May 18, 2026

EagleEye

A Newsletter for UMW Faculty and Staff

Rao Presents on Speech Anxious Students at National Communication Association Conference

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Professor of Communication Anand Rao

Anand Rao, Professor of Communication, presented last Friday at the National Communication Association conference held in Baltimore, MD. The title of his presentation was “Helping Speech Anxious Students Survive and Thrive” and was part of a panel about speech apprehension and the basic course. In the presentation, he discussed what UMW has done to help address communication apprehension for first-year students at UMW through the FSEM, as well as the special sections of COMM 205: Public Speaking that he has offered for highly apprehensive students. Anand reports that the panel had a great turnout–approximately 35 in attendance–and a wonderful discussion after the panel.

Blevins Presents at Feminisms and Rhetorics Conference

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Assistant Professor of English Brenta Blevins

Brenta Blevins, Assistant Professor of English, recently presented at the 2019 Feminisms and Rhetorics conference her project “Composing New Public Rhetorical Possibilities Using Augmented and Mixed Reality.” Blevins analyzed installations of traditional epideictic rhetoric, such as memorial statues and artwork, at institutions that began as schools for women, and, after examining other Augmented Reality (AR) projects, contended that AR compositions, such as class assignments, could offer additional means for expanding campus historical interpretation.

Barry Invited to Give Book Talk at Temple University

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Jennifer Barry, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, was invited to give a book talk at Temple University on November 14, 2019. Barry presented to the audience material from her recent publication with the University of California Press, Bishops in Flight: Exile and Displacement in Late Antiquity. Barry’s monograph was published in April, 2019 and is published in both print form and is also available via open access through the Luminos Series.

Research By Farnsworth and Jeremy Engel ’20 Presented at Academic Conference

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Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science and director of the University’s Center for Leadership and Media Studies

Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science and director of the University’s Center for Leadership and Media Studies

Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science and director of the Center for Leadership and Media Studies, and Jeremy Engel  ’20, a senior political science major and a research associate at  the center, are co-authors of a recently research paper, “The Politics of Late Night Humor: Framing Presidential Candidate Character in the Age of Trump,” which was presented at the Annual Meeting of the Southwestern Social Science Association in San Diego, California.

Dr. Farnsworth has also been quoted in several regional and national news stories:

Virginia’s Legislature Will Tackle Gerrymandering In The New Year (WAMU)

Democratic debate set to feature attacks on Pete Buttigieg as he leads Elizabeth Warren in Iowa (MarketWatch)

Sondland to Testify at Impeachment Inquiry (CTV News Channel)

“Millionaires Surtax” Considered as Federal Budget Balancer (WVTF)

Suburban voters in Virginia defeated the NRA this fall. Next stop: Texas (Daily Kos)

Disarming the NRA: How Guns Flipped Virginia Blue (Mother Jones)

Now that the Democrats own the 2021 redistricting, will they resist the temptation to derail it? (Virginia Mercury)

COMMENTARY: Changes in 28th District doomed GOP candidate (The Free Lance-Star)

Impeachment Hearings Recap (WRVA)

Bonds Co-authors Op-Ed on Climate Change for The Free Lance-Star

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Associate Professor of Sociology Eric Bonds

Associate Professor of Sociology Eric Bonds and Rebecca Rubin, president and CEO of Marstel-Day, an environmental consulting firm, published an op-ed in The Free Lance-Star on what the Fredericksburg area can do to combat climate change:

 

Marstel-Day President and CEO Rebecca Rubin

Marstel-Day President and CEO Rebecca Rubin

YOU can regularly see it in the news reported in the Free Lance-Star and other newspapers: climate change is remaking our world. Fredericksburg urgently needs to develop a climate plan in response.

This effort should include a plan that would both reduce our city’s carbon emissions (which help propel global warming) and enable adaption to impacts that are inevitable—such as lethal heat, and air- and water-borne diseases—given that a certain amount of warming is already locked into our climate system.

Such a strategy would both respond to climate change risks and prevent them from worsening. Read more. 

Cooperman Comments on Kentucky Governor-Elect

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Associate Professor of Political Science Rosalyn Cooperman

Associate Professor of Political Science Rosalyn Cooperman

Associate Professor of Political Science Rosalyn Cooperman commented on Kentucky Governor-Elect Andy Beshear’s decision to select for his transition team longtime supporters of his family’s political campaigns.

According to the article, “The most active and involved Democrats are oftentimes most likely to be giving money to support their candidate, said Rosalyn Cooperman, associate professor of political science at the University of Mary Washington.

‘This is intuitive,’ she said. ‘The electoral context is that Democrats – or any party – are strategic actors if they want to win.’

