PDF for Printing - Graduate School of Arts and Sciences - Columbia ...

CONTENTS1 Message from the Dean2 Dead Reckoning and Dendrochronology8 Dissertations and the Digital Age12 On the Process of Building a Graduate Community17 Roundtable20 When Intellect Meets Emotion26 Citizen Sociologists30 The Mutual Benefits of Mentoring32 Alumni Profiles36 On the Shelf: Faculty Publications38 On the Shelf: Alumni Publications39 Dissertations44 Announcements46 Alumni Awards48 Helpful LinksGSAS ALUMNI ASSOCIATION BOARD OF DIRECTORSDale Turza, President, Art History and Archaeology M.A. (1974)Louis Parks, Vice President, Ancient Studies M.A. (1995)Inge Reist, Secretary, Art History and Archaeology Ph.D. (1984)Jillisa Brittan, English and Comparative Literature M.A. (1986)Robert J. Carow, Economics and Education Ph.D. (1994)Kenneth W. Ciriacks, Geological Sciences Ph.D. (1962)Annette Clear, Political Science Ph.D. (2002)Leonard A. Cole, Political Science Ph.D. (1970)Michael S. Cornfeld, Political Science M.A. (1973)Deborah Gill Hilzinger, History Ph.D. (2002)David Jackson, English and Comparative Literature Ph.D. (1981)Andrew Kotchoubey, Applied Mathematics Ph.D. (1966)Les B. Levi, English and Comparative Literature Ph.D. (1982)Bridget Rowan, English and Comparative Literature M.A. (1980)Komal S. Sri-Kumar, Economics Ph.D. (1977)John Waldes, Plasma Physics Ph.D. (1971)Lester Wigler, Music M.A. (1980)LETTERS TO THE EDITORTo share your thoughts about anything you have readin this publication, please e-mail gsaseditor@columbia.edu.Unless you note otherwise in your message,any correspondence received by the editor will beconsidered for future publication. Please be sure toinclude in your message your nameand affiliation to the Graduate School of Arts andSciences.SUPERSCRIPT is published three times per year bythe Graduate School of Arts & Sciences and the GSASAlumni Association.Dean: Carlos J. AlonsoEditor: Kristin BalickiAssociate Director for Alumni Relations: Jennifer ShawDesign, Editing, and Production: University PublicationsCover Image: CSA Images/Mod Art CollectionLink back to contents page2 Superscript

For 36 years, theTree-Ring Lab hasused the versatilityof tree research toenhance our understandingof climate, ecology, andhistory both natural andarchaeological.Dead ReckoningPederson, Courtesy of the Lower Manhattan Development CorporationLink back to contents page2 Superscript

and Dendrochronologyby Kristin BalickiDendrochronology, the science of dating based on tree-ring analysis, isnot a topic that appears in international news very often. So when theremains of a ship were discovered three floors down from street level atthe World Trade Center site in July 2010 and reporters wrote that dendrochronologywould be used to date the vessel, the researchers in the Tree-Ring Labat Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory took notice. As Dr. Neil Pederson recalls, “OnFacebook, it was funny because you could watch the interest spread [throughout theworld]. People [in our field] were all asking ‘Who is going to do this?’” The Tree-RingLab seemed an obvious choice since it was the facility closest to the excavation site.AKRF, the environmental firm whose archaeological team was working for the PortAuthority during construction, had worked with the lab on prior projects. And it didnot hurt that the lab had more tree chronologies than any other in the eastern UnitedStates. “There was some discussion in the lab on whether we should do the projector not due to timing and funding,” states Pederson. “But we felt in the end that weshould. It was in our backyard and was a no-brainer that we would want to date theship.”For thirty-six years, the Tree-Ring Lab has used the versatility of tree research toenhance our understanding of climate, ecology, and history both natural and archaeological.The lab’s work is often split between cutting-edge ecological research and outreacheducation. Postdoctoral researcher Dario Martin-Benito describes the study oftree rings as a “tangible science” and “an obvious tool to study the environment” thatis growing in popularity and demand. Researchers at the Tree-Ring Lab can be foundhelping scientists build labs in Nepal, Mongolia, and Vietnam, dating historic buildings likeIndependence Hall, or leading high school groups through their greenhouse.Superscript 3Link back to contents page

Pederson started working in the lab asa technician after completing his master’sdegree in forest ecology at Auburn University.He quickly became “hooked on treerings and went on to complete his Ph.D.in Earth and Environmental Science atColumbia in 2005. His primary researchfocuses on the “interaction between climateand ecology, how the climate impacts theenvironment.” He uses trees to reconstructan environment, and his reconstructionshave been used to further our understandingof drought, ecology, and carbon dynamics.Martin-Benito came to Lamont-Dohertyfrom Spain last September to study theforests of Southeast Asia, the dynamicswithin those forests, and their relation tothe environment. Despite their researchfocus on ecology, both Pederson andMartin-Benito were interested in the ship’sremains. Martin-Benito had read aboutthe ship in the newspaper prior to comingto the States. When he arrived at the lab tobegin his work, he was excited to have theopportunity to analyze the ship’s samplesand learn about New York City history inthe process.Finding a ship in Manhattan is rare. Thelast such discovery was made in 1982 nearthe South Street Seaport. Like that ship,the one at the World Trade Center site hadlikely been sunk in the late eighteenth orearly nineteenth century when the city useddebris to expand lower Manhattan into theHudson River. The site was close to whatwas once the location of Lindsey’s Wharfand Lake’s Wharf, and it had been leftundisturbed for at least two hundred years;its location was not included in the originalWorld Trade Center towers’ construction.The sizeable remains of the USS Adrian—named after the excavation site manager—and their condition also made this particularfind exciting. Approximately thirty feetof the wooden hull—estimated to be abouthalf of the original—was intact and relativelywell preserved in its encasement ofsludge.Despite the general enthusiasm, Pedersonand Martin-Benito had their concernsregarding the project. In total, 24 sampleswere taken from the keel, keelson, andplanks of the ship; they were likely to be inan extremely unstable state from havinglain in mud for two centuries. Along withthe condition of the samples, Pederson hadquestions about the original condition ofthe ship itself as debris. “If the city decidedto sink a ship into a landfill, something hadto be seriously wrong with it in the firstplace.” Moreover, the ship’s origins wereentirely unknown. If the Adrian had beenbuilt in a part of the world for which notree-ring chronologies have been derived,the study would come to an abrupt anddisappointing end.Luck, however, was on their side. WhenMartin-Benito began examining thesamples, he discovered that they were inexcellent condition and sturdy enough toallow for drying and sanding, making therings clearer to see and record. One samplewas identified as hickory, which meant thewood was from either eastern Asia or easternNorth America. Logic pointed to NorthAmerica, and since the remaining sampleswere oak—the species for which the labhad the best and most extensive chronologies—theproject quickly became a matterof matching a master chronology.Master chronologies are the lab’s recordsof historic tree-ring data from around thecountry, compiled by director and founderDr. Edward Cook over the last few decades.They are the “perfectly dated yearly seriesof tree-ring width” the lab uses to locatesamples in place and time and to tell thestory of regional forests. Like written andoral accounts in history, the collective groupand the individual tell slightly differentstories. “If you have one piece of woodand you want to compare it to a chronology,you could do that,” Pederson explains.“But if you had three or four from the sameforest, you could date those and make amaster chronology by averaging out theLink back to contents page4 Superscript

