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Dr. Gordon Campbell (BA 1967)

Dr. Campbell is a recipient this year of an Arts Alumni Achievement Award, which will be presented to him during the kickoff on September 17.

     Dr. Gordon Campbell’s (BA 1967) career as a professor has allowed him to visit and live in many different countries. After he graduated from UW and obtaining a Master’s degree from Queen’s University in Kingston, he moved to England to study at The University of York.

     At the beginning of his professional career, Dr. Campbell moved to Denmark, where he taught for a couple of years at Århus University. Subsequently he taught in Liverpool for five years, and for the past three decades he has held a faculty position at the University of Leicester. “[When] the job came up, [England] was an agreeable place. So here I am.” Dr. Campbell is a professor of Renaissance studies and an international relations advisor at the university. His central focus of his research is John Milton, but he also writes on subjects such as art and architecture. His extensive travels in the Islamic world have created an interest in those regions.

     The University of Waterloo was like a “different world” to Dr. Campbell when he first arrived on campus as a teenager. When he began his studies, the school system was based on the 3-year and 4-year Scottish models of the undergraduate degree. During this time, “a lot of American [professors] were coming north. [Many of] their sons were 17 and eligible for the draft. They didn’t want to fight in Vietnam.” The university was soon filled with “idealistic Americans” who brought “freshness” to the curricula and new ways of measuring academic performance, such as GPAs. Perhaps a backlash was inevitable, and “there was later a movement for Canadian jobs for Canadians,” says Dr. Campbell.

     Dr. Campbell recalls enjoying two of his English classes in particular: Sixteenth Century Literature taught by Dr. Jack Gray and a course in Literature in ideas taught by Dr. Jim Stone. Both of these courses are memorable because they were “Intellectually very stimulating.” Dr. Campbell became a 17th Century literature specialist; his first course on this subject was with Dr. Roman Dubinski, who introduced him to Milton.

     Though an expat for the past forty years, Dr. Campbell still “retain[s] great affection for Waterloo.” As an alumnus who had hasn’t been back for decades, he is excited to be returning to Waterloo for the 50th Anniversary Kickoff Celebration on September 17.

Read more about Dr. Campbell at http://www.le.ac.uk/ee/staff/campbell.html