And money is critical to win in a high-profile, competitive race, Cooperman said.” Read more. 

Richardson Column in The Free Lance-Star

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UMW College of Business Dean Lynne Richardson

UMW College of Business Dean Lynne Richardson

College of Business Dean Lynne Richardson’s weekly column in The Free Lance-Star tackles how to have tactful conversations with students and employees about body odor and other smells in the workplace. Read DISTRACTING ODORS.

 

In the space of one week, I had the following experiences:

While walking on campus one morning, I was behind a woman who must have bathed in perfume. The smell was distinctive and strong.

Another day, I was passed by a young man who reeked of food.

Two days later, a person near me had either not bathed recently or was wearing his clothing for the umpteenth day. His body odor was unpleasant, to say the least.

It made me think about having conversations with both students (who are about to enter the workplace) and employees about the way we smell.

Read more. 

Lorentzen Presents Paper on Dickens and American Popular Culture

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Eric Lorentzen, Associate Professor of English

Eric Lorentzen, Professor of English

Eric G. Lorentzen, Professor of English, contributed a paper, “21st-Century ‘American Notes’: Charles Dickens and Popular American Culture” at the annual Victorians Institute conference this November in Charleston, SC. This year’s conference theme was Transatlantic Influence, and Lorentzen’s talk first surveyed quickly the multitude of modern-day Christmas festivals that are grounded in Dickens’ text across this country, before he turned to visual media. He made brief connections with some of the cultural manifestations that obtain on screen, from the fairly obvious A Muppet Christmas Carol, to the far more esoteric connections to be made with seemingly non-holiday fare such as films like The Game, Groundhog Day, and the more recent Disney blockbuster film, Christopher Robin. These connections led to a discussion of the ways in which Dickens’ somewhat Wordsworthian ideas of the crucial formative years of childhood, and the necessary project of philanthropy for social justice in A Christmas Carol, germinate into more fully-articulated and mature philosophies in latter novels like David Copperfield and Bleak House. The objective was to demonstrate how thoroughly (and extremely) these Dickensian archetypal tropes have permeated our own American zeitgeist in “texts” of popular culture that could not seem further away from the literary in general, or Charles Dickens specifically.  To that end, the final text Lorentzen took up for analysis was the once hugely “popular” teen soap/drama of the early 2000s, The O.C., a series which depended upon, admittedly in the most unlikely of ways, multiple Dickensian archetypes for its thematic (and didactic?!?) backbone.  Amidst the oversexed bikini-clad angst of Southern California, the Victorian dude of serial fiction abides, and our postmodern cultural studies theoretical methodologies can help us discover why the recognition of such an arcane connection remains crucially important, in terms of both individual and collective agency.

 

Farnsworth Comments in the Regional and National News

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Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science and director of the University’s Center for Leadership and Media Studies

Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science and director of the University’s Center for Leadership and Media Studies

Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science and director of the University’s Center for Leadership and Media Studies, has been quoted in several regional and national news stories:

How Much is Too Much for Virginia’s New Democratic Majority? (WVTF)

The Score: Virginia Elections, Candidates Speak, Assessing Politics, Business Ethics, Gerald Baliles (Bearing Drift)

Suburban voters were key to Democratic takeover in Virginia — and both parties will need to keep wooing them (The Virginian-Pilot)

Maloney: Trump’s 2nd Phone Call Not Relevant (CTV News Channel)

This Week in Richmond: Elections 2019 Review (VPM NPR)

Public impeachment hearings will ‘harden’ rift (cp24.com)

Diplomats Testify in Trump Impeachment Inquiry (CTV News Channel)

After defeating Miles, Davenport plans to scrap reforms (Chesterfield Observer)

Cox wins reelection but loses speakership (Chesterfield Observer)

 

Cooperman Talks Cost of Virginia General Assembly Elections

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Associate Professor of Political Science Rosalyn Cooperman

Associate Professor of Political Science Rosalyn Cooperman

Associate Professor of Political Science Rosalyn Cooperman was recently interviewed for a story on WAMU on how even extremely well-funded campaigns lost in the Virginia General Assembly elections last week.

According to the story, “Virginia is one of only a few states to hold elections in off-off years, and both parties saw this year’s vote as a bellwether for the 2020 presidential race.  Virginia had already drawn national attention after Democrats shrank the majority in the House of Delegates in 2017 by flipping 15 seats, political scientist Rosalyn Cooperman at the University of Mary Washington noted.”

“‘You’ve immediately raised the stakes for the next election because Democrats came within a whisker of taking both the House of Delegates and the state Senate,’ Cooperman said. ‘You’re coming into an election cycle that’s going to raise the profile of these races.'” Read more.