Pederson, Courtesy of the Lower Manhattan Development CorporationPathologists also studied evidencesuch as the shipworms in the remainsto determine what the shipwas used for and where it traveled.Initial findings pointed to the shipbeing used for trade, possibly alongthe eastern seaboard and in theCaribbean. The recent discovery thissummer of the vessel’s bow, however,has led to another theory: that theship was a British troop carrier.Superscript 5Link back to contents page

Martin-Benito, Courtesy of the LowerManhattan Development CorporationIt was clear the wood ofthe ship came from thePhiladelphia/centralNew Jersey region, andtherefore, most likelyfrom the same forest.They had discovered theplace; next came thequestion of time.Link back to contents pageindividual differences. Trees are like people.Each has a different personality, and whilethey respond differently to changes in theenvironment they have the same generalresponse…If you starve a group of peoplethey get grouchy but by varying degrees.”Each sample from the Adrian offered a“barcode of tree rings that floated in time,”Martin-Benito describes. First the team hadto make a master chronology of the ship,then compare it to the oak masters fromNorth American regions. “It’s such a powerfultechnique, and in a way so simple. Yousee the rings, you see the growth, and youcan gather so much information about atime when no one was measuring anything,when there were no forest records at all.”The lab’s oak chronologies were from themid-Hudson Valley, central New Jersey,and northern New Jersey, among other areas.Looking back on the project, Pedersonis unsure exactly why, beyond instinct orhappenstance, they began with the Philadelphiamaster chronology. But when theymatched the chronologies, the Adrian’s patterns“started to lock in beautifully.” It wasclear the wood of the ship came from thePhiladelphia/central New Jersey region, andtherefore, most likely from the same forest.They had discovered the place; next camethe question of time.No sample of wood from a ship is perfectfor dating. The timber has been carved,shaped, and manipulated for construction,losing the important outer ring that marksa tree’s final year. To complicate matters,the Adrian had slowly deteriorated over thecourse of its time underground, further rottingaway rings. A few of the samples, however,were convexly curved, showing a portionof sub wood, the last set of functionalrings in a tree. Thus, the only rings missingfrom these samples were the last few. Withthis evidence, Martin-Benito and Pedersonwere confident they could date the woodwithin a range of a few years. The last ringof the samples was formed in 1773, so theAdrian’s timber was harvested in the early1770s and the ship was likely built within ayear or two of that date. The Tree-Ring Labsent its report to AKRF and the informationwas added to the conclusions of othersworking to flesh out the ship’s history.The lab’s dating supported the findings ofthe maritime historian studying the Adrian.The ship appeared to be constructed in away that was, as Pederson was told, like “ajigsaw puzzle, less sophisticated or industrializedthan one would find in a ship built ina major urban shipyard.” The constructionof the ship was consistent with rural methods,like those used in smaller shipyardsin central New Jersey. Its rural associationcorroborated the lab’s findings that the timbercame from one forest. Pathologists alsostudied evidence such as the shipwormsin the remains to determine what the shipwas used for and where it traveled. Initialfindings pointed to the ship being used fortrade, possibly along the eastern seaboardand in the Caribbean. The recent discoverythis summer of the vessel’s bow, however,has led to another theory: that the ship wasa British troop carrier. The USS Adrianwas taken to the Maryland ArchaeologicalConservation Laboratory in St. Leonard forpreservation and is now housed at the Centerfor Maritime Archaeology and Conservationat Texas A&M. She will continue to bestudied, adding to our understanding of thebeginnings of commerce and transport inAmerica.The future of the samples at the Tree-Ring Lab will also be productive. The den-6 Superscript

sity of the rings in the samples is notable,and Pederson is looking forward to one daystudying them further to understand betterthe history of the region’s ecology. “Thebeauty of tree rings, for me, is that you takesome samples from a forest, and you canuse them to answer a variety of questionsabout ecology, the climate, how the treesinteract…it really pays off.” The timber’stree-ring data will be added to the Philadelphiamaster chronology, which will in turnbe added to the North American droughtatlas to reconstruct the drought history ofthe region.The discovery of the USS Adrian and thework of Pederson, Martin-Benito, and theirfellow researchers brought the Tree-RingLab a great deal of attention. This interviewwas Pederson’s third on the project. Dendrochronologydoes not usually garner suchinterest. “I think the biggest deal about theproject [for us] was the response people hadwhen the ship was first discovered. Theywere really fascinated and excited, and thatcaught me a little off-guard.” Not only hadit been thirty years since such a discoveryhad been made in Manhattan, but the ship’sconnection with the World Trade Center sitealso increased interest. After the Tree-RingLab was brought to the project, Pedersonvisited the site. “It was surreal to be downin the pit, to look around, and to think ofwhat had been there.” For the public, aneighteenth-century shipwreck may havebeen a welcome and romantic change fromthe memory of more recent happenings atthe site. Whatever the reasons for the ship’ssparking such curiosity and thrill, it is clearthat the Adrian vividly testifies to the layeredhistory of New York City and the ever-evolvinglife of Manhattan.Courtesy of the Lower ManhattanDevelopment CorporationSuperscript 7Link back to contents page

DissertationsColumbia joins other academicLink back to contents page8 Superscript

and the Digital Ageinstitutions in making dissertations available onlineby Salvo Candela, Dissertation Defense and Deposit OfficeWe live in a world where free and instant access todigital information is expected, whether through acomputer, a smartphone, or other device. This expectationof immediate access to online content has influencedour consumption of information, so it should come as no surprisethat a similar demand should have arisen for online accessto academic research.As universities and other research centers have been movingsteadily into the digital age, an increasing number of institutionshave embraced an open-access approach to the online availabilityof scholarly works. Columbia is no exception to this trend. Earlierthis year, the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and ColumbiaUniversity Libraries each adopted formal resolutions callingon faculty, librarians, and other researchers to make papers andjournal articles available through open-access repositories suchas the university’s Academic Commons. The Graduate School ofArts and Sciences took a step in the same direction earlier thisyear by transitioning to an electronic dissertation deposit systemthat makes every Ph.D. dissertation simultaneously available onlinethrough Academic Commons as well as through ProQuest/UMI, the publisher that has provided to date the most prominentdatabase of doctoral dissertations and theses.Superscript 9Link back to contents page

