Editor's Note

Comparative Civilizations Review Volume 72 Number 72 Spring 2015 Article 2 4-1-2015 Editor's Note Joseph Drew Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/ccr Recommended Citation Drew, Joseph (2015) "Editor's Note," Comparative Civilizations Review: Vol. 72 : No. 72 , Article 2. Available at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/ccr/vol72/iss72/2 This Front Matter is brought to you for free and open access by the All Journals at BYU ScholarsArchive. It has been accepted for inclusion in Comparative Civilizations Review by an authorized editor of BYU ScholarsArchive. For more information, please contact , . Drew: Editor's Note Comparative Civilizations Review 1 Editor’s Note This has been an eventful year for the journal. As noted in the last edition, Dr. Laina FarhatHolzman resigned as Senior Editor after many years of highly productive work; she was a central figure in advancing the publication. She wrote many valuable articles in these pages; if you go to our publishing website, https://ojs.lib.byu.edu/spc/ index.php/CCR, you will find fully 47 articles under her name (some major essays, others book reviews, one “front matter”), since 2008. She resigned last summer in order to attend to her bi-weekly article series published in Northern California newspapers. But, California’s gain meant the journal’s loss. How have we attempted to recoup? First, at the Monmouth University annual meeting of our sponsoring organization, the International Society for the Comparative Study of Civilizations, the Editorial Board elected two new Executive Editors. They are Dr. J. Randall Groves of Michigan and Dr. Tseggai Isaac of Missouri. Both are long-time authors and members of the ISCSC. Dr. Groves, Professor of Humanities and Comparative Civilization at Ferris State University, published the lead article in last spring’s edition; it was entitled “Southeast Asian Identities: The Case of Cambodia.” Dr. Isaac, Associate Professor of History and Political Science at the Missouri University of Science and Technology, published the second lead article in the same issue: “Civilizations: Which Constitutes Africa’s Most Effective Choice?” Further, both have proved of central significance to the journal this year. Especially important is that Dr. Groves selected the lead author for a “focus” argument in this current issue. The central article is by Prof. Steve Farmer; it represents an innovative approach to the study of religious and philosophical systems, using the computer to find commonalities across civilizations. Prof. Groves guided Dr. Farmer through the editorial process, taking an earlier work and expanding and updating it for the journal. It’s a controversial argument, and we are carrying some responses in this issue, plus an introduction by Dr. Groves. Because of an extensive publishing commitment later this year, Dr. Groves had to decline to serve as Executive Editor for more than the current year, but he will continue to be associated with the journal. Similarly, Prof. Isaac is taking the lead in the fall number. What he has taken on will touch the hearts of all interested in comparative civilizations. He is supervising the creation of a festschrift to a great expert in this field, and a friend of many of us: Dr. Matthew Melko. Such a festschrift has happened in the past, once before, with an edition in honor of Dr. Benjamin Nelson, first president of the ISCSC in its American incarnation. Thank you very much, Dr. Isaac, for this leadership. Published by BYU ScholarsArchive, 2015 1 Comparative Civilizations Review, Vol. 72 [2015], No. 72, Art. 2 2 Number 72, Spring 2015 Next, the role of Managing Editor has been taken up ably by Peter Hecht of Washington, D.C. Mr. Hecht is great at administering organizations; his talent in this regard was honed by the years he spent first directing the growth and expansion of Coca Cola as National Sales and Marketing Manager in Uzbekistan, achieving worldwide #1 status for sales growth in 1996, and then directing the efforts of R. J. Reynolds / Nabisco to establish a regional sales force in Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and the other Central Asian republics now known generally as the “stans.” Several years ago, Mr. Hecht returned to the United States as his wife, Kimberly Heimert, now Vice President and General Counsel of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, became a top official of the Obama administration. So, he entered the graduate program in Social Foundations of Education at the University of Virginia. His comprehensive exam was adjudged the highest honors pass of the year. As a reader, and as his professor, I can attest to his exceptional abilities. He is putting the journal on an efficient and effective footing. Copy-editing is also led by two superlative experts. Carolyn Carpentieri Potter, a graduate of Harvard College and Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, was for many years an editor and publisher in New York, as well as a college faculty member in Connecticut. Her specialty has been editing publications in the apparel and retail industry. She also created, wrote, and developed an important health and wellness curriculum for American junior high schools; she now lives in Florida. Many of our colleagues met her for the first time at the Monmouth University conference this past summer, where she was elected Senior Editor. She is joined by the German-born and bred, now Washingtonian, Dr. Stefan Gunther, as Editor. He began his university studies at the University of Wurzburg and the University of Kent at Canterbury, and holds a master’s in English from SUNY Oneonta and from Brandeis, where he earned his doctorate, as well. His dissertation, on the hermeneutics of memory and representations of the Holocaust in contemporary fiction, shows that individual memory of the Holocaust is being supplanted by cultural memory. Dr. Gunther has been a top university academic administrator in the Washington area, serving at the George Washington University, the USDA Graduate School, Johns Hopkins University, and DeVry University, which sponsored our meeting several years ago. Our new Corresponding Editor is Dr. Nejat Dogan. He is a full professor of international relations at the Anadolu University of Turkey, where he chairs the Department of International Relations. This is another brilliant person. The proof? Upon graduation from the school of political science at Ankara University, he took a national test and emerged with the very highest performance in the entire country. As a result, he was sent for graduate studies in the United States on complete scholarship, earning a master’s degree in international politics from The American University and a doctorate in foreign affairs from the University of Virginia. https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/ccr/vol72/iss72/2 2 Drew: Editor's Note Comparative Civilizations Review 3 His writings -- he is fluent in both English and Turkish -- dea (...truncated)