For their commitment to Beloit and the education of their students, the following faculty receive emeriti status upon retirement.
Debra Majeed
Professor of Religious Studies Debra Majeed is an award-winning teacher, author, scholar, mentor, and social activist, and the first African-American woman and first Muslim to earn tenure at Beloit College.
From the time she joined the faculty in 1999, she has made a profound impact through her scholarship and teaching of religious studies, Islamic studies, cultural and identity studies, and womanist studies. She has furthered a public understanding of Islam and the experience of American Muslims as a scholar and a practitioner and contributed to the well-being of the college community by speaking directly and convincingly at critical junctures when her voice was most needed.
A religious historian, she has published numerous articles, book chapters, and is the author of Polygyny: What it Means When African American Muslim Women Share Their Husbands, published by University Press of Florida (2016).
She earned her undergraduate degree from Pepperdine University, her M.A. and M.Div. from Fuller Evangelical Theological Seminary, and her Ph.D. from Northwestern University. In 2017, she received the Underkofler Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, an honor based on student nominations.
The word that best encapsulates Professor Debra Majeed’s stance, approach, philosophy, and pedagogy, is courage. She is brave beyond measure. Her fearless risk-taking transforms her communities, most especially Beloit College, by encouraging all of us to imagine and become our best selves—that is, to follow her lead in balancing a reflective inner life with a courageous outer life. Nowhere has she issued and met this challenge more compellingly than in the classroom, where for the past 20 years Professor Majeed’s high expectations and passionate dedication to her students have elicited their best work.
While living with structural inequities to which others were oblivious sometimes brought loneliness and alienation, her warrior spirit tempered righteous rage with compassion and wisdom in order to address injustice, both in her work with students and colleagues and in her scholarship. A space-maker throughout her time at Beloit, Professor Majeed opened new places of welcome for staff, students, and faculty members. And she always chose to teach courses that fostered the creation of new pedagogical spaces, from “Marvel’s Take on Religion and Race” to her final first-year seminar, titled “Dear White People.”
Like her teaching, Professor Majeed’s scholarship explores understudied lifeways with sensitivity and insight. Her acclaimed 2016 book, Polygyny: What It Means When African American Muslim Women Share Their Husbands, made waves among U.S. Muslim communities. Critics have hailed her womanist approach as “captivating, provocative, and groundbreaking,” and praised her “depth and analytical rigor about a topic we have scarcely begun to understand” (Amina Wadud). Professor Majeed has brought the same critical curiosity to her professional service as a board member at organizations such as Daughters of the African Atlantic Fund, Wisconsin Faith Voices for Justice, and the Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion. Even without students, she continues to speak and act fearlessly for social justice.
It is with sadness, gratitude, and undying respect that we welcome Professor Debra Majeed into the honored ranks of Beloit College faculty emeriti.
Jo Ortel
Jo Ortel, Professor of Art History and holder of the Nystrom Chair in Art History, joined the Beloit College faculty in 1997.
Her courses on modern contemporary art, Native American art, and environmental art have engaged and inspired students through wide-ranging projects. During her tenure, she was adept at forming creative interdisciplinary connections, most notably integrating art and art history with environmental studies. She developed and taught one of those cross-disciplinary courses, Contemporary Art in an Age of Global Warming, using the Powerhouse, Beloit’s student union and recreation center, to teach students about art’s potential to engage with substantive problems.
Her research and scholarship on contemporary Native American art includes the publication of Woodland Reflections: The Art of Truman Lowe (2004). Published by the University of Wisconsin Press, her book showcases the life and work of the contemporary Ho-Chunk artist.
In 2003, she received the Underkofler Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching at Beloit. She earned her B.A. from Smith College, her M.A. from Oberlin, and her Ph.D. in art history from Stanford University.
Jo Ortel, Professor of Art History and holder of the Nystrom Chair in Art History, joined Beloit College in 1997. Her courses on modern contemporary art, Native American art, and environmental art have engaged and inspired students through wide-ranging projects.
During her tenure, she was adept at forming creative interdisciplinary connections, most notably integrating art and art history with environmental studies. She developed and taught two of those cross-disciplinary courses with a focus on specific spaces. Contemporary Art in an Age of Global Warming and Enchanted Spaces both focused on the Powerhouse, Beloit’s student union and recreation center. She taught students about art’s potential to engage with day-to-day environmental challenges through Nature at the Confluence, an urban environmental center in South Beloit. In 2003, she received the Underkofler Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching at Beloit.
Professor Ortel played a leading role in the growth of Beloit College’s environmental studies program, particularly in the arts and the humanities. Under her leadership, the program doubled the size of its faculty advisors and multiplied the number of graduates by 10. She attended numerous regional and national conferences to learn new ideas for Beloit and to share some of Beloit’s own best practices. Environmental studies remains one of Beloit’s most robust programs, encompassing five different majors.
Her research and scholarship on contemporary Native American art includes the publication of Woodland Reflections: The Art of Truman Lowe (2004). Published by the University of Wisconsin Press, her book showcases the life and work of the contemporary Ho-Chunk artist. Professor Ortel leaves Beloit College to work on making sure that the art of Truman Lowe is prominently exhibited at some of the leading museums around the country. We cannot be more confident that she will achieve this goal.
In honor of her dedicated service, and as a symbol of our deep appreciation and abiding respect, we welcome Jo Ortel into the honored ranks of Beloit College faculty emeriti.
