Lauren RubensteinTo prevent cheating, Libor should be replaced with a market-based rate, says Grossman
"Hollywood Enigma" teaches us to appreciate an actor whose standing in Hollywood should be reassessed
Wesleyan announced on Sept. 19 a new partnership with Coursera, a company offering the public access to free online courses from top colleges and universities. Wesleyan was one of 17 new institutions to sign on this month, and is the very first liberal arts institution focused on the undergraduate experience to do so. Other partners among Coursera’s 33 participants include Stanford, Princeton and Brown; public research universities such as the University of Florida; and specialized schools such as Berklee College of Music. Coursera was founded by two Stanford University professors seeking to expand educational opportunities through technology. Since its launch…
Speaking in the Center for Film Studies on Sept. 24, actor Bradley Whitford ’81 shared wisdom on subjects ranging from show business to politics to dealing with the insecurity inherent in being an actor. Whitford addressed an audience of film and theater majors, prospective majors and alumni. Best known for his role as Josh Lyman on The West Wing, Whitford was recently elected to Wesleyan’s Board of Trustees. He has also had starring roles in the shows Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and The Good Guys. Recently, he co-starred in a film, “Cabin in the Woods,” written by Joss Whedon…
Read the following words in your head: Incense Lemon Kick Though it may be happening on a subconscious level, all these words share an important feature: They all evoke a sensation or perceptual experience in the mind of the reader. Incense brings to mind a particular scent; lemon, a tart taste in the mouth; and kick activates a part of the brain responsible for motor behavior. Research suggests that these mental reactions occur very quickly—within fractions of a second—after reading a word. In the Eye Movement and Reading Lab at Wesleyan, Barbara Juhasz, assistant professor of psychology, assistant professor…
"Common Ground 2012," the 4th annual Middletown International Film Festival, kicks off Oct. 11 with a screening of My Voice (Nha Fala), a 2002 film in Portuguese directed by Flora Gomes. The film will be shown at 7 p.m. at Wesleyan's Film Studies Department. Five more films from around the world will be aired as part of the festival. They are: Thursday, Oct. 18 at Russell Library Seraphine (French, 2008) Directed by Martin Provost Thursday, Oct. 25 at Russell Library The Concert (Russian, 2009) Directed by Radu Mihaileanu Thursday, Nov. 1 at Wesleyan Film Studies Poetry (Korean, 2010) Directed by Chang-dong Lee Thursday,…
Laura Grabel updated a state legislature committee on her lab's research into stem cell therapies for epilepsy
Assistant Professor of Psychology Patricia Rodriguez Mosquera has become Associate Editor of The European Journal of Social Psychology. The journal is an international forum for original, high-quality, peer-reviewed research in all areas of social psychology. The international editorial team encourages submissions based on empirical, meta-analytical, and theoretical research. Topics covered include, among others, intergroup relations, social cognition, attitudes, social influence and persuasion, self and identity, verbal and nonverbal communication, language and thought, affect and emotion, embodied and situated cognition and individual differences of social-psychological relevance. The European Journal of Social Psychology is sponsored by the European Association of Social Psychology.…
The Magazine of the Harvard Graduate School of Education featured a story this month on Professor of Theater Ron Jenkins' Dante Project, "a program he created that attempts to use theater as a catalyst for positive change in prisons throughout the world." According to the article, the program, which has been facilitated in places as far flung as Italy and Indonesia, encourages incarcerated men and women to "write about points of connection between their own life stories and the experiences of the characters" in classics like Dante's Inferno. These writings are then used to create a script that is performed…
Janice Naegele, professor of biology, professor of neuroscience and behavior, and Laura Grabel, the Lauren B. Dachs Professor of Science and Society, professor of biology, were recently honored in Hartford Magazine’s “Amazing Women” issue. Two of only 13 women selected this year for recognition, Naegele and Grabel were lauded for their contributions to the field of stem cell research. The magazine's profile of Naegele states: "The research conducted by Janice Naegele, who is professor of biology and neuroscience and behavior at Wesleyan University, is opening up new possibilities for treating epilepsy through stem cell therapy. Her work focuses on temporal lobe epilepsy,…
On Sept. 14 and 15, Professor of Economics Richard Grossman attended a conference in Munich jointly sponsored by the Bundesbank (the German central bank) and a Munich-based research institute called CESifo. Grossman chaired a session and acted as a discussant at the conference, whose focus was, "The Banking Sector and the State." According to the conference website: "The current financial and sovereign debt crisis has shown once again that the banking sector and the state are intertwined in many ways: On the one hand, the state lends support to distressed banks and accepts risks from the private sector; in this…
On Aug. 31, "Where We Live," a program on WNPR public radio, featured two segments about music at Wesleyan. Rob Rosenthal, provost, vice-president of academic affairs and the John E. Andrus Professor of Sociology, and his son Sam Rosenthal, a writer and musician in New York City, discussed a new collection of Pete Seeger's personal writings that they co-edited. The book is Pete Seeger: In His Own Words (Paradigm Publishers). They described the experience of combing through decades of Seeger's writings in the folk singer's Beacon, NY home while he hovered nearby. "He would drop in from time to time…