Supporters of open access cite a number of reasons why making work digitallyavailable is beneficial to scholars. Among these are the increase in readershipand in potential citations in other scholars’ research.Traditionally, students completing a Ph.D. degree havebeen required to produce a dissertation that contributesto academic knowledge, and which is made accessible forother scholars to build upon. Before the advent of onlineinformation resources, this public access was achievedthrough bound copies of dissertations made availablethrough university libraries and interlibrary loan, as wellas through microfilm copies accessible through the UMIdissertation abstracts index. Space constraints on libraryshelves, however, forced many universities includingColumbia to store dissertations off-site, where the likelihoodof these volumes being read or cited remained low. Ifthe doctoral dissertation is truly meant to be an open contributionto academic knowledge, the Internet has proven tobe the best vehicle to enable it.An open-access work is one that is digital, availableonline, and free of price barriers such as subscriptionsor licensing fees. Making a work available through openaccess does not require an author to give up copyright onthe work, although some authors do choose to release theirwork without copyright or use a Creative Commons licensethat permits a work to be redistributed, remixed, or builtupon to an extent determined by its author. Early movementsto harness the Internet for open-access archiving ofacademic work led to a series of meetings that took placein Budapest, Bethesda, and Berlin in 2002 and 2003. Theresult of these meetings was a commonly accepted definitionfor open-access content that emphasized freedom fromprice barriers in accessing information and the availabilityof works to all legitimate scholarly uses. In the years sincethese meetings, an increasing number of universities,research institutions, and publishers have embraced whathas come to be called the “BBB definition”—named for thethree cities—in providing open-access services.Supporters of open access cite a number of reasons whymaking work digitally available is beneficial to scholars.Among these are the increase in readership and in potentialcitations in other scholars’ research. According to the OpenAccess Scholarly Information Sourcebook (OASIS), studieshave demonstrated the positive impact that open accesshas on the dissemination of research, including substantialincreases in readership and citations as well as increasedaccess to scholarly work for universities in developing nationswhose budgets do not allow for institutional subscriptionsto traditional journals and databases. At Columbia,another benefit to students completing the dissertation isthe permanent URL assigned to every work made availablein Academic Commons, which enables an always-valid linkto be included in CVs and citations.One concern among doctoral students, particularlythose in the humanities, is that open access may interferewith the future publication of a book based on the dissertation.While opinions on this vary from editor to editor, it iscommonly understood that a book manuscript should bea very different document from a dissertation. The onlinearchiving of a dissertation is unlikely to interfere with thepublication of a book. Professor Stuart M. Shieber, Directorof the Office for Scholarly Communication at HarvardLink back to contents page10 Superscript

One concern among doctoral students...is that open access mayinterfere with the future publication of a book based on a dissertation.University, addressed this issue at the 2011 meeting of theAmerican Historical Association. In his blog The OccasionalPamphlet, Professor Shieber writes, “dissertations are andshould be public documents, disseminated as universitiessee fit to make good on the Ph.D. degree’s promise ofcontributing to human knowledge.” He emphasizes that“even before the advent of the online dissertation repository,dissertations have been publicly available documents,obtainable from the university library and UMI.” With openaccess, only the method of distribution has changed.In recognition, however, that some doctoral studentsmay have a valid reason to place a delay on open-accessavailability, Columbia permits students to request an embargoon their dissertation, which prevents public access tothe work for a predetermined period of time. The embargoallows patents to be processed, forthcoming journal articlesto be published, and—in cases where a student has alreadybeen negotiating with a publisher—forthcoming books tobe printed.The number of open-access policies at universities andother research institutions continues to increase. Accordingto the University of Southampton, which maintains an ongoingdatabase of open-access mandates, over two hundredinstitutions currently require that all scholarly work or atleast all theses and dissertations be made available and openonline. Earlier this summer, a group of twenty-two institutionsincluding Columbia announced the formation of aCoalition of Open Access Policy Institutions with theintention of collaborating and sharing strategies for theimplementation of open-access mandates, bringing attentionto open-access issues, and advocating nationally foropen-access institutions. This coalition will play a major roleat the Berlin 9 Open-Access Conference that is sponsoredpartially by Columbia and taking place in November inWashington, D.C.Columbia doctoral students have been uploading theirdissertations to Academic Commons since the arrival ofelectronic deposit at GSAS earlier this year. The transitionhas been largely a smooth one, and the lowered costs andstreamlined system simplify the overall process and allowsstudents outside New York City to deposit as easily as thoseon campus. As the system grows and open access becomesthe standard in academe, GSAS will continue to providesupport to students, addressing any concerns or questionsabout the procedures that they may have.To Learn More:GSAS will be offering a workshop entitled “Your Dissertation:What You Need to Know about Copyright and ElectronicFiling” on Wednesday, October 26, 2011 at 12:00p.m. in 555 Lerner Hall. This workshop will be presented byKenneth Crews, director of the Copyright Advisory Office,and Robert Hilliker, manager of Academic Commons, andintroduced by Dean Carlos J. Alonso. Dissertations are availablethrough Academic Commons at http://academiccommons.columbia.edu.Superscript 11Link back to contents page

Iva Petkova, former Graduate School Advisory Council (GSAC) Chair, discusses the challenges ofcommunity-building at GSAS and what student government needs to do to overcome them.On The Process of Buildinga Graduate CommunityHow can we build a strong student community at theGraduate School? Who are the relevant constituents ofthis community and what are the organizational effortsin which students should engage to achieve community?When I started my program in sociologyfour years ago, I identified “community”with my department and thePh.D. degree I was pursuing, not onsocial or academic interests outside myprogram of study. At the time, I wasnot cognizant of a graduate governmenton campus or of an interdepartmentalcommunity, but I was interestedin becoming part of one. I learnedabout the Graduate Student AdvisoryCouncil (GSAC) from monthly emailssent by my colleague in sociology, arepresentative of GSAC. Despite theseemails, I never understood GSAC’sexact role until I joined it.I came to GSAC in 2008 as a representativeof my department. In 2009,I was elected Arts & EntertainmentChair. The following year, I becameChair of GSAC – a one-year positionthat leads the council’s steering committee.I have been engaged with communityon campus ever since. I becameLink back to contents page12 Superscript

