Olivia DrakeSonia Sultan, chair and professor of biology, professor of environmental studies, received a fellowship from the Wissenschaftskolleg/Institute for Advanced Study for 2012-13. She and approximately 40 other fellows from around the world will work on projects of their own choice for one academic year. The group is designed to represent a range of academic disciplines from both humanities and sciences. As a fellow, Sultan will be working on a book project that is under contract with Oxford University Press for its Ecology and Evolution series. "In this book, I aim to bring together recent findings from a range of biological disciplines to shape an updated understanding of the developmental…
Jeff Rider, professor of romance languages and literatures, professor of medieval studies, has received a residential fellowship from the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts in Brussels for the second semester of the 2011-12 academic year. Rider is in Brussels working with two other fellows on the topic, "Perception and Performance of Social Identity in the Nascent Urban Societies of the High Middle Ages." In addition to presenting a lecture to other fellows at the center, he's presenting lectures at the University of Ghent, the Catholic University of Louvain, the Royal Library of Belgium, the Charles University in Prague, and to a European research group…
Khachig Tölölyan, professor of letters, presented several lectures on Diaspora studies in 2011. They include: “The Transatlantic Study of Transnational Diasporas,” at Germany’s Münster University, whose new program of diaspora studies was funded for $3.6 million by the Marie Curie Institute, an EU organization. Nov. 28, 2011; “Varieties of Diaspora: Phenomena, Concepts, Terminology,” at the conference “Perspectives on Global Diasporas,” organized by the Programs in Jewish Studies, Asian Studies, African American Studies and International Affairs, at Northeastern University, Nov. 17, 2011; “Twenty years of diaspora studies: success through confusion,” at the Conference on Diasporas and Cultures of Migration,” held at…
Lauren RubensteinIn this issue of The Wesleyan Connection we ask 5 Questions of Daniel Long, assistant professor of sociology. Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy has made education reform a major priority this year. He has proposed a sweeping package of reforms, including overhauling teacher tenure, increasing Education Cost Sharing grants to struggling districts, funding more preschool slots for low-income children, and requiring districts to contribute additional money for students to attend charter schools. Q: Connecticut suffers from the highest black/white and poor/non-poor achievement gap in the country. What can be done to address this? A: In Connecticut—as well as nationwide—longitudinal studies have shown…
Charles Sanislow, assistant professor of psychology, and two members of his lab, Katie Marcus '13 and Liz Reagan '13 published an article on challenging old assumptions about about the outcome of borderline psychopathology in the February 2012 issue of Current Psychiatry Reports. The paper details current findings from major longitudinal psychiatry studies including the Collaborative Longitudinal Personality Study, which Sanislow has been as an investigator on for the past 16 years, and suggests new directions for clinical research. The article is online here. Also published in February is a work that Sanislow co-authored from the Collaborative Personality Study in the…
Professor Ellen Nerenberg, chairperson of the Romance Languages and Literatures Department, recently published a new book, Body of State: The Moro Affair, A Nation Divided. It offers a translation of Marco Baliani's acclaimed dramatic monologue, Corpo di Stato, concerning the 1978 kidnapping and assassination of Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro by the terrorist Red Brigades. Nerenberg authored the translation along with Nicoletta Marini-Maio and Thomas Simpson. She also co-wrote a critical introduction to the book, with Marini-Maio. Corpo di Stato was commissioned by Italian state television in 1998 to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the "Moro Affair." Through over 100 performances of Baliani's monologue since…
Joel Pfister, the Kenan Professor of the Humanities, chair of the English Department, is invited to serve as one of two American faculty members in the West-China Faculty Enhancement Program in American Studies. The program, which will take place in July in Xi'an, China, is sponsored by the Ford Foundation and China Association for the Study of American Literature. Pfister will present 10 intensive, two-hour lectures on American literature to faculty from universities in western China that have poor rural students. He'll also conduct a seminar session on American studies pedagogy. "The aim is to better equip these university teachers…
A book written by Deb Olin Unferth, assistant professor of English, was named a 2011 finalist in the National Book Critics Circle. Olin Unferth's Revolution: The Year I Fell in Love and Went to Join the War (Henry Holt) is one of five finalists in the autobiography category. In the memoir, Unferth describes the year she ran away from college with her Christian boyfriend and followed him to Nicaragua to join the Sandinistas. Winners of the National Book Critics Circle Awards will be announced at the awards ceremony on March 8 at the New School’s Tishman Auditorium in New York.…
Su Zheng, associate professor of music, associate professor of East Asian studies, will speak on "150 Years of Chinese Music" during a Year of the Dragon Festival Feb. 26. From 1 to 2:30 p.m., she will address her audience in English and from 3 to 4:30 p.m. in Mandarin. Her lecture will take place at Flushing Town Hall in Flushing, N.Y. Each lecture will be followed by a signing of her book, Claiming Diaspora. The year 2012 is the Year of the Dragon, which comes once every 12 years; and is also a Year of the Water Dragon, which occurs…
An article written by three Wesleyan faculty and two alumni was published in the January 2012 issue of the Journal of Neuroscience, 32(1): pages 46-61. In "Differentiation and functional incorporation of embryonic stem cell derived GABAergic interneurons in the dentate gyrus of mice with temporal lobe epilepsy," the authors describe embryonic stem cell derived neuronal transplants for treating temporal lobe epilepsy. The authors include Jan Naegele, professor of biology, professor of neuroscience and behavior; Gloster Aaron, assistant professor of biology, assistant professor of neuroscience; Laura Grabel, the Lauren B. Dachs Professor of Science and Society, professor of biology; Xu Maisano Ph.D. '11; and Elizabeth…
Seth Redfield, assistant professor of astronomy, received a grant worth $65,932 from the Space Telescope Institute to support a project titled, "Cool Star Winds and the Evolution of Exoplanetary Atmospheres." The grant expires in October 2014. Redfield is observing stars that are host to their own planetary systems. These "exoplanets" were only discovered in the last decade or so, and since their discovery, astronomers are very interested in learning more about the properties of these planets and their atmospheres. "Invariably, the study of exoplanets is really an exercise in putting life on Earth into a cosmic context. How common are planets?…
Joe Siry, professor of art, is the author of the book Beth Sholom Synagogue: Frank Lloyd Wright and Modern Religious Architecture, published by the University of Chicago Press in December 2011. Beth Sholom Synagogue provides the first in-depth look at the synagogue’s conception and realization in relation to Wright’s other religious architecture. Beginning with his early career at Adler and Sullivan’s architectural firm in Chicago and his design for Unity Temple and ending with the larger works completed just before or soon after his death, Siry skillfully depicts Wright’s exploration of geometric forms and structural techniques in creating architecture for…