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Honorary Fellowships for Damon Ieremia Salesa, Anna Sapir Abulafia and Howard Michael Robinson

Professor Damon Salesa (BA, MA (Hons) (Auckland), DPhil (Oxford)) studied for his DPhil in Modern History at Oriel, matriculating in 1997, having completed his undergraduate degree at the University of Auckland. Professor Salesa was the first Rhodes scholar of Pacific descent to study at the University of Oxford. He was appointed as Vice-Chancellor of the Auckland University of Technology in April 2022, becoming the first person of Pacific descent to hold the position of Vice Chancellor at any New Zealand university. Professor Salesa is a prize-winning author, specialising in the interdisciplinary study of the Pacific. He has published on race, politics, history and society and is a publicly engaged scholar around questions of inequality, politics and education.

Professor Anna Sapir Abulafia (DTh, LittD, DLitt, FBA, FRHistS) is Emeritus Professor of the Study of the Abrahamic Religions in the Faculty of Theology and Religion at the University of Oxford. An Emeritus Fellow of Lady Margaret Hall, Professor Abulafia was formerly Senior Tutor (1996 – 2002) and Vice-President (2002 – 2010) of Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge. Elected as a Fellow of the British Academy in 2020, Professor Abulafia’s research focused on the interaction of medieval Christianity and Judaism within the broad context of twelfth and thirteenth-century theological and ecclesiastical developments.

Professor Howard Michael Robinson (MA (Oxon), MPhil (Notts), PhD (Liverpool)) is a Professor Emeritus in Philosophy at the Central European University in Budapest. Professor Robinson was a Lecturer in Philosophy at Oriel from 1970-1974, after which he took up a post as Senior Lecturer and Reader in Philosophy at the University of Liverpool, where he taught until 2000. Following his time at Liverpool, Howard took up a post as Professor of Philosophy at the Central European University in Hungary, where he later served as Provost and Academic Pro-Rector from 2007 – 2010. Currently a Research Fellow at Blackfriars Hall, Oxford, Professor Robinson has written and edited books and articles on the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of perception, and articles on the history of philosophy (mainly Berkelian idealism) and the philosophy of religion.

We are delighted that Professor Salesa, Professor Abulafia, and Professor Robinson have accepted these Honorary Fellowships in recognition of their outstanding academic contributions.

Professor Abulafia and Professor Robinson had their Honorary Fellowships conferred by the Provost and Fellows in Oriel’s Chapel on Thursday 2 February, and we look forward to welcoming Professor Salesa to College when he is able to make it to the UK.