“It is perhaps not up to the student government to cater to thewishes of every single graduate colleague in hopes of creatinga sense of a unified community. Such a plan would be tantamountto catering to the needs of no one.”a member of the GSAS ExecutiveCommittee; I serve with the StudentAffairs Caucus (SAC) at ColumbiaSenate; and I am on the AlumniBoard of GSAS. I now understandcommunity to encompass all of theseconstituent organizations including,but not limited to, the student government.GSAC is a body of studentelecteddepartmental representativesfrom the 61 Ph.D. and 48 M.A.programs of GSAS. Each representativeis responsible for raisingsystemic issues originating in theirlocal milieu. This is our first role, inwhich, according to our mission, we“facilitate communication betweengraduate students and administratorsin the areas of housing, campusand study space, computer services,health care, and stipends.” This role,I believe, should be expanded toinclude a multi-stakeholder approachto community-building by workingtogether with the dean of GSAS, theSAC and University Senate, and otherprofessional student associationson campus. The active intermediaryposition of GSAC allows us to expandour mission statement in this way,and it is the direction GSAC needs totake in order to be integrated in thegraduate lives of students to the samedegree as students are integrated intheir own graduate programs.We have begun to engage insuch an approach. GSAC holds twostudent seats on the GSAS ExecutiveCommittee, and we gained apermanent student seat on the GSASAlumni Board in June 2011. We alsorecently established the need fordedicated space for graduate studentson campus. Our 2009 Quality of LifeSurvey (QoL) showed that studentsfound lack of space a problem in conductingtheir scholarly work. 62% ofthe respondents—19% of the entireGSAS student population—rated theavailability of space as average to verypoor. An additional 41% noted that,due to the lack of space, they workedfrom home. In response, with thehelp of SAC and Dean Alonso, weproposed a document that called foran interim space for student use.In September 2010, the UniversitySenate adopted a resolution for adedicated Graduate Student Center.The development of an interimgraduate center is now in the works.Space for students is one of the mostsignificant achievements of ourstudent government in recent yearsand an important asset in establishinga stronger community within theschool.Compared to the level of fundingwe receive from student activityfees—roughly $71,000 per annum—GSAC has considerable ambitionsfor the 2011-12 year. Our currentactivities include sponsored eventsand activities, recognition of graduatestudent groups, and partial fundingfor small-scale graduate conferences.These programs were not designedto spearhead community-building,and as a consequence they tend tobe viewed by the student body as anotherchannel for one-off assistancerather than as an evolving set of programsthat are thoughtfully designedto improve life on campus and fosterinterdepartmental community. Interms of events, student governmentis not the sole outlet for students toenjoy themselves in New York, andwe are in competition with the city.Superscript 13Link back to contents page

“One of our problems with building community is a lack of public relations…I have attended two convocations, and many graduates who passed bythe GSAC table set up for the event did not know GSAC was the student government.”One of our problems with buildingcommunity is a lack of public relations.As GSAC chair, I have attendedtwo convocations, and many graduateswho passed by the GSAC table set upfor the event did not know GSAC wasthe student government. We work onvisibility by holding speeches informingincoming and outgoing studentsof GSAC’s role on campus and byissuing monthly e-newsletters to keepstudents abreast of sponsored events,but the problem of visibility persists.I think it is time to consideradding a public relations chair to theGSAC steering committee. This personwould be responsible for increasingawareness of GSAC among studentsand alumni and establishing andmaintaining contact with other studentgovernments on campus, whichmay lead to joint events and programs.The role of GSAC department representativescan also be expandedto increase productivity. Groups ofvolunteers can be assigned to completework between GSAC monthlymeetings on dedicated projects connectedto our major programs suchas the content for our new graduatestudent seminar series and student/alumni interaction. Another obstacleto building community is the need toprovide strong intellectual incentivesfor students to engage in events andprograms. One M.A. student summedthis up well by asking me: “How willI benefit from this?” It is perhaps notup to the student government to caterto the wishes of every single graduatecolleague in hopes of creating a senseof a unified community. Such a planwould be tantamount to catering to theneeds of no one. However, GSAC’sinitiatives have tended to inadvertentlyexclude one major population at theschool: M.A. students. Representationat GSAC is skewed toward Ph.D.students. Our QoL survey was alsooverwhelmingly answered by Ph.D.students (85%). As a result, one M.A.student told me master’s students feelit is “hard to break into communitybuildingactivities,” because eventsare “geared toward Ph.D. students.”Another student noted that there is a“lack of quality events for students” ofthe caliber our peers at other graduateschools enjoy.The conclusion from this M.A.student criticism is that GSAC needsto come up with creative ideas for connectingboth degree populations usingthe budget we currently have. Onesolution is the website Arts4Grads.com, where GSAC presents its socialcalendar. Another is to rekindle theinterest of M.A. and Ph.D. studentsin our biweekly social events. Socialswill be held under the name TEASE(Thursday Evening Arts & ScienceSocial Event) this year, and this summerwe looked into expanding accessto TEASE to include other graduateschools as well. In addition to TEASE,we will launch a new monthly studentseminar series to showcase studenttalent. The series will feature talks bystudents about their research or othertopics about which they are knowledgeable.The series will be videotapedand made available on GSAS andGSAC websites; possible themes mayinclude technology, science, entertainment,design, culture, arts, business,communication, innovation, and politics.A final example of joining relevancyand visibility is the permanentstudent seat on the GSAS AlumniBoard. I asked graduate students howthey view our goals with alumni, andone student’s reply was particularlyapposite. He said that as a community,we should be “forward thinkingenough to understand what GSASalumni relationships will look likein 2065.” Our current ideas includelaunching a regular alumni-sponsoredseries where alumni help studentsdiscover career routes other than theacademic and offer both academic andprofessional advice. Such events couldmotivate us, future alums, to contributeto our school in the future as wewalk in the footsteps of those who successfullymade their way forward aftergraduation.As I look back at our graduategovernment in action, I think that wehave gained a tremendous amount ofknowledge about the needs of our studentbody. We have worked hard andsucceeded in communicating thoseneeds to the school’s administration.We now need to focus on communicationswith students and alumni.We look forward to firm and prosperouscollaborations in the future, withwhich we will continue to build programsaround community and developinstruments to gauge the success oftheir implementation.Link back to contents page14 Superscript

Link back to contents page16 Superscript

new yorkstate’smarriageequality actROUNDTABLE FACULTY SHARE THEIR VIEWS ON CURRENT EVENTSOn June 24, 2011, New York became the sixthand largest state in the country to legalizesame-sex marriage. A similar effort in Albanyfailed in 2009. This year, support for the issue wasled by Governor Andrew Cuomo whose top aidecoordinated the efforts of local gay-rightsorganizations in a campaign leading up to thevote. The Senate, dominated by Republicans,allowed for a full vote on the act, and each memberwas left to vote according to his or her conscience.In the end, four Republicans joined all butone Democrat in support of the measure and thebill passed 33 to 29.Three faculty members provide to Superscripttheir perspectives on the Marriage EqualityAct and same-sex marriage in New York and thenation. Randall Balmer is the Ann Whitney OlinProfessor of American religious history. He is anadvisory editor for Christianity Today, and his workhas appeared in scholarly journals, in the popularpress, and on PBS. Justin Phillips, Associate Professorof Political Science, studies American state andurban politics, and his current projects analyze theeffects of public opinion on sub-national policymakingand the power of governors in negotiationswith legislatures. Professor Robert Shapiro,Political Science, is advisory committee chair forPublic Opinion Quarterly and previously served asPresident of the New York Chapter of the AmericanAssociation for Public Opinion Research. Hiscurrent work focuses on partisan polarization andideological politics in the United States.Superscript 17Link back to contents page

