Dr. Deborah Chappel, associate professor of English in the College of Arts and Sciences at Arkansas State University, was recently recognized at the annual Honors Banquet.

Chappel, a member of ASU faculty since 1991, received the first Steven Leigh Mayes Honors Faculty Award.

The ASU Honors Association sponsors the Honors Faculty Award to recognize a faculty member who has demonstrated an exceptional effort to encourage student growth and learning. The recipient may be an honors professor, advisor, or a supervisor of an independent study (honors independent study, honors option, or honors senior thesis).

Chappel received her bachelor’s degree in English from Arkansas State University in 1986, a graduate certificate in women’s studies from Duke University in North Carolina, and her Ph.D. in American literature from Duke in 1991.

Her teaching interests include women writers; popular culture studies (theory and genres); 19th and 20th century American literature; Southern literature; and feminist theory.

The award was named in honor of Mayes, a professor of art in the College of Fine Arts. He served as an honors professor and advisor for more than 10 years. He is a member of several honors governance committees, and designer for the first five Undergraduate Scholars Day catalogues. Mayes is retiring from the university this year.

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