M Glen Johnson, PhD

Born in east Kentucky, I grew up in Frankfort. After taking my B.A. at Georgetown College in Kentucky, I earned a Ph.D. at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and took an initial teaching appointment at the University of Kentucky in Lexington.

I joined the Vassar faculty in 1964 and retired in 2002 as Shirley Ecker Boskey Professor of Political Science and International Relations. I served as Chair of the Department, Dean of Freshman, Assistant to President Alan Simpson, founding Director of the International Studies Program, and twice as Acting President of the College during President Fran Fergusson’s sabbaticals. Twice I was a Fulbright Scholar in India including three years as Director of the American Studies Research Centre in Hyderabad. Later, I spent two years as Visiting Professor and founding Director of the American Studies Program at the American University in Cairo, Egypt. My published research is mainly in the areas of US foreign policy, international human rights, and Indian politics and foreign policy.

I was elected Class Advisor to the Class of 1969. With my wife, Sipra Johnson, an emerita faculty member at SUNY, New Paltz, I led a number of educational trips to India for the AAVC travel program. I was the inaugural recipient of the AAVC award for Outstanding Faculty and Staff and in 2013, I was awarded the Eleanor Roosevelt Val-Kill Medal.

Since retiring, I have worked for ten years with the Indian Fulbright Commission as the Academic Facilitator for the annual Indian Higher Education Administrator’s Seminar.

My wife and I now live in Bowie, MD, just outside Washington, DC.

Contact

• Email: johnsong@vassar.edu