Paula Johnson is the 2020 Distinguished Scholar in the Humanities
UPDATED with video. Please join Secretary Bunch for the 2020 Distinguished Scholar Award in the Humanities, Thursday, March 3, at 2:00 p.m. The award ceremony and lecture will be presented on PRISM.
After a COVID-caused delay, Paula J. Johnson has been chosen to receive the 2020 Smithsonian Distinguished Scholar Award in the Humanities. The award, first given in 2000, celebrates excellence in all branches of Smithsonian scholarship by honoring the sustained achievement of two outstanding Smithsonian scholars each year—one in the sciences and one in the humanities. The winners are asked to deliver a lecture on some aspect of their work to the Smithsonian community and interested members of the general public, and receive a medal and a contribution to their research funds.
Johnson is a curator, project director, and public historian in the Division of Work and Industry at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History in Washington, DC. She is responsible for the food technology and fisheries collections, and is the project director for the American Food History Project. Her research in the newly developed field of food and wine history has resulted in substantial additions to the museum’s collections and archives, and has been featured in exhibitions, publications, and public programs, including the museum’s annual “Food History Weekend.” Johnson is the project director and co-curator for the exhibition, FOOD: Transforming the American Table, on view since 2012, and was one of the curators who collected Julia Child’s home kitchen in 2001. She is a member of the editorial collective for Gastronomica: The Journal for Food Studies.
Johnson also directed and co-curated the long-term exhibition, On the Water: Stories from Maritime America, which opened to the public in 2009, and was the curator for several components of the permanent exhibition America on the Move, both on view at the National Museum of American History. She holds degrees in English (BA) and Folklore/Anthropology (MA), and has published books and articles on the fisheries of the Chesapeake Bay, traditional watercraft, maritime communities, and food history and museums. Johnson has worked at the Smithsonian since 1991 and in museums since 1981.
Great thanks are due to the committee who assisted with the selection of the 2020 recipient:
- Kenneth Slowik, Chair, (National Museum of American History);
- Louise Cort (Freer and Sackler Galleries/National Museum of Asian Art);
- David DeVorkin, (National Air and Space Museum);
- Giovanni Fazio (Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory/Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics);
- Christine Jones (SAO, CfA);
- Nancy Knowlton (National Museum of Natural History);
- Christine Mullen Kreamer (National Museum of African Art);
- Igor Krupnik (NMNH);
- Ellen Miles (National Portrait Gallery);
- Michael Neufeld (NASM); and
- Tom Watters (NASM, Center for Earth and Planetary Studies).
UPDATE
Paula Johnson presented her webcast lecture, “Appetite for Change: Research and Reflections of a Food History Curator” at 2:00 PM on Thursday, March 3.
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Posted: 18 February 2022
