A new face and a familiar one will be working as faculty assistants for the vice provost for academic personnel over the next year. Harriet Murav, a professor of Russian and comparative literature from the German and Russian department, has been appointed as the new assistant vice provost for diversity and academic personnel. She replaces linguistics professor Lenore Timm. In addition, Gail Finney, another professor of German and Russian, has agreed to stay on another year to work as assistant vice provost for academic personnel in the office. The two will help develop policy, analyze faculty data, and plan and conduct conferences and workshops. "Harriet brings to the faculty assistant position a broad-based knowledge of scholarship in the humanities as well as a commitment to work with the academic personnel group in its goal of helping to foster a diverse campus community of scholars and students," said Vice Provost for Academic Personnel Barry Klein. "I am also very pleased that Professor Finney has agreed to stay on another year to work with our group. Gail has worked diligently and effectively on a number of important academic personnel issues." Murav came to the campus in 1986 after receiving her doctoral degree from Stanford University in comparative literature. A fellow at the Davis Humanities Institute in 1992, Murav also received a faculty development award in 1997 and was a member of the California Council for the Humanities in 1997. Murav's active community service has ranged from membership on the Academic Senate's Childcare Advisory Committee and the Committee on Privilege and Tenure to service on her college's Advisory Council for Academic and Budgetary Matters. The co-founder and coordinator of the Faculty Interdisciplinary Research Group from 1986 to 1990, Murav has been co-chair of the Faculty Group on Jewish Studies since 1995. Finney, who has her doctoral degree from UC Berkeley, came to Davis in 1988 from Harvard University where she was on the faculty from 1980 to 1988. She has a number of academic honors to her name, including the Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow-ship in Berlin in 1989-90 and a National Endowment for the Humanities Grant for Independent Study and Research in 1983-84. Her book Women in Modern Drama was nominated for the American Comparative Literature Association's Harry Levin Prize.