Powers Travel Grants Send 14 Abroad on Research Projects By Sue Kropp
			DECEMBER 14, 1999--The College's Committee on Research and Development recently distributed among 14 members of the faculty $45,329 in H.H. Powers travel grants. Eleven awards fund travel for projects in Europe, and three awards fund research in Brazil, China, and South Africa. Rita Chin, assistant professor of history, is researching the migration of writers, film makers, and intellectuals from Turkey to Germany during the latter half of the 20th century. Her work will result in a book, Rewriting the "Guest Worker": Turkish-German Artists and the Emergence of Multiculturalism in the Federal Republic of Germany, which will examine the effect the artists had on the German higher-education system. Arlene Forman, associate professor of Russian, will travel to Russia to film native Russian speakers from varied socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds. Forman will use the videos to make CD-ROM and web-based interactive exercises for students studying Russian at the intermediate level. The activities will help students learn more about Russian history and culture, and will improve listening and comprehension skills. Forman's research is an outgrowth of a collaborative project, Points of View, undertaken by faculty members of Oberlin College, the College of Wooster, Kenyon College, and Ohio Weslyan College. Gregory Fulkerson, professor of violin, will spend two months in Europe visiting musicians in Paris, Stuttgart, Copenhagen, Milan, and Vienna to explore recording and performing opportunities. Martin Jones, professor of philosophy, will travel this coming summer to England, where he will continue to explore several traditional issues in metaphysics as they are informed by current debates on the interpretation of quantum mechanics. Jones will work with scholars at the Centre for the Philosophy of the Natural and Social Sciences and at the University of Bristol, where he is an affiliate scholar and a visiting lecturer, respectively. Jody Kerchner, assistant professor of music education, is conducting a research project, Making Music Concrete: Teachers' and Students' Use of of Metaphors in the Description of Choral Music, at the Roehampton Institute in London. She will examine the use of metaphor by choral directors and singers as they attempt to describe the abstraction of music in concrete terms. Kerchner, a visiting research fellow at the institute, also will observe and compare public-school, cathedral, and community youth choral programs in London and Vienna. Quisha Ma, assistant professor of Chinese, will study the industrial and business associations of Chinese nonprofit and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Ma will travel to China, where she will interview industrial and business NGO leaders and officials supervising NGOs at the municipal level. She will present the findings at the fourth conference of the International Society of Third Sector Research in Dublin, Ireland, in July. Claudia Macdonald, associate professor of musicology, will travel to the Robert Schumann Research Center in Dusseldorf, Germany, and to the Robert Schumann Museum and Archives in Zwickau, Germany, for work involving the publication of an early Schumann piano-concerto movement in the Schumann New Edition of the Complete Works.Macdonald also will complete a book-length project titled "A History of the Piano Concerto from Beethoven to Liszt and the Critical Views of Robert Schumann." Lorraine Manz, associate professor of singing, will travel to London and Germany, where she will observe professors at several prominent voice studios. The observations will strengthen her knowledge of vocal pedagogy and enhance several of her courses, including The Teaching of Singing, which requires students to compare teaching approaches in various national schools. Pat Mathews, associate professor of art history, will finish an interdisciplinary study of the paintings of French artist Suzanne Valadon (1865-1938). Mathews will travel through Europe, viewing private collections of Valadon's paintings, and complete additional research at the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris. The study will result in a book, of which Mathews already has written two chapters. Pipo Nguyen-duy, assistant professor of art, will complete his visual thesis, "Another Expedition." The thesis will be a simulated natural history museum installation of a fictitious Vietnamese colonial expedition to France, and will include physical specimens from Monet's garden in Giverny, France. Nguyen-duy hopes that his research will create a better understanding of the colonial relationships that existed between France and Vietnam. William Norris, professor of sociology, will travel to Brazil to research urban community development among poor populations, particularly squatter settlements. Norris will examine whether the Brazilian transition to democracy has led to regularization of land tenure and political participation or the provision of urban services among the settlement populations. Benjamin Schiff, professor of politics, is researching the development of international cooperation (an "international regime") in prosecuting war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. He will travel to South Africa to learn how the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) incorporated the experiences of truth commissions in other countries into its planning and operations. Stephan Sheppard, professor of economics, will present his research findings on location and migration decisions of university graduates in Britain at the 6th World Congress of the Regional Science Association in Lagano, Switzerland. Sheppard will then travel to Britain, where he will meet with researchers at the Higher Education Statistics Authority and obtain new data to continue his research on the subject. Anne Trubek, assistant professor of expository writing and English, is researching the history of the book at the British Library in England, St. Bride's Printing Library in England, and the Edinburgh Center for the History of the Book in Scotland. Her research will result in materials for a textbook, "Technologies of Writing: From Plato to the Digital Age", and a course of the same name at Oberlin College. Stephen Sheppard and Claudia Macdonald, members of the R&D committee, did not participate in the judging of the grant proposals because they applied for grants themselves. Members of the committee at the time of the awards were: Stephen Sheppard, professor of economics; Pat Day, associate professor of English; Norman Craig, Biggs Professor of the Natural Sciences; Sharon Patton, director of the Allen Memorial Art Museum; Michael Fisher, professor of history; David Love, associate vice president of research and development; Claudia Macdonald, associate professor of musicology; Bruce Richards, associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences; Lynne Rogers, assistant professor of music theory; Laura Kuennen-Poper, associate dean of the Conservatory of Music; and Denny Smith, professor of neuroscience and psychology.
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