Clare alumni receive honorary degrees from the University of Cambridge

Clare Honorary Fellows Professor Anthony Appiah (1972) and Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr (1973) received honorary degrees from the University of Cambridge on 22 June 2022. The conferment of honorary degrees is one of the highest accolades the University can bestow upon those who have made outstanding achievements in their respective fields.

Professor Anthony Appiah completed his undergraduate degree and PhD in Philosophy at Clare. A professor of both Philosophy and Law at New York University, Professor Appiah has taught philosophy, African studies and African American studies at the University of Ghana, as well as at Yale, Cornell, Duke and Harvard Universities. He is also the current Leslie Stephen Lecturer at the University of Cambridge.

Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr came to Clare as a Mellon Fellow from Yale in 1973 and stayed on to complete a PhD in English. Currently the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and Director of the Hutchins Center for African & African American Research at Harvard, Professor Gates is known for pioneering theories of African and African American literature and has created more than 20 films, including a ground-breaking genealogy and genetics series, Finding Your Roots.

Professor Appiah and Professor Gates visited the Forbes Mellon Library at Clare on 21 June 2022 with their friend, Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka, who also received an honorary degree this week.

 

The University website contains more information on the honorary degree ceremony.