Tags: Society


2014 Gregory Lecture brings Lincoln scholar to UGA

Eric Foner, the DeWitt Clinton Professor of History at Columbia University, whose 2010 book The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery received the Pulitzer Prize for History, will deliver the 2014 Gregory Distinguished Lecture. Foner's lecture, drawn from a forthcoming book on the subject, is "Gateway to Freedom: The Hidden History of the Underground Railroad." The lecture will take place Oct. 27 at 4 p.m. in the M. Smith…


'State of the Art' exhibition includes UGA professor, alumni

Imagine you're a major research university, with aspirations for rising in the ranks. Everything from your endowment to annual extramural funding dollars can be included in quantifiable metrics you use to measure your progress. But there are other aspects of your impact that can be more difficult to quantify. For example, how good is the history department? How strong is your art school? Clear metrics on those endeavors rarely pop up, but when…


Hispanic Heritage Month

1:30-4 p.m. at ALCES, which is located at 445 Huntington Road. Oct. 11-Pueblos Originarios: Un Festival Artesanal. Arts and crafts inspired by the indigenous peoples of the Americas as well as food and music from all over Latin America will be showcased from 1-5 p.m. at the Pinewoods Library and Learning Center, 465 U.S. Highway 29 North. Oct. 12-Book Fiesta With Lucha Libre. Share stories and make a luchador mask from 3-4 p.m. at the…


Jessica Kissinger: making research usable

Great opportunity to feature not just one of our star faculty members, but also an emerging challenge for all researchers everywhere in this era of big data: Jessica Kissinger is a molecular geneticist whose research on the evolution of disease and the genomes of eukaryotic pathogenic organisms—Cryptosporidium, Sarcocystis, Toxoplasma andPlasmodium (malaria) among them—has led her to perhaps the emerging issue among research scientists…


Heart, mind, and eye — the art of Lamar Dodd

Terrific appreciation of Lamar Dodd by Jamil Zainaldin at the Saporta Report: Life in Depression-era New York was hard for Dodd, as well as for his family back home in LaGrange. He and his new wife, also of LaGrange, decided in 1933, against the advice of his teachers, to return to the South, where he took a position in a Birmingham art store. He continued painting with heart, mind, and eye, honoring the humble and dignifying the ordinary in…


UGA engineering enrollment grows

Congratulations to the UGA College of Engineering, which is experiencing tremendous growth in enrollment. This growth was forecast long ago, forecasts themselves that were part of the rationale for offering a wider range of engineering degrees at the university in the first place, for which the Franklin College has long been an advocate and supporter: The college now has UGA’s fifth-largest undergraduate enrollment after passing the College of…


Changes in the Life Sciences

Not the sciences themselves, but a new UGA graduate education approach. The Integrated Life Sciences: giving entering graduate students in the life sciences one of the nation's broadest range of research opportunities through its redesigned and expanded Integrated Life Sciences program. More than 50 students recently started their studies in the relaunched program, which allows them to gain hands-on experience in three labs before selecting a…


ASA Founders Award for Franklin

Christine Franklin, that is. It seems that every week is awards week for Franklin College faculty, as the American Statistical Association honored one of our best with its most prestigious award: [ASA] recently presented its Founders Award to Christine Franklin, the Lothar Tresp Honoratus Honors Professor in the University of Georgia Franklin College of Arts and Sciences department of statistics. The ASA is the nation's preeminent professional…


Franklin faculty honored with Regents awards

Two Franklin College professors along with the First-Year Odyssey program, which if you remember also originated in the Franklin College, were honored with excellence awards from the USG Board of Regents: • William Finlay, Meigs Distinguished Teaching Professor of Sociology in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, has been awarded the Regents' Teaching Excellence Award; • Paula Lemons, associate professor of biochemistry and molecular…


Imagining America

Connecting the arts and humanities to a democratic revivial in the United States is more than an intriguing idea - the future of the cultural and political ideals of a diverse nation hangs in the balance. And while that may sound like hyperbole, consider the headwinds of violence, apathy, low-voter turnout, politcal disillusionment and eroding trust in institutions into which American society has turned in recent years. As much as that 'decision…


New LDSOA director Chris Garvin

Each fall brings many new faces to campus, but this semsester marks the beginning of a new era at the Lamar Dodd School of Art with the arrival of its new director, Chris Garvin. Learn more about Garvin, his background and vision for the school in this extended Q&A (an abridged version appeared in the Sept. 2 Columns): Chris Garvin comes to UGA from The University for the Arts in Philadelphia, where he served as program director. An…


Reading by Philip Lee Williams

A former Franklin colleague near and dear to many of us returns to campus this week to read from his new memoir, It Is Written. Welcome back, Phil: Award-winning author Philip Lee Williams will read from his latest autobiography, "It Is Written: My Life in Letters." The book covers Williams' 30-year career and tells the story of his creative life in an open, jaunty and often hilarious autobiography. Presented by UGA Libraries. Over a 30-year…