What differed this year in Albany that led to the passage of the MarriageEquality Act compared to 2009 or to similar recent efforts in other statesthat failed?Balmer: Aside from the particular—and often peculiar—politics ofthe New York Assembly, I think that the attitude of Americans has, ingeneral, changed dramatically. Just as it is no longer okay in the eyes ofmost Americans to be anti-Semitic, anti-Catholic, or racist, it is no longeracceptable to be homophobic, at least not openly so. The legislatorsin New York were merely reflecting that change.BalmerPhillips: For me, the biggest difference was Governor Cuomo. In 2009,legislation legalizing same-sex marriage was championed by a relativelyineffective and unpopular governor. By 2011, that had changed. Cuomowas a very effective advocate and he worked hard to get Republicans inthe state senate to bring the marriage bill to the floor.How significant do you feel the addition of New York as a same-sex marriagestate is to the national picture of religion and politics?PhillipsPhillips: The adoption of same-sex marriage in New York is quite significant.The state contains a large portion of the country’s gay and lesbiancouples, and these individuals will now have access to important legalprotections. Beyond these very real benefits, the adoption of marriageequality in New York is a symbolic victory given the state’s importanceas a cultural center and media hub. The process by which same-sex marriagewas adopted is also significant—it occurred via legislative actionas opposed to being imposed by the courts. Success here may containimportant lessons for other states with governors advocating similarlegislation, such as Maryland and Rhode Island.Shapiro: It is symbolically significant given New York’s national status.The numbers of gays who will marry here will move same-sex marriagetoward becoming an acceptable norm.ShapiroThe law passed, in part, because certain Republican senators voted againstconservative lines. What does this show about the state and function ofparty politics and ideology? Could such a “vote of conscience” be possible atthe federal level?Shapiro: There were New York Republicans who tended toward beingmore moderate in this case compared to Republicans at the nationallevel who face public and electoral pressure. Nationally, it will take thetrend toward gay marriage becoming more prevalent, posing less of amoral threat, to enable other Republicans and conservatives to take sucha vote of conscience, so to speak.Link back to contents page18 Superscript

What does the passage of the act indicate about public opinion and its influence onpolitics?Phillips: Over the past fifteen years public support of same-sex marriage hasbeen steadily increasing. Indeed, some polls now show a slim national majorityin favor of marriage equality. Political science research shows that there is astrong relationship between public opinion and policy on gay rights issues—aspublic support increases, states, localities, and even the federal government aremore likely to adopt policies that establish legal protections for gays and lesbians.However, this relationship is not perfect. It often requires large majoritiesin favor of gay rights before governments will act.What role does same-sex marriage play in current American politics?Balmer: I think same-sex marriage is the next iteration of civil rights in thecountry. My sense of American history is that Americans always rise to theirbetter selves, to the principles of equal rights and opportunity.I think same-sexmarriage is the nextiteration of civil rights inthe country. My sense ofAmerican history is thatAmericans always rise totheir better selves, to theprinciples of equal rightsand opportunity.What does the passage of the act mean for the state of marriage in the UnitedStates? What does it mean for religion and religious practices?Shapiro: It means more marriages and married couples with children as well asmore divorces. Religion will play less of a role, proportionally, in the performingof marriages. Formal religions may have to reconsider their rules and practicesif they want to have authority in affecting family values, with “family” broadenedin its definition.Phillips: I think the adoption of same-sex marriage will have no impact on religiouspractices in the state.Do you think the passage of the act will play a role in the 2012 elections?Shapiro: It will be useful to watch what happens with ballot initiatives andconstitutional amendment proposals in individual states. In the next year,Democratic candidates and the party could use this issue as a voter mobilizationvehicle to get out the vote among those less thrilled with Democrats’ workwith the economy and other recent issues. Republicans may do the same ontheir side. This will, however, be a lesser national issue in 2012 because of theprecarious state of the national economy, serious developments abroad, and thefuture of health-care reform.Phillips: I agree that same-sex marriage will be a fairly minor issue in 2012,especially in regards to the presidential election. Economic issues and concernsover the growing national debt will dominate that election. This does not meansame-sex marriage will be entirely absent, but cultural issues will take a backseat to economic ones next year.Superscript 19Link back to contents page

When Intellect MeetsLink back to contents page20 Superscript

Emotion THE ACADEMIC STUDY OF9/11 AND ITS IMPACT ONSUBJECT AND RESEARCHERby Kristin BalickiThe tenth anniversary of September 11, 2001 brought withit countless hours of television specials, documentaries,political commentary, and public commemorations andmemorials. Individuals reflected, or mourned, while politiciansand the media reminded everyone not to forget. In such anemotionally charged atmosphere, what is the place of academic research?Research aims for dispassionate examination, not emotionalreaction. What does it mean to study 9/11? How is such a subject managed?To answer these questions, Superscript spoke with faculty andresearchers at the Graduate School to ask them how they navigatedthe minefield of grief and anger connected to the subject of September11th and how their work corresponds to the national discourse.Superscript 21Link back to contents page

the towers collapsed. Furthermore, large organizations like theRed Cross had no models for urban disasters. Local grassrootsorganizations, in contrast, were effective. For example, SafeHorizons, a network of city services for battered women, wasone of the most productive due to its connection to resourcesthroughout the city and experience in quickly responding tobasic needs like housing and money.After the Response and Recovery Project had begun, Clarkstarted to think about the possible role oral history could playbeyond documentation alone. Inspired by Elders Share theArts, an organization that brings collected stories from elderlycommunities to artists for scripting and staging, Clark beganthe Telling Lives Project. “There is a value to the act of tellinglives back to the people who told them as a means to strengthentheir capacity to share their stories...” Two of Clark’s interviewers,Gerry Albarelli and Amy Starecheski, took the projectinto city schools in Chinatown to teach students the life storiesof people who survived other difficult times in history.The Telling Lives project was, in many ways, a response tothe lessons interviewers learned when working with a subject’ssuffering. The initial goal of the first project, Narrativeand Memory, was to record full life stories, but it was clearduring interviews that that could not happen in the immediateaftermath of 9/11. “We didn’t know at first that it was literallyimpossible for people to form a story about their lives in relationto 9/11 because their exposure to raw trauma preventedthem from doing anything more than narrating what actuallyhappened [that day].” The interviews became on outlet for peopleto share their more harrowing stories. Such a response wasnew for Clark. Oral histories are often collected in retrospect,long after events occurred and interviewees have processedtheir experiences. The 9/11 projects, in contrast, were recordedonly weeks and months after the attack.The Narrative and Memory Project was a longitudinalstudy, so it consisted of two rounds of interviews. In the first,people discussed their 9/11 experiences. Eighteen months (ormore) later, subjects were encouraged to discuss their experiencessince September 11th and their life stories in general.Each second interview began with “How have you been sincewe last met?” Thus, people could avoid the subject of 9/11 ifthey wished and had the opportunity to talk instead about whatwas on their mind at the time. It was now 2003 and 2004.Time had passed, the war in Iraq had begun, and people hadcontinued their lives. “Often something more important hadhappened to people other than 9/11,” Clark explains. “As oneman said to us, ‘I’m so glad you didn’t ask about 9/11, becausemy wife is battling brain cancer and 9/11 was nothing comparedto this. If you asked me about 9/11, I would have left theroom.’”For the second interviews, Clark also asked for assistanceSuperscript 23Link back to contents page

