The Theiline Pigott McCone Chair in Humanities is dedicated to promoting scholarly life among faculty.  The President of Seattle University bestows this award to a member of the College of Arts and Sciences  faculty who is an outstanding teacher and scholar in one of the basic humanities disciplines.

The 2012-14 Pigott McCone Chair is Professor Theresa Earenfight, Ph.D.

President Stephen Sundborg, S.J. awarded the Theiline Pigott McCone Chair in Humanities to History Professor Theresa Earenfight. As Pigott McCone Chair, Earenfight will further scholarship on “Health from a Historical Perspective” through symposia, conferences, and lectures. Presenters will include anthropologists who study health care, historians who study the social and political impact of epidemics in the modern world, and literary scholars who study depictions of health and disease in novels and nonfiction works.  An event focusing on how people in the Middle Ages understood fertility and responded to infertility and pregnancy-related conditions is also planned.

Earenfight is known internationally for her scholarship on medieval Europe and gender issues. She is the author of The King's Other Body: Maria of Castile and the Crown of Aragon (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2009) and recently edited Women and Wealth in Late Medieval Europe (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). She is currently working on a textbook about queens who reigned during the Middle Ages and early Renaissance.

Earenfight received her Ph.D. from Fordham University and joined the faculty in the College of Arts and Sciences in 1998. She has received numerous awards for her scholarship, including grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Spanish Ministry of Culture, and the Society for the Study of Early Modern Women and a Fulbright fellowship to Spain.

Pigott McCone Chairs

1985 - 1988: Hamida Bosmajian, English Department  

1988 - 1991: Lane Gerber, Psychology Department 

1991 - 1994: James Risser, Honors Program 

1994 - 1997:  Andrew Bjelland, Philosophy 

1997 - 1999: Richard Young, Political Science   

1999 - 2001: Jeanette Rodriguez, Theology and Religious Studies   

2001 - 2002:  Jim Hogan, Institute of Public Service        

2002 – 2004: Dan Dombrowski, Philosophy  

2004 – 2006: Maria Bullon-Fernandez, English        

2006 – 2008: Le Xuan Hy, Psychology 

2008 – 2010: Burt Hopkins, Philosophy, Report of Activities  

2010 – 2012: H. Hazel Hahn, History, Report of Activities