Faculty and Staff Notes

Yveline Alexis was the keynote speaker on the origins of Haitian Vodou(n) at the Fet Gedé, Haiti Group in the United Kingdom. The talk combined history with live performances by acclaimed percussionist Ted Beaubrun.

Professor of Religion Cindy Chapman published “The Field Belonging to Boaz: Creating Kinship through Land, Labor, Food, and Feeding” in the Journal of Biblical Literature 142/3 (2023): 431-450.

The Korean edition of Professor of East Asian Studies Sheila Miyoshi Jager's book, Narratives of Nation-Building in Korea: A Genealogy of Patriotism (M.E. Sharpe, 2003; Routledge, 2016), was published by Namu Yonpil publishers in October 2023.

Professor Ron Cheung, chair of the Department of Economics, was interviewed for an article on rising and declining cities that appeared on FinanceBuzz, a site that provides news on finance topics. Cheung teaches and conducts research in public finance and urban economics, and also teaches a seminar on the economics of housing and real estate.

Visiting Assistant Professor of History Victoria Broadus spoke at the Immigration Film Festival on October 20 in Washington, D.C., about the making of her documentary "Park Regent" (2022), which was featured in the festival program. The documentary captures the history and long-time community of an apartment building in the Mt. Pleasant neighborhood of Washington D.C.

Professor Christopher Trinacty presented the paper, "Seneca's Natural Questions: Three Perspectives" at the University of Athens. This paper offers a reading of Seneca's work that stresses its rhetorical, literary, and philosophical sophistication. In addition, Trinacty was a featured panelist at the University of Cincinnati's "An Evening with Seneca," where he discussed Seneca's tragedies and philosophical works as well as his complicated relationship with Nero.

Hal Sundt appeared on the podcast "The Greg Krino Show" to talk about his new book, Warplane: How the Military Reformers Birthed the A-10 Warthog.

Associate Professor of Physics and Astronomy Jillian Scudder published an article in Nautilus, explaining the recent discovery inferring the first observational evidence of a spinning black hole.

On October 19, Associate Professor of Art History Matthew Rarey delivered his paper "Renaming the Fetish: Assembling Bolsas de Mandinga" at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Massachusetts. Rarey's invited talk was part of the Clark's 2023 conference, "The Fetish A(r)t Work: African Objects in the Making of European Art History, 1500-1900," which examined the making and “invention” of African art in European discourse.

Visiting Assistant Professor of Creative Writing Pallavi Wakharkar published a new short story, entitled "On Live," in the autumn 2023 issue of The Southern Review.

Wakharkar's short story "Simple Animal," published in December 2023 in The Iowa Review, was recently noted as a Distinguished Story in Best American Short Stories 2023, edited by Min Jin Lee.