History professors Guy Lazure, Leslie Howsam and Steven PalmerHistory professors Guy Lazure, Leslie Howsam and Steven Palmer celebrate the launch of their respective books.

Simultaneous launch puts trio of books into circulation

To have its faculty publish three books simultaneously is like winning the lottery for the history department, says head Miriam Wright.

“This department has a very strong research culture,” she said Tuesday during a reception launching the publications. “Even though our interests are quite varied, we appreciate the support we get have from the department and from each other.”

Steven Palmer, whose Medicine and Public Health in Latin America: a History, co-authored with Marcos Cueto and published this month by Cambridge University Press in its New Approaches to the Americas series, agreed.

“We do have a wonderful intellectual milieu here,” he said.

That atmosphere lends itself to collaboration with colleagues around the world, said Guy Lazure. He worked with Bartolomé Pozuelo Calero of Universidad dé Cadiz to edit the letters of Spanish humanist Pedro Vélez de Guevara in a volume published in November.

“History is not only an individual endeavour,” said Dr. Lazure. He also acknowledged the contributions of five graduate students to his book.

Leslie Howsam edited The Cambridge Companion to the History of the Book, published in December 2014 by Cambridge University Press. She said she is looking forward to her work finding readers: “It will be gratifying to see it being used.”

The occasion also served as an introduction of newly appointed faculty members Yukari Takai and Guillaume Teasdale.