An opinion column by Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science and director of the University’s Center for Leadership and Media Studies, was published in “The Fix” blog of The Washington Post. The column focused on the results of a new Virginia public opinion survey from the center. The column was titled, “How a Jim Webb independent presidential bid could actually matter (hint: Virginia).” In addition, Dr. Farnsworth recently spoke before UMW’s Washington Area Alumni Association on the 2016 Presidential Campaign and the 2015 Virginia legislative elections.
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.”
Dasgupta Presents on Bengali Cinema
Shumona Dasgupta, assistant professor of English, presented the paper titled “Representing the Partition: Memory, Mourning and Trauma in Bengali Cinema” at the Mid-Atlantic Popular and American Culture Association’s annual conference held in Philadelphia Nov. 5-7, 2015.
Taylor-Schran Edits Melchers Book
Gari Melchers Home and Studio released a new pictorial book on the paintings of Gari Melchers. Edited by Susan Taylor-Schran ’75, Museum Shop and visitor services manager, Selected Works by Gari Melchers: From the Collection of the Gari Melchers Home and Studio, was released on December 1.
In response to numerous requests by visitors to the historic home and studio, Taylor-Schran edited and assembled the 100+ page full-color book, featuring more than 80 paintings in the Belmont Collection. With contributions from Joanna Catron, curator, and David Berreth, director, the book includes a biographical timeline of Melchers, as well as archival photographs.
Completed to accompany the 40th anniversary of Gari Melchers Home and Studio at Belmont opening to the public, the book is available only at the Museum Shop.
Farnsworth Presents Research on the Presidency
Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science and director of the University’s Center for Leadership and Media Studies, recently presented a research paper, “Studying the Presidency after 9/11: Re-considering Presidential Character in Domestic and International Contexts,” at the 9/11 and the Academy Conference at Emory & Henry College in Emory, Va.
Foss Presents Paper Celebrating the Work of Claudia Emerson
On Nov. 13, Professor of English Chris Foss presented a paper titled “‘The body’s own account’: Disease, Disability, Death and the Argument for Life in the Poetry of Claudia Emerson” at the South Atlantic Modern Language Association annual convention in Durham, N.C. The paper celebrates Claudia’s unflinching consideration of disease, disability and death in her most recently published book, Impossible Bottle, a work throughout which Claudia consistently refuses to airbrush the experience of pain and suffering while simultaneously refusing to succumb to despair.
Indeed, Impossible Bottle powerfully testifies to the meaningfulness and the value of all lives touched by disease, disability and death. Ultimately, Claudia discards any vision of some sort of final disconsolate decline in the face of a dogged disease like cancer, or some sort of defeatist surrender to a death without dignity, and instead gifts us all with a brilliant argument for life that not only envisions but also enacts a truly compelling embodiment of a heartening resilience that remains elastic, fresh and enlightening.
Scanlon Shares Paper on Great War Literature
Mara Scanlon, Professor of English, recently participated in the seminar “WW I: Reconsidering Rupture” at the 17th Annual Modernist Studies Association Conference. Her paper, “Mary Borden’s ‘Moonlight’: ‘A Crazy Hurting Dream,'” focused on the experimental war book The Forbidden Zone, written by Mary Borden, an American civilian who ran a hospital unit behind the front lines in World War I. The paper theorized the traumatic encounter with beauty, defined as an “abraded adjacency” in a revision of Elaine Scarry’s terminology from On Beauty and Being Just, which can shock the self from its protective mechanization in a time of violence. The Forbidden Zone is also included in Scanlon’s English class called Literature of the Great War.
Harris Presents Paper at Slavic Studies Conference in Philadelphia
Department of History and American Science Professor Steven E. Harris presented his paper, “The Soviet Martyrdom of an Aeroflot Stewardess in the Age of Détente,” at the 47th Annual Convention of the Association for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies in Philadelphia, Nov. 19-22, 2015. At this same conference, Harris was also a panelist on the roundtable titled “Motion & Urbanity: Visual Symbolism, Sites of Mobility & the Built Environment in the Tsarist and Soviet Empire,” where he discussed his current work on the history of Soviet airports.
Buster-Williams to Present at College Board Regional Forum
Kimberley Buster-Williams, associate provost for enrollment management, has been selected to present at College Board’s Southern Regional Forum in Orlando, Fla., on Feb. 17, 2016. Buster-Williams will be presenting with colleagues Dr. Katrina Myers-Caldwell and Diane Fuselier-Thompson. Dr. Katrina Myers-Caldwell is the Assistant Vice President for Student Affairs at Northern Illinois University. Dr. Caldwell has a track record of successful strategic planning and implementation of diversity programs at Chicago-area higher education institutions. Diane Fuselier-Thompson is a doctoral student at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Her research focuses on the African American female narrative as it relates to persistence in engineering.
The conference session is titled, “We Check More Than One Racial Category. . . Are You Ready for Us?” and focuses on ways participants can become more knowledgeable about adjustment challenges that multiracial students face and ways to assists student affairs and admissions professionals with developing appropriate support services and outreach messages. Participants will also learn more about stories from Dartmouth College students featured in the book “Mixed-Multiracial College Students Tell Their Life Stories.”
The College Board connects students to college success and opportunity and was founded in 1900. Today, the membership association is made up of more than 6,000 of the world’s leading educational institutions and is dedicated to promoting excellence and equity in education. The Southern Region serves students and educators in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia.
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 gave a lecture entitled, “Virginia Politics 2015: Gerrymandering, Recent Elections and Public Opinion,” at the Annual Meeting of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government. The organization includes activists, politicians, government workers and journalists focused on strengthening public disclosure laws in the Old Dominion.