When she began interviewingtherapists, one ofSeeley’s first observationswas their struggle to properlylabel their patients’suffering. Existing psychiatriccategories did notfully capture it.Professor Karen Seeleyfrom Marylene Cloitre, a research and clinical psychologistand trauma specialist at NYU. Cloitre brought to the projecta team of psychologists who advised on interview techniquesand provided professional services to subjects and researcherswhen needed. Sometimes, however, their services as therapistswere not wanted. Many interviewees were willing to talk withthe oral historians because they were not psychologists. Clarkcould understand that reaction. “Human suffering precedesand supersedes medical diagnosis. It can’t be fully expressed.”Who Counselsthe Counselors?Practicing psychotherapist and anthropology professor KarenSeeley was not a trauma specialist when she began her 9/11-relatedresearch. In fact, she didn’t want to research September11th at all. “My first instinct was to find some distance.” In2002, however, Columbia sociologist David Stark contactedher. He was completing a study of the response to 9/11 in thecity and wished to include specific occupational groups (seepage 26). He asked if Seeley would be interested in studyingtherapists and their post-9/11 work.When she began interviewing therapists, one of Seeley’sfirst observations was their struggle to properly label theirpatients’ suffering. Existing psychiatric categories did not fullycapture it. “There was a general consensus that [Post-TraumaticStress Disorder (PTSD)] was the closest thing psychiatryhad to offer” in terms of defining what was happening. PTSDrequires the existence of an external event in order to be diagnosed,and 9/11 fit the bill for many New Yorkers. PTSD, however,was not included in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manualof Mental Disorders until 1980, and many of the therapistsSeeley was interviewing had no training or experience with it.Before September 11th, few therapists specialized in trauma.Though Seeley thought that “PTSD may not have been themost appropriate way to categorize what people felt after 9/11,therapists started to take crash courses in trauma just to try toget a sense of what it was and how to treat it.”Seeley also found that therapists were struggling with morethan their professional ability to address patient trauma. Theywere struggling with trauma themselves. “I anticipated thattherapists would have processed their personal reactions to9/11. I was surprised to see how desperate many of them wereto talk…about what they were going through [in their personaland professional lives]. They were having very powerful reactionsto their work that they couldn’t quite get a handle on.”For many of the therapists, meeting with Seeley was the firstopportunity they had in over a year to reflect on their own ex-Link back to contents page24 Superscript

periences. They had been working nonstop since 9/11, makingthemselves available to communities and individuals in needsuch as first responders and the newly widowed. Seeley sawthat many therapists had not expected their own distress toescalate when they listened to patients’ stories.This type of professional reaction was new to Seeley.Her previous work had focused on cultural psychotherapy,the study of culture’s influence in therapy and how emotionand cognition vary in different cultural settings. Differencesbetween patient and therapist can provide a buffer betweenthem. “When therapists’ work is emotionally taxing, onething that helps them stay grounded is an awareness of theboundary between themselves and their patients.” This wasnot possible for therapists who lived and worked in New YorkCity and had directly experienced 9/11. The event produced arare instance of simultaneous trauma, where therapists wereharmed by the same event that injured patients.Graphic images that patients described during sessionsstayed in therapists’ minds. Some therapists had sufferedlosses of their own or had offices downtown or near the siteof the attack. Many went to work with the smell of the destructionin the air, walking past missing person flyers. Theexperience began to take a toll. Some suffered fatigue or lackof motivation to listen during sessions, or began to experiencethe same nightmares and fears of their patients. Many decidedagainst going into therapy themselves. “They did not wantto traumatize someone else. They did not want it to spread.”Often, when talking to Seeley, they would censor themselves,sparing her images and details.Research and ResearcherDespite these precautions, Seeley began to experience a formof secondary trauma through her research. During her interviewsin 2002 and 2003 and throughout the writing of herbook—Therapy After Terror: 9/11, Psychotherapists, and MentalHealth (2008)—she “couldn’t get away from 9/11. It really affectedmy perceptions of it.” One day, after interviewing threetherapists, she arrived to interview the fourth and the therapisttold her, “You look traumatized.” It was then that Seeleydecided to slow the pace of her research, allowing herself morespace from the subject. “It was too much to have in my mind.”Clark, too, found the emotional impact of her oral historywork challenging. “I didn’t know how I could be analyticalwhile recording people’s grieving.” She remembers oralhistorian Alessandro Portelli offering her advice. “He said,Superscript 25Link back to contents page

Citizen SociologistsDavid Stark, ArthurLehman Professorof Sociologyand InternationalAffairs, was in themidst of fieldworkstudying traders atthe World Financial Center on September11, 2001. On the day itself, he and DanielBeunza, a graduate student working withhim, decided to stay on campus to discussthe project instead of heading downtown.When the WFC was destroyed, Starkassumed their work had come to anindefinite end. He waited until tradingresumed six days later to call his contactat the company, now operating in NewJersey, and ask if everyone was all right.When Stark said he would call againafter time had passed, his contact quicklyreplied, “No, you won’t.” He insistedStark and Beunza resume their researchimmediately. He told Stark that theymust “witness what was going on in therecovery room in New Jersey. We werethe only social scientists working in [theWFC then], and he told me that it wasof historical importance.” Being invitedinto a community at such a time was “thehighest honor to an ethnographer.”The uniqueness of the situationyielded questions and observations Starkwould not have come across otherwise.In the end, his research with the tradersfocused on recovery as a form of innovationwithin an organization. “Recovery isa response to extreme uncertainty,” and itrequires a group of people to respond tochallenge in new ways. It quickly becameclear to Stark and his students that suchinnovation was not confined to organizationsalone. It could be studied in allof lower Manhattan. Stark recalls oneevening in October 2001 when he and hiswife and fellow social scientist MoniqueGirard hosted a dinner with students,and Girard declared that the “time forgiving blood was over. We were socialscientists, and we needed to use our workto do something for the city.” It was a callto arms. Several students halted work ontheir dissertations and Stark and his wifeset aside projects in order to study theresponse and recovery efforts in the city.Stark remembers thinking, “We are here.There are important lessons to learn, andwe have to do this. It was an extension ofour understanding of what it meant to bea social scientist in New York at that time.We had to respond ourselves and takeresponsibility as citizens.”Their research focused on forms of,in Stark’s words, “public assemblies”—such as not-for-profit organizations, largecompanies, select professions, and publicdemonstrations—operating in downtown‘You can’t move around suffering. You have to move throughit. You have to acknowledge it before you can analyze it.’” Inretrospect, Clark is glad to have brought the NYU psychologistteam to the Narrative and Memory Project in its laterdevelopment. After a year of recording stories, the work hadbegun to wear on the interviewers and the offer of free therapysessions became a necessary resource. “It was a relief to me tohave someone to call if something happened in the field that Ineeded to talk about.”Despite its emotional impact, Seeley believes trauma studyis helpful to her work as an anthropologist and psychotherapist.“People’s subjectivities are important. It is very dangerouswhen we only look at disasters in a distanced or clinical way.I don’t think you have to take the emotion out of academicwork. Instead, we need to find ways to put emotion back in sowe can better understand what happens to those who experiencetraumatic events and to those who study them.” However,there is a balance between being open to emotion andtaking in too much. Seeley now teaches a course on trauma.While she encourages students not to shy away from traumastudy, she also warns that students with trauma in their backgroundshould take care if they decide to remain in the class.Like Seeley, Clark feels that emotion is necessary for theintegrity of research. It is not possible to separate oneself fromthe emotion of the work, and one should not wish to do so. “Apart of oral history is to not make that divorce. We will alwaysrespect the suffering of people and at the same time be able tostand back and use our brains to analyze.”Time is also beneficial. “It takes time to make meaning,”explains Clark. “Oral history is a process, not a product.” TheSeptember 11, 2001 oral history archives have been openfor more than a year. They have been used by students andresearchers, but their existence has remained relatively quiet.This may change after they are officially opened and Clark andLink back to contents page26 Superscript

