Faculty and Staff Notes

Matthew Rarey, assistant professor of art history, was awarded a 2018-2019 Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Humanities for his book project, Insignificant Things: Assemblage, Occlusion, and the Art of Survival in the Black Atlantic. Professor Rarey is spending his fellowship year as a visiting scholar in the Program of African Studies at Northwestern University.

Associate Professor of Religion Margaret Kamitsuka published in the Journal for Feminist Studies in Religion.

Matthew Rarey, assistant professor of art history, delivered his lecture, "Questions of Value and Bondage at a Hotel in London, March 1865" at the Center for Visual Culture at Bryn Mawr College. The lecture, which is based on an in-progress article, discusses Dante Gabriel Rossetti's 1866 painting, The Beloved, in the context of 19th century theories of race and sexuality, as well as transnational abolitionist dialogues.

Danforth-Lewis Professor of Economics John V. Duca presented papers at the 35th annual International Association for Research in Income and Wealth (IARIW) conference in Copenhagen, August 20-25, 2018. Duca presented two papers, “Equity Regulation and U.S. Venture Capital Investment” and “How Financial Innovations and Accelerators Drive Booms and Busts in U.S. Consumption.”

Assistant Professor of Religion Cheryl Cottine and Assistant Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry Lisa Ryno co-authored the article "Biological Impact and Ethical Implications of Pesticide Use: A Short Module for Upper-Division-Undergraduate Biochemistry Courses" published in the Journal of Chemical Education.

Assistant Professor of Economics Evan Kresch presented a paper at the annual Liberal Arts Colleges Development Economics conference.

Professor of English T. S. McMillin’s essay, “Between the Disciplines and Beyond the Institution: Emerson’s Environmental Relevance” just appeared in the book Approaches to Teaching the Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (eds. Mark C. Long and Sean Ross Meehan), published by The Modern Language Association of America. In their introduction, the editors write, “T. S. McMillin extends the lessons of ‘creative reading’ to the sciences, uncovering in Emerson’s writings on nature a perspective of ‘transdisciplinarity’ that highlights Emerson’s relevance for both English and environmental studies students and also makes Emerson a valuable field guide for instructors working in the environmental humanities.”

Renee Romano, Robert S. Danforth professor of history and professor of comparative American studies and Africana studies, has an article in the September 2018 volume of Differences: A Journal of Feminist Cultural Studies, a special volume on the theme of Black Marriage. Her article, “Something Old, Something New: Black Women, Interracial Dating, and the Black Marriage, Crisis,” explores the arguments and viewpoints of a vocal group of black women who promote interracial dating and marriage in blogs, books, and internet advocacy sites.

Dang Thai Son, the conservatory’s newest member of the piano faculty—and a renowned teacher, performer, and interpreter of the Polish composers Chopin and Paderewski—traveled to Warsaw in September where he was awarded the “Zasluzony Kulturze Gloria Artis” (Gold Medal for Merit to Culture) by Poland’s Ministry of Culture and National Heritage.

Jared C. Hartt, associate professor of music theory, published an edited book, A Critical Companion to Medieval Motets (Boydell and Brewer, 2018). This volume of collected essays, the first to be devoted exclusively to medieval motets, features chapters by seventeen leading scholars from around the world. More information on the book and its contents can be found here.