May 3, 2004 -- Dr. Maurice Wohlgelernter, professor emeritus of English, Baruch College, City University of New York, will receive an honorary doctoral degree from Richard M. Joel, president of Yeshiva University, at its 73rd Annual Commencement on May 20. The exercises will take place at The Theater at Madison Square Garden, where YU President Richard M. Joel will deliver the commencement address and confer more than 2,000 undergraduate and graduate degrees. President Joel will also bestow honorary degrees on Rabbi Marvin Hier, founder and dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center and its Museum of Tolerance in Los Angeles, and Dr. Ruth Roskies Wisse, Martin Peretz Professor of Yiddish Literature and professor of comparative literature, Harvard University. Dr. Wohlgelernter received a BA from Yeshiva University, an MA and PhD from Columbia University, and ordination from YU’s affiliated Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary. From 1972 to 1982, he directed Baruch’s Religion and Culture Program, and has taught at Yeshiva University and the New York Institute of Technology in Old Westbury, NY. Dr. Wohlgelernter also held visiting and adjunct positions at New York University; YU’s Stern College for Women; City College, City University of New York; Bar-Ilan University; The New School; and Manhattanville College. He is the author of Israel Zangwill: A Study (Columbia University Press, 1964); Frank O’Connor: An Introduction (Columbia University Press, 1977); and Jewish Writers/Irish Writers: Selected Essays on the Love of Words (Transaction Press of Rutgers University, 2000). Dr. Wohlgelernter also edited three books and wrote more than 50 essays and reviews.