Manhattan or involved in the recovery andreconstruction of the area. The researchdemonstrated that the process of reconstructionhad as much influence in reshapingthe public sphere in lower Manhattanas the final constructed product itself.Stark described the project as the “sociologyof collaborative production.”In spring 2002, Girard and Starkorganized a conference at Columbia withthe architecture studios and urban plannersthat were proposing plans to the cityto discuss publicly the development oflower Manhattan and what could be doneto redefine the downtown district. This ledto another study on the use of technologiesin social assemblies, and how PowerPointin particular was used as a tool for publicpersuasion at events such as the firstarchitectural competition for the designon the new World Trade Center site. Thisyear, Girard and Stark collaborated withReinhold Martin of the Graduate School ofArchitecture, Planning and Preservationon an exhibit highlighting their projectarchive. The exhibit opened September 12in Columbia’s Avery Hall.Stark does research on organizationsand their search for meaning and value.His time studying the response to September11th was unplanned and sometimeschallenging, but when he discusses it onecan sense that he feels honored by theopportunity. He got to see “democracy inaction and an outpouring of creativity thatcame from New Yorkers as they respondedto and recovered from the event.” Whenasked what he learned from his September11th work, Stark explains that the lesson hecarries with him is the positive impact thatparticipatory endeavors can have.Bearman release their new book this month. After the Fall: NewYorkers Remember September 2001 and the Years That Followed(The New Press) features nineteen stories from the projects.For some who have worked in the archives, the experienceof listening to interviews mirrors the experiences of theinterviewers who recorded them. Oral History M.A. alumnaEllen Klemme focused her thesis on the interviews of two firstresponderparamedics. Before coming to Columbia, Klemmewas an emergency medical technician, and as a student wasinterested in the role of memory in the work of a paramedic.Like the interviewers, she also had difficulty processinginformation without ingesting it. “Listening to the interviewswas very challenging. My head was simultaneously in 2001and in the present. [There were] moments…when I was pulledbetween 2001 and 2010 too quickly or when what the paramedicssaid stuck with me for too long and haunted me in myday-to-day life.” Overall, however, Klemme was not troubled bythis effect because it was true to the work. “The interviews arenot intended to create sound bites. They are human conversations.”jHistory is more than sound bites, and research is not withoutemotion. It can be driven by it, ultimately served by it. By notsteering away from emotion—their subjects’ or their own,Clark and Seeley approached the subject of 9/11 in an organicway, incorporating the complexities and contradictions thatmade up people’s experience of September 11th in New YorkCity. Their work complicates the national narrative of 9/11to the benefit of understanding more fully what happenedon that day and on the days that followed. Staying true tocomplexity increases understanding, and understanding is asimportant as remembering.Superscript 27Link back to contents page

Graduate School of Arts & Sciences | Alumni NewsCONTENTS30 The Mutual Benefits of Mentoring32 Alumni Profiles36 On the Shelf: Faculty Publications38 On the Shelf: Alumni Publications39 Dissertations44 Announcements46 Alumni Awards48 Helpful LinksLink back to contents page28 Superscript

“I became involved to give back to acommunity that gave me so much.”—Bridget Rowan ’80M.A. in English and Comparative Literature“Involvement in the AlumniAssociation has opened my eyes to theresourcefulness of Columbia’sJoin theprofessors and students.”conversationGSAS graduates are getting involved with Columbia. Here’s how:—Inge Reist ’85Ph.D. in Art History and ArchaeologyATTEND events to expand your mind and your circle of friendsDIG IN to library research servicesLOG IN to online career networks, job boards, and careersupport from CCEFIND discount tickets and special access to shows from CAALPAY LESS for insurance, prescriptions, and computersMENTOR, volunteer, and give backGIVE to provide financial aid to graduate studentsVisit alumni.columbia.edu/login-help to update your information.Then watch your inbox—we’ll keep you posted!Graduate School of Arts and SciencesAlumni AssociationSuperscript 29Link back to contents page

The Mutual Benefitsof Mentoringby Ruth Longobardi and Rani RoyCenter for Career Education Graduate Student Career DevelopmentGraduate School of Arts and Sciences alumnihave been an increasingly integral part of the Columbia community in recent years. Atthe Center for Career Education (CCE), we find that alumni have not only played anactive role during these difficult economic times, but that their participation has beenimpactful and beneficial for students and fellow alumni both. Several years ago, as theeconomy began to wreak havoc with students’ plans for employment, our Hire Columbiansinitiative asked alumni to reach out to their fellow graduates when searching foremployees and to hire Columbians looking for jobs and internships. This initiativefocused on the many ways in which alumni could help students or other alumni findjobs, but it also asked that alumni take time to connect with students, to mentor them,and to provide advice as they began to build their careers.CCE’s focus on building connections between alumni and students is supportedby career development research dating back thirty years that shows that mentorship–direct engagement with students and young professionals with respect to their careers– pays dividends for students and alumni alike. Educause, a higher education professionalorganization, reports that mentoring provides enhanced career development,retention, and compensation for the mentee, and also encourages a greater degree ofcareer satisfaction for the mentor. Mentoring is a collaboration, a mutually beneficialevolving relationship whose advantages for mentees can be tangible, such as providinggreater career opportunities; or more abstract, such as building confidence and insight.For mentors, the interaction allows for opportunities to recognize abilities in individualswith less exposure, which can result in diversifying talent and fostering a fertileenvironment for the fresh viewpoints necessary for academic and business success.Professional mentoring is especially valuable in today’s job market. While the advisorstudentrelationship requisite for graduate study provides a mentoring relationshipaimed at academic employment, professional mentoring proves a means of nurturingproductive careers outside of academia at a time when the number of full-time facultypositions is shrinking.Link back to contents page30 Superscript

