Prof. Jennifer Brier Named LAS Distinguished Professor
Introduction
In a Wednesday afternoon ceremony on March 4, 2026, LAS Dean Lisa Freeman bestowed the medal reserved for LAS Distinguished Professors upon the neck of Jennifer Brier, Professor of History and Gender and Women's Studies at UIC since 2003. The award, established by the College in 2006 to honor exceptional faculty members for their significant and sustained intellectual scholarship, is reserved for those who have developed new pathways in their field or found other ways to demonstrate scholarly excellence and give back to both the community and the institution.
The newly named Distinguished Professor Brier then proceeded to give a compelling 50-minute talk on her latest research, which includes creating an archive and website for those suffering from Long Covid, called Listening for the Long Haul. The talk, which pulled from her earlier work on narrating the AIDS crisis through women's voices, allowed the audience to see the historian's craft at work, to watch someone cultivate and amplify an archive nearly from scratch, then draw scholarly conclusions from the newly empowered voices.
The ceremony and talk is available on Youtube.
Professor Brier is one of UIC’s most visible public intellectuals. A specialist in the history of AIDS, women’s history, and the LGBTQ+ experience, she has developed her scholarly presence in multiple contexts and for an uncommonly broad range of audiences. Her work has opened new paths of scholarly inquiry, made histories of lesser-studied social groups visible, and invited public participation in the process of the production of historical knowledge. This intellectual generosity epitomizes the public-facing scholarship to which UIC aspires and she is richly deserving of the recognition of Distinguished Professor.