Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science and director of the University’s Center for Leadership and Media Studies, recently delivered a lecture titled “The Changing Landscape of Virginia Politics” at the 2016 Virginia Civics Summit, a conference for public school social studies teachers held at the Virginia State Capital in Richmond.
Buster-Williams Published in Recruitment and Retention
Kimberley Buster-Williams, associate provost for enrollment management, had an article featured in Recruitment and Retention’s December edition. The article was titled “Moving to an Effective Digital Records Strategy.”
Buster-Williams Published in College & University Journal
Kimberley Buster- Williams, associate provost for enrollment management, had an article featured in College & University’s winter edition. The article was titled “Optimism in Enrollment Management.” College & University is AACRAO’s educational policy and research journal focusing on emerging concerns, new techniques, and technology in higher education. It is published four times a year.
Al-Tikriti Joins MESA Panel Discussion on Ottoman Seas
On Friday, Nov. 18, Associate Professor of Middle East History Nabil Al-Tikriti served as the discussant for the second of two panels titled “Ottoman Seas,” which took place in Boston at the Middle East Studies Association (MESA) Conference. As the panel discussant, Al-Tikriti placed the panel papers within the context of the field, critiqued the papers’ content and structure, and provided additional perspective on the arguments presented. This panel attendance was supported by a CAS Dean’s Office Faculty Supplemental Grant. On the way home from the conference, on Monday, Nov. 21, Al-Tikriti served as a grant reviewer for this year’s Fulbright-IIE research competition, at the Institute for International Education, in New York City.
The MESA conference panel announcement, presented below, can be reached here: https://mesana.org/mymesa/meeting_program_session.php?sid=f90e0e7f8bf5a54af89ee6e278d01a39.
Panel Summary: “Ottoman Seas” is a two-panel session that explores how the Ottomans imagined, constructed, and interacted with maritime space. As with every early modern empire, the limits of Ottoman territories were characterized by a degree of fluidity, more akin to flexible markers (Stuart Elden, The Birth of Territory). Much more so in the case of maritime realms, territorial ownership and control were regularly negotiated and reconstructed. Trying to avoid generalizations and blanket statements about big spatial units such as the Mediterranean, the session shifts attention to the specific components of the Ottoman seas: the Black Sea, the Adriatic, the Marmara Sea, the Aegean archipelago or the North African coast. Bringing together scholars who work on different facets of maritime interactions in these areas, we invite them to consider how maritime spaces were both geographically- as well as ideologically defined Ottoman entities. Participants will explore Ottoman seascapes on the basis of eyewitness accounts, collective experiences of sailors, pirates and statesman, as well as cartographical and architectural evidence. Inquiring into the military, economic and cultural nature of the Ottoman imaginations of the empire’s liquid frontiers, we aim to bring together studies of primary sources, and construct empirical and theoretical arguments building upon and contributing to, existing literature.
Paper Titles:
- Establishing an Ottoman Naval Vision: Reforming Admirals Hayreddin Pasha and Mezemorta Pasha by Isom-Verhaaren, Christine
- Memories of the war in the sea, Safai’s History of the Ottoman conquest of Naupaktos and Methoni by Menguc, Murat
- From Surat to Izmir and Venice: Armenian Diamond and Gem Merchants in Early Modern Global Trade by Tajiryan, Sona
- The Kadi of Malta: Piracy, Captivity, and Law in the Ottoman Mediterranean by White, Joshua
Panel Participants:
Palmira Brummett, Brown University, Chair.
Christine Isom-Verhaaren, Brigham Young University, Presenter.
Nabil Al-Tikriti, University of Mary Washington, Discussant.
Murat Menguc, Seton Hall University, Organizer; Presenter.
Joshua White, University of Virginia, Presenter.
Sona Tajiryan, University of California at Los Angeles, Presenter.
Rafferty Publishes Essays on Presidents
Colin Rafferty, Associate Professor of English, has published three essays on presidents in the newest issue of Juked: “Bully (#26),” “Death Song for Andrew Jackson (#7),” and “18 1/2 (#37).” They can be read here: http://juked.com/2016/11/colin-rafferty-three-presidential-essays.asp.
Fontem Awarded Best Paper Award at INFORMS Conference
Bellah Fontem, assistant professor in the College of Business, received the Best Paper award at the INFORMS conference for “An Optimal Stopping Policy for Car Rental Businesses with Purchasing Customers.” Fontem’s fellow finalists were from Texas A&M and Ohio State. The paper studies revenue-maximizing decision rules for car rental firms that serve both rental and purchasing customers using the same pool of cars.
Farnsworth Lectures on Gerrymandering in Virginia
Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science and director of the University’s Center for Leadership and Media Studies, recently delivered a lecture titled “How Gerrymandering is Changing Virginia – and How it is Not” at the One Virginia 2021 Forum in Manassas, VA.
Orozco Chairs Peninsular Literature Panel
On Nov. 4 and 5, 2016, Patricia Orozco, lecturer in Modern Languages and Literatures, chaired the panel Spanish II Peninsular Literature: from 1700 to the Present at the 88 South Atlantic Modern Language Association Conference, this year titled Utopia/Dystopia: Whose Paradise Is It?, celebrated in Jacksonville, Florida. On this occasion, the panel consisted of four sessions. This was an elected position for which Dr. Orozco was chosen among scholars from the South Atlantic area.
Barrenechea Wins Essay Award
Antonio Barrenechea, Associate Professor of English, has won the award for “Best Essay in Inter-American Studies” from the International Association of Inter-American Studies for his essay “Hemispheric Studies Beyond Suspicion: Comparative Literature and the Summa Americana.” The essay is a critique of U.S.-led Hemispheric Studies as currently practiced in favor of a comparative global paradigm that is invested in the languages and literatures of the Western Hemisphere.
UMW Hosts Eighteenth-Century Conference
The 47th Annual Conference of the East-Central American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies met at UMW on Oct. 27-29. Marie McAllister (ELC) served as 2016 Conference Chair. Program Committee members were Ben LaBreche (ELC), Betsy Lewis (MLL), Will Mackintosh (HIST), and Maya Mathur (ELC). Marie Wellington (MLL) and Richard Hansen (emeritus, ELC) served as registration volunteers. The nearly one hundred attendees hailed from institutions in Virginia and neighboring states, and from schools across the country. Events included a keynote address by Catherine Ingrassia of VCU and walking tours of Historic Fredericksburg. LaBreche and Mackintosh also presented their scholarly work at the conference, and Wellington served on the Molin Prize Committee.
The conference was supported by the Wendy Shadwell ’63 Program Endowment in British Literature, the CAS Dean’s Office, and the ELC, HISP, HIST, and MLL Departments. Special thanks to our student aides and to the many wonderful staff members from Events, Setup, Catering, Copy Center, Admissions, University Center, Parking, CAS, ELC, HISP, HIST, and MLL who contributed their knowledge and assistance.