Faculty and Staff Notes

East Asian Studies Professor Sheila Miyoshi Jager accepted an invitation to join the inaugural advisory board of the Hyundai Motor-Korea Foundation Center for Korean History and Public Policy at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington D.C.

The advisory board is composed of eminent leaders in academia, public life, and the business community and advises the center on all programming aspects of its work and reviews the center’s activities on a regular basis.

Launched in 2015, the mission of the Center for Korean History and Public Policy is to provide a coherent, long-term platform for improving historical understanding of Korea and the US-Korea relationship and informing the public policy debate on the Korean peninsula in the United States and beyond.

The Wilson Center, chartered by Congress as the official memorial to President Wilson, is the nation's key non-partisan policy forum to inform actionable ideas for the policy community.

Professor Mathematics Robert Bosch ’85 delivered the talk “Life is Beautiful: The Startling Consequences of Three Simple Rules” at MoMath (the National Museum of Mathematics) on February 3. Bosch’s talk was part of the Math Encounters presentation series.

Vice President and Dean of Students Eric Estes spoke on a panel at the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) annual meeting in January 2016. The theme of the meeting was "How Higher Education Can Lead—On Equity, Inclusive Excellence, and Democratic Renewal."

The session, hosted by the Consortium for High Achievement and Success (CHAS), focused on the value of consortial relationships at this important moment in higher education for addressing institutional challenges and opportunities related to compositional diversity of students, faculty, and staff, as well capacity building related to campus climate. Estes is currently the chair-elect of CHAS, the oldest and largest national organization dedicated to the academic success of students of color at liberal arts institutions. Estes will serve a three-year term as chair beginning in June 2016.

Professor of Studio Art Nanette Yannuzzi contributed to the exhibition The Let Down Reflex, which opened at EFA Project Space in New York January 30. The exhibition attempts to recognize the complexities of parenting in the art world and asks if a better alternative for families can exist. The exhibition runs through March 12.

Denise Birkhofer, the Ellen Johnson '33 curator of modern and contemporary art, has authored the catalogue Judit Reigl: Body of Music in conjunction with the retrospective exhibition on view at the Allen Memorial Art Museum through May 29, 2016. The 172-page publication includes essays by Birkhofer and musicologist Benjamin Perl; a foreword by museum director Andria Derstine; an illustrated checklist of works in the exhibition; a selection of writings by Judit Reigl, translated into English for the first time; and the artist’s biography and exhibition history.

Professor of East Asian Studies Sheila Miyoshi Jager reviewed Richard Boynton's The Invitation Only-Zone in the January 17, 2016, issue of the New York Times Sunday Book Review.

Ruberta T. McCandless Professor of French Matthew Senior presented two papers at international conferences during the Fall 2015 semester. '"Only the soul feels': Disembodied Emotions in Descartes" was part of the interdisciplinary conference Compassion in Early Modern Culture, 1550-1700, hosted by the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, September 19, 2015.

The second paper, "Le visage de l'animal (XVIe-XVIIIe siecles): de l'anthropomorphisme au zoomorphisme," was presented at the Portraits: regards sur l'animal et son language conference, hosted by the universities of Le Mans and Angers, October 8, 2015.

Professor of Politics Harry Hirsch has published Office Hours: One Academic Life, a memoir and critique of contemporary higher education. Read more about the book on this website.

Professor of Classics Kirk Ormand recently published two articles. The first, “Toward Iambic Obscenity,” appears in Ancient Obscenities: Their Nature and Use in the Ancient Greek and Roman Worlds, edited by Dorata Dutsch and Ann Suter (University of Michigan Press, 2015). Ormand’s contribution explores the narrative and literary uses of invective obscenities in the fragmentary poems of the archaic Greek poet Hipponax, with particular attention to the story of how “iambic” poetry got its name and became associated with obscene invective.

The second article, “Buying Babies in Euripides’ Hippolytus,” argues that Hippolytus’ famous misogynistic speech in Euripides’ is framed in terms of an ongoing discursive conflict between short-term, lower-class, economic exchange and long-term, upper-class, aristocratic gift-giving. As such, Hippolytus’ misogyny also marks him as an aloof aristocrat living in the household of Theseus, legendary founder of Athenian democracy, a conflict that is played out through the rest of the drama. This article appears in a special edition of Illinois Classical Studies (volume 40.2, fall 2015).

Rick Baldoz, associate professor of sociology, and Shelley Lee, associate professor of comparative American studies and history, published the article "Donald Trump fails history: How the right’s failure to understand Japanese-American internment drives anti-Muslim hatred" on Salon.