David Marples Wins Prestigious University of Alberta Award

David Marples, who is well-known in academic and wider circles for his prolific and timely writings on contemporary Ukraine, was awarded the University Cup in a ceremony at the University of Alberta (U of A) on September 26. The University Cup, the highest honour the U of A can bestow on a member of its academic staff, is awarded to scholars who have achieved outstanding distinction in scholarly research, teaching, and service to the University and to the community at large. The recipient of the University Cup is deemed to be a scholar with an international reputation, who is esteemed as exceptional by his colleagues and students, and is also highly regarded by the community.

 For the past 22 years, as an editor, researcher and professor of history at the University of Alberta, David Marples has maintained a close relationship with the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, including holding positions at the Institute. He first gained a reputation as a leading scholar following the Chornobyl nuclear power plant accident of April 1986. This occurred shortly after his return to the U of A from West Germany in 1986 to take up a position at CIUS following a posting as a research analyst at Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty in Munich, where he had learned much about the USSR’s and, in particular, Ukraine’s nuclear energy industry.

Several months of interviews by media and appearances before government bodies followed, which introduced him to the role of commentator and consultant, a role he still fulfills today through his commentaries and analytical articles which have appeared in major newspapers in North America and Europe and regularly in the Edmonton Journal. A book on nuclear energy, Chernobyl and Nuclear Power in the USSR, published by CIUS Press, appeared in 1986. Subsequently, Dr. Marples has continued writing on Ukraine, publishing many articles in academic journals and books on Ukraine during the perestroika period, Stalinism in Ukraine, and most recently on historical memory in Ukraine entitled Heroes and Villains: Creating National History in Contemporary Ukraine, published in 2007. In addition to his research on Ukraine, Dr. Marples has published four books on the history and politics of Belarus, and a book on the 1917 Russian Revolution. In total, he is the author of twelve books and editor of two.

Today, David Marples is University Professor in the U of A’s Department of History and Classics, a distinction and rank he received in 2006. He also serves as director of the Stasiuk Program on Contemporary Ukraine at the U of A’s CIUS. At the University of Alberta, he was also awarded the Faculty Research Prize for full professors in 1999; the J. Gordin Kaplan Award for Excellence in Research (a university research prize) in 2003, and a Killam Annual Professorship in 2005-06. In 1999, he was a recipient of the Taras Shevchenko Medal awarded by the Ukrainian Canadian Congress. Colleagues and staff at CIUS congratulate Dr. Marples for this well-deserved and prestigious recognition.