Mike SembosJohanna Tayloe Crane ’93 is the author of a new study, Scrambling for Africa: AIDS, Expertise, and the Rise of American Global Health Science (Cornell University Press) which documents how and why Africa became a major hub of American HIV and AIDS research in recent years after having formerly been excluded from its benefits due to poverty and instability. “American AIDS researchers became interested in working in Africa for two major reasons—one humanitarian, and one having more to do with scientific/professional motivations,” Crane said. “Once effective HIV treatment was discovered in the mid-1990s and the American epidemic began to come…
David LowTatanka, directed by Jacob Bricca ‘93, will have its world premiere at the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival in Missoula, Montana on February 22, 2014. Big Sky is one of America's premiere documentary festivals with over 20,000 visitors/year, and the film will be screening alongside such critically lauded films as Citizen Koch, I Am Divine, and Gore Vidal: The United States of Amnesia. In the film, based on his own experiences, Bricca, the son of a sixties activist, confronts the enigma that is his father Kit, a man whose uncompromising idealism helped build a movement but nearly tore his family…
In his new book, The Forensic Historian: Using Science to Reexamine the Past (M. E. Sharpe), Robert Williams ’60 demonstrates how seemingly cold cases from history have been solved or had new light shed on them by scientists and historians using new forensic evidence. He provides examples ranging in time from Oetzi the Iceman—who died 5,300 years ago in the Swiss Alps from an arrow wound, yet is known to have had brown eyes Lyme disease, type-O blood, an intolerance to lactose, cavities, and tattoos—to the process of identifying Osama Bin Laden’s body in 2011. “Since World War II, forensic…
Starz CEO Chris Albrecht has named John Penney '87 Chief Strategy Officer at Starz, the integrated global media and entertainment company. Penney will work closely with the CEO to extend the company’s corporate and business growth strategies via partnerships, ventures and innovative models for new business opportunities. “His deep insight into the global media and entertainment ecosystem is uniquely valued,” said Albrecht, in a press release. “He has set a high bar in providing our management team with keen industry analysis that has been invaluable to our decision making, and we look forward to John’s continued contributions to helping grow…
Benjamin TraversTwin comedians Todd '05 and Adam Stone '05 first took the stage as Stone and Stone while at Wesleyan. Today they perform standup together and have been featured on NBC's Last Comic Standing, a series of national Verizon FiOS commercials and in videos on Comedy Central. They have performed at comedy clubs and theaters throughout New York and Los Angeles, including the UCB Theatre, Carolines, Gotham Comedy Club and the Laugh Factory, and they perform regularly at the People's Improv Theater (PIT) and at the New York Friars Club, where they have roasted people including Larry King, George Takei, and…
In November 2013, the White House nominated Stefan Selig ’84 as under secretary of international trade for the United States Department of Commerce. Since 2009, he’s served as executive vice chairman of global corporate and investment banking at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. The Obama administration rarely appoints Wall Street bankers, especially from Bank of America, so this is an exceptional case. If confirmed by the senate, Selig will head the International Trade Administration, working toward the expansion of American industry, job creation and the promotion of exports. Selig earned his BA from Wesleyan and an MBA from Harvard Business…
Gabe Rosenberg '16Aram Sinnreich ’94 is the author of the new book The Piracy Crusade: How the Music Industry’s War on Sharing Destroys Markets and Erodes Civil Liberties (University of Massachusetts Press). An assistant professor of journalism and media studies at Rutgers University, he served as an expert witness on the 2010 court case Arista Records vs. Lime Group, which was settled out of court before he could present his 20,000-word report. The Piracy Crusade was built on the foundation of his unused research at the time. Sinnreich argues that Hollywood, the recording industry, and the United States government are acting as…
The artwork of Assistant Professor of Art Sasha Rudensky ’01 has been featured in a multi-page spread in the January 2014 issue of Rangefinder, a monthly magazine for the professional wedding and portrait photographer. The story is called “Culture of Brightness,” and it explores Rudensky’s “Brightness” photo series, in which she documents the lives of everyday Russians, Ukrainians and Belarusians. The collection was four years in the making. Rudensky herself was born in Moscow in 1979, and in the article she explains that in Russian-Ukrainian culture, the concept of “bright” is a synonym for “being beautiful, unforgettable — something that…
Kate CarlisleGuy Geyer Marcus '13 has won the Leroy Apker award for the American Physical Society, the highest prize offered in the United States for an undergraduate thesis in physics. Marcus is the second Wesleyan student to win the prize in three years; Wade Hsu ’10 also claimed the prestigious award. In 2008, Gim Seng Ng ’08 was a finalist for the Apker. “This achievement naturally highlights the quality and seriousness of our undergraduates and our undergraduate program,” said Physics Department Chair Brian Stewart. Marcus' Wesleyan advisor was Greg Voth, associate professor of physics. Marcus is working toward a Ph.D in…
Hankus Netsky, who received a Ph.D. in ethnomusicology from Wesleyan in 2004, has been chosen by the editorial staff of The Forward — a well-respected weekly newspaper covering the Jewish world — as one of the 50 American Jews who have had the greatest impact on the world in 2013, alongside the likes of Harvey Fierstein, Mandy Patinkin and Janet Yellen. Netsky is the chair of the contemporary improvisation department at the New England Conservatory of Music. He has mentored countless young Jewish musicians, many of whom attended NEC primarily to study with him, and has guided jazz and classical…
Cynthia RockwellJoseph Fins ’82, MD, MACP, The E. William Davis, Jr. M.D. Professor of Medical Ethics and Chief of the Division of Medical Ethics at Weill Cornell Medical College, was elected an Academico de Honor of the Real Academia National de Medicina de España or the Royal National Academy of Medicine of Spain. This is a significant honor, as the general membership appoints an Academico de Honor (honored or distinguished member) only when death vacates the one of fewer than 20 positions. Fins, the sole Academico de Honor elected in 2013, will be formally inducted in 2014, when he will give…
Charles Newell ’81 was recently awarded the prestigious Zelda Fichandler Award, which recognizes an outstanding director who is transforming the regional arts landscape through singular creativity and artistry in theater. He received the prize, an unrestricted grant of $5,000, from the Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation (SDCF). Over the years, Newell has become one of the nation’s foremost theater directors. He is currently in his 19th year as artistic director of the Court Theatre, the renowned professional theater in residence at University of Chicago, where he had directed more than 40 productions. Newell comments: “To receive The Zelda Fichandler Award…