A Tribute for an Arizona State University Scholar From the American Historical Association

Asuncion Lavrin, professor emerita of history at Arizona State University, received the Distinguished Scholarship Award for lifetime contributions from the American Historical Association.

A native of Cuba who came to the United States in the 1950s to study at Radcliffe College, she went on to earn a Ph.D. at Harvard University. As a woman in a discipline dominated by men at that time, Dr. Lavrin had a difficult time securing a tenure-track faculty position at a major university. Eventually, she joined the faculty at Howard University, the historically Black educational institution in Washington, D.C. Professor Lavrin joined the faculty at Arizona State University in 1995.

Professor Lavrin is a leading scholar on the role of women in the church in colonial Latin America. She is the author of more than 100 scholarly articles and nine books including the award-winning Brides of Christ: Conventual Life in Colonial Mexico (Stanford University Press, 2008).

Upon hearing she won the award, Professor Lavrin said that “it is the crowning event in my life as a historian. It means not just my own personal work but the field it represents has been recognized at a national level and that make me very happy.”