University of Richmond Professor Wins Book Prize From American Catholic Historical Association
February 4, 2004
Joanna H. Drell, assistant professor of history at the University of Richmond, has received the American Catholic Historical Association's Howard R. Marraro Prize for her book, "Kinship and Conquest: Family Strategies in the Principality of Salerno during the Norman Period, 1077-1194."
Drell received the award at the association's 84th annual meeting, held in conjunction with the annual American Historical Association meeting in Washington, D.C.
The prize is named in memory of Howard R. Marraro, a Columbia University professor and author of more than a dozen books on Italian literature, history and culture. It is presented each year to the author of a distinguished scholarly work dealing with Italian history or Italo-American history or relations.
Drell's book is an investigation into the society of the Norman kings in the Kingdom of Southern Italy and Sicily and explains how a dominant family assimilated itself successfully in a world very remote from its geographical origins.
"This excellent work further illuminates the ascendancy of powerful noble families and their extensive, interlocking kinships, which ultimately provided administrative support, property ownership and military strength," noted the award committee.
Drell received a B.A. from Wellesley College in 1987 and A.M. and Ph.D. degrees in history from Brown University. She has received Fiat and Fulbright fellowships in Italy and the 2000-01 Rome Prize of the American Academy in Rome. She joined the University of Richmond faculty in 2000.
Drell also is co-editor of "Medieval Italy: A Documentary History," which will be published next fall, and she is researching another book on the construction of Mediterranean identity.