affairs, and Science & Technology.
George Hornberger, who serves in both the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences and the School of Engineering’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, also finds satisfaction in effecting positive change through his work. Hornberger’s research has spanned a number of specializations in his career, but has always been tied to the connections between watersheds and human behavior. He taught for many years at the University of Virginia and has served as a visiting scholar at leading institutions, including Stanford University, the University of California at Berkley, and the U.S. Geological Survey. Because of his consistently groundbreaking work, he is one of the most frequently-cited scientists in his field. He is also a member of the National Academy of Engineering and either the current or past chair of several National Academies committees.
One of Hornberger’s passions is collaboration: finding points of connection between hydrology and other fields and spearheading related research that makes a measurable impact on the wider world. In the 1980s, that activity took the form of examining the impact of acid rain on watersheds. He has also consulted with city governments on water conservation, researched tradeoffs between irrigation and hydropower, and helped find new ways to provide fresh water to rural Bangladesh. Most recently, he worked on a study of the interrelationships between drought, energy, food supply, and human behavior in Sri Lanka.
“Every five or six years, I get interested in something new and go off and study it. I’ve collaborated with ecologists, other hydrologists, geochemists, even psychology postdocs. The hydrologists think I’m a geochemist, and the geochemists think I’m an ecologist. I tell people that the thread that has run through a lot of my work is geo-bio-hydro-chemistry,” Hornberger said.
That penchant for interdisciplinary work is what drew Hornberger to Vanderbilt. While he was still teaching at the University of Virginia, friends at Vanderbilt encouraged him to apply for the directorship of the new Vanderbilt Institute for Energy and the Environment. He was intrigued by the institute’s interdisciplinary mission, sent in his application, and got the job. Within a semester of arriving on campus in 2008, he’d connected with faculty all over Vanderbilt.
“From the first day, I loved it. I was so taken by how low the walls were between disciplines and schools,” Hornberger said. “I met people in Nursing, Peabody, Business, Law, Engineering and Arts and Science. It was just unbelievable. It’s not that disciplinary walls don’t exist, but they’re extraordinarily low. I think that’s such a delightful aspect of Vanderbilt.”
Not surprisingly, Hornberger is most excited about the AAAS’s interdisciplinary research and outreach. Whether providing unbiased information to Congress or helping the public understand the broader importance of the arts and sciences, he’s looking forward to contributing to the organization’s mission.
Baker is similarly excited about the Academy’s interdisciplinary efforts.
“The AAAS addresses some of the most serious problems of the human condition with a relentlessness fueled by the longevity of the Academy itself,” he says. “To join that collaboration for new knowledge and for the amelioration of tenacious problems is dizzying. I couldn’t be happier about this moment.”
Posted by Kathryn Royster on Tuesday, June 2, 2020