Teaching Ferguson's lessons

Hot-off-the-presses is not usually a part of lesson plans in university classrooms - unless it is. History, political science, economics... social sciences and humanities classtime can easily and sometimes should be convulsed in topical isses. Faculty at institutions in the immediate area don't have the luxury of remove and often need to incorporate the events for multiple reasons. The Chronicle of Higher Education shares some lessons plans from…


Welcome to the Class of 2018

The 5,285 freshmen who entered UGA this week, assembled into a Super G on Sunday in Sanford Stadium as part of the Freshman Welcome to the Class of 2018 sponsored by the Student Government Association and the Student Alumni Council.  That's a lot of people - normally, you would have to be crossing 42nd Street and 7th Ave to see that many people in one place. Welcome to everyone and do not worry: you will get lost, and then lost again…


The Humanities: towards greater empathy

News and current events today challenge us to be able to see the world from the persepctive of others. The more insulated we become - socially, economically, politically - the more difficult it can be to understand the broader issues and events swirling around us. Of course, an education steeped in the humanities can go a long way towards making us better people, better citizens who can relate to our fellow citizens constructively, who want to…


Educator/alum addresses school reformers

Some great plain talk on school reform from Franklin College alumnus and Clarke Central High School literature teacher Ian Altman in the Washington Post: 7. Don’t tell us to leave politics out of the classroom.  Don’t be naïve.  Learning always has some kind of political efficacy. Some opinions are more sensible than others, some arguments stronger than others, some interpretations and theories better supported than others. It is okay…


Renovations around campus

It's that time of year (in which I start out several posts with 'It's that time of year...') when the town begins to be once again flooded with people and cars, returning students, parents, futons, and hopes (we hope). Instead of showing a picture of a very congested Milledge Avenue during sorority rush, we'll preview some renovations to campus buildings that will soon re-open. The University Architects office does a great job keeping our…


Faculty in the media, Summer 2014

The summer slows on campus but our faculty have been very busy in the national and international media. A sampling of the active engagement of faculty scholarship and expertise across a braod range of subjects: When predators vanish, so does the ecosystem – The New York Times reports on a study that shows recreational fishing and crabbing may be responsible for dying salt marshes off the coast of New England.  But “it’s still a leap to…


Campus smart streets

It's the lull just before fall semester, but around campus, progress marches on. Though they have been a political hot potato locally, smart streets are a safety innovation the university can and has embraced. Note the new pedestrian islands on Carlton Street in front of Stegeman Coliseum. The university has added painted bike lanes around campus as well, all in the service of safer transit in what is a very densely populated area. Look for more…


Pavlic on Palestine

Creative writing professor and poet Ed Pavlić just returned from the West Bank, where he toured the region with other writers as well as government and NGO officials. He offers some poignant observations about the current conflict in this piece for Africa Is A Country: I know. It’s the oldest of old hats to note the distended shapes American journalism creates to preserve the Israel-first, false impression of some symmetry or parity between…


This week in UGA history

213 years ago, by just a few days (July 25, 1801), there appeared a classified ad in the Augusta Chronicle (alas, no link from that year) announcing that: The Senaticus Academicus had chosen a site for the university, "an institution deeply interesting to the present age, and still more to an encreasing posterity." [Re-]discovered in Nash Boney's excellent A Pictorial History of the University of Georgia. May we be today and always deeply…


Summer Commencement

The summer semester is winding down on campus and that can only mean one thing--summer commencement is quickly approaching.  This summer, commencement is being held on Friday, August 1 at 9:30 a.m. at Stegeman Coliseum.  The 2014 summer commencement is a combined Graduate and Undergraduate event. Doors open at 8 a.m.  For those unable to attend,the ceremony will be broadcast live on Channel 15 of the University Cable System and…


Workshop for Researchers: Displaying your data

The UGA Statistical Consulting Center (SCC) announces its inaugural short course, “Exploratory Data Analysis in Excel”. This two hour mini-workshop will be open to faculty, staff and students from Franklin College. The recommended audience is researchers who are new to quantitative research, and who want to learn some simple methods for understanding and displaying data in Excel. A background in statistics is not required. This hands-on short…


Changing the Humanities

It is difficult to defend the humanities and simultaneously champion the idea that they must change with the times. An article in the CHE shows the Mellon Foundation grappling with this contradiction: Other private donors and foundations—the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, for instance—foot the bill for occasional humanities projects. But the Mellon foundation and the National Endowment for…


Chemistry doctoral graduate Gilliard awarded Merck Fellowship

2014 doctoral graduate in the department of chemistry Robert J. Gilliard, Jr., has been awarded a UNCF/Merck Foundation Postdoctoral Science Research Fellowship. The award provides $92,000 and includes a stipend, research grant and travel funds for up to two years of fellowship tenure: Gilliard will pursue research projects focused on synthetic chemistry and will collaborate with John Protasiewicz of Case Western Reserve University in…
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