Miami University distinguished music professor, Tammy Kernodle, was recently named one of Phi Beta Kappa's (PBK) visiting scholars for the 2024-2025 academic year. She has also been selected as PBK’s annual Frank M. Updike Memorial Scholar for her work in the humanities.

PBK, a prestigious academic society, invites the top scholars from liberal arts colleges across the country to meet with resident faculty and undergraduate students. 

As a visiting scholar, Kernodle will spend two days on each included campus for a total of 100 locations throughout the year, stopping by classes as well as giving one major lecture to the campus and the public each time.

One of the options for Kernodle’s lecture on music involves her research on women’s contributions to protest culture that is associated with the emergence of the Black Lives Matter Movement. The other explores the genesis of “girl culture” in America and how the image of the “girl” is being re-examined in reaction to the success of the Barbie movie and the recent concert tours of Beyonce and Taylor Swift.

“This is a significant honor for me,” Kernodle said. “It has illuminated to me that others are listening, reading and taking note of the work that I've been doing in reclaiming the artists and certain forms of music from the cultural margins on a level that I was not aware of

I embarked on this intellectual journey in the early 1990s when I entered graduate school.”

Kernodle’s time in college intersected with explorations of racial and gender studies in music. In graduate school, she wanted to build off of those discoveries and the pioneers who came before her, but her focus on cultural and intellectual studies was rarely recognized as a primary focus in music.

“My work was not recognized within certain disciplinary circles and I often felt like an outsider,” Kernodle said. “On a personal level, this is confirmation that being true to myself, honoring the personal mission statement I wrote decades ago, and just keeping my head down and doing the work has paid off.”

Kernodle thanks her colleagues in the music department, the College of Creative Arts, and many other faculty and scholars across campus for their support surrounding this achievement.