Three Women Scholars Promoted and Granted Tenure at Colby College in Maine

Colby College, the highly rated liberal arts educational institution in Waterville, Maine, has announced the promotion of four faculty members to the rank of associate professor. Each was granted tenure. Three of the promotions went to women.

Art historian Marta Ameri works at the intersection of visual studies and archaeology. She is an interdisciplinary scholar who studies carved or engraved miniature seals from South and Central Asia and the Persian Gulf region. She is the co-editor of Seals and Sealing in the Ancient World: Case Studies from the Ancient Near East, Egypt, the Aegean, and South Asia (Cambridge University Press, 2018). Dr. Ameri earned a bachelor’s degree in classical and Near Eastern archaeology at Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania. She holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in art history and archaeology from the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University.

An anthropologist of religion, Britt Halvorson examines the cultural history and practice of medical humanitarianism within religious communities, and the ethics and politics of aid relationships between Christian communities in the U.S. and sub-Saharan Africa. She is the author of Conversionary Sites: Transforming Medical Aid and Global Christianity from Madagascar to Minnesota (University of Chicago Press, 2018) and co-author of Imagining the Heartland: White Supremacy and the American Midwest (University of California Press, 2022). Dr. Halverson is a graduate of Albion College in Michigan, where she majored in anthropology and English literature. She holds a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Michigan.

Ying Li is a scholar of computer networks focused on finding solutions to the challenges of creating low-cost, easily deployable wireless networks in contexts where wired networks are unavailable or have failed. For example, intermittent networks can be created to support search and rescue operations in disaster areas or to provide wireless service in rural or remote areas. Her most recent scholarship explores the use of drones to support intermittent networks. Dr. Li earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the Hubei University of Technology in Wuhan, China. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of New Hampshire.