Alumni interested in connecting (or reconnecting) withthe Columbia community can participate in CCE’snetworking and alumni events: information sessions,alumni panels, professional-in-residence opportunities,and on-campus recruiting efforts.Because of the condition of job markets withinand without academe, the need for mentorship on theColumbia campus has never been more pronounced. Assuch, the number of opportunities for alumni to get involvedas mentors is growing. Alumni interested in connecting(or reconnecting) with the Columbia communitycan participate in CCE’s networking and alumni events:information sessions, alumni panels, professional-inresidenceopportunities, and on-campus recruiting efforts.Alumni can also submit a career profile to the CCEwebsite or make themselves available for emails andrequests for information sent by Columbia students andgraduates. Students frequently ask whether alumni willbe annoyed by such communications, and the answer isa resounding no. A majority of emails are answered andinformational interviews granted.The availability of social media also makes differentstyles of mentoring readily available. Today’s web culturehas vastly changed the traditional mentor/mentee relationship.Where mentees might once have sought a singlementor in their field, new social networks have givenrise to a growing sense of community where studentshave a forum to find information and solicit advice fromlarge groups of professionals. Our efforts to enhance socialnetworking at CCE have focused in part on LinkedInas a means of building a professional online community.There are LinkedIn groups that all Columbia studentsand alumni may join, including the Columbia AlumniAssociation (now over 19,000 members) and the rapidlygrowing Columbia Career Connections, which wasintroduced in July and has over 1,000 members thusfar. Jill Galas Hickey, Director of Programming at CCE,suggests that Columbia Career Connections is “an idealway for members to connect with other Columbians associatedwith an especially broad range of industries toengage in wide-ranging discussions, to locate jobs, andto schedule informational interviews.”Finally, for students and alumni looking for mentorshipopportunities, there are opportunities beyondCCE and the Internet. Numerous companies matchnew employees with professionals in official mentoringprograms, and professional associations in many fieldsprovide mentoring opportunities, as do formal mentornetworks such as MentorNet. There are also a variety ofmentoring programs run through the University, includingVirtual Mentor at GSAS.Mentorship is a concept that embraces several typesand styles of engagement, but one of the most importantaspects of the mentoring relationship, no matter whatthe approach, is inspiration. The building of a professionalrelationship in which collaborative practices anddiscussions are central brings with it long-lasting benefitsand deeper insight into new perspectives and directionsfor everyone involved.To learn more or to get involved, visit the Center forCareer Education alumni website athttp://www.careereducation.columbia.edu/alumni.Superscript 31Link back to contents page

Alumni ProfilesGSAS catches up with some of the school’s alumniShahram HashemiHuman Rights Studies M.A., 2007What are you doing now?I am currently the Executive Director ofStudent World Assembly, a grassrootsinternational student organization dedicatedto promoting democratic values,human rights, and youth leadership.I am also on the Board of Directors ofAmnesty International USA and haveserved as its Treasurer since 2008.Why did you choose yourdegree program andColumbia?I had been actively involved in humanrights and political activism since Icame to the U.S. from Iran over tenyears ago, and I founded a chapterof Amnesty International at my undergraduatecollege. I heard about ahuman rights program at Columbiathrough a mentor and was attracted tothe program because of the university’sreputation and the program’s combinationof flexibility and focus. My degreewas specialized in economic development,but I was able to take a broadrange of courses from other schoolswithin the university and expose myselfto many facets of human rights anddevelopment issues.What was your research focus?My thesis was a socio-political examinationof Iranian history told throughthe prism of three generations of myfamily. By providing narratives withina broader context of Iranian politics,economics, and society, I shed lighton some of Iran’s history and currentnational challenges.What did you most and leastenjoy about your time as astudent at the Graduate School?In the Human Rights Studies program,and among other graduate students,there was a breadth of knowledge fromdifferent fields and areas of researchwhich made classes stimulating. Itwas much more interesting in class todiscuss refugee issues in Sudan whena student had lived there for a few yearsworking for a humanitarian agency andcould bring his experiences to bear onthe conversation. The professors werealso very supportive.What I liked least was the confusionand red tape surrounding courseregistration and the lack of fundingavailable to international master’sstudents.What career paths have you takensince graduation?After graduation, I began my workas Executive Director at the StudentWorld Assembly (SWA). I met thefounder at one of their meetings inNew York City a few months prior,and his vision of establishing the firstinternational organization for studentsbuilt around activism and leadershipresonated with me. As a young personin Iran, it would have been enormouslyhelpful to connect with other youngpeople in order to communicate andbe more effective.At Amnesty International, I found asignificant amount of space for students,and I ran for the Board in mylast year at Columbia.How have you applied yourdegree work to your career developmentand job?Before I attended the Human RightsStudies program, I abstractly understoodhuman rights and economicdevelopment. I didn’t know theirmany legal and normative componentsand the questions surrounding theirimplementation. I was able to develop akeener sense of these issues, andLink back to contents page32 Superscript

I’ve applied it to my work to developmore effective ways to advocate forhuman rights. The program also gaveme the language to frame many humanrights issues, which is critical when Iam applying for grants.What is the most satisfying andchallenging aspect of your currentjob?It has been enormously rewarding towork with students and see how effectivethey can be in bringing about socialchange. Students at SWA have establishedchapters all over the world, evenin countries where the government isopposed to any form of civil society.These students come up with fantasticways to raise awareness for causesand to have a positive impact on theircommunities. It is a constant source ofinspiration to me.We are now working on a projectto raise awareness of the civil rightscomponent of the Arab Spring and therole of young people. With this projectand others, the greatest challenge israising funds, especially in the currenteconomy.Have you found your fieldsurprising in any way?I think many people find the humanrights field extremely competitive andfrustrating. There are many forcesagainst you, whether it is governmentor bureaucratic red tape. Sometimesyou find yourself discussing whatseems like trivial details when theissues at hand are so important, butthat’s just politics.If you could give advice to currentstudents, what would it be?Take courses that relate to the issuesyou will face in your career and thatgive you some type of marketable skill,because graduate school is about honingin on an expertise or specific skillset. Also, attend as many events on andoff campus as you can to expand yournetwork, build relationships with mentors,and take advantage of the largeamount of resources and expertiseavailable to you.What are your futurecareer plans?I would like to go back to school in thenear future for a law degree or Ph.D. inMiddle Eastern politics.Superscript 33Link back to contents page

Alumni ProfilesGSAS catches up with some of the school’s alumniAri BuchalterAstronomy Ph.D., 1999What are you doing now?I am currently Chief Operating Officerof MediaMath, a digital media technologycompany. Our platform helps advertisersand agencies figure out wherethey should buy ads and how to pay forthem, execute the buy, and analyze theresults. I also advise a number of technologystartups in the New York area.Why did you choose your degreeprogram and Columbia?After completing my undergraduatestudies in physics at Stanford University,I took a year off to work part-time,travel, and generally see if the worldcould dissuade me from my long-timeinterest in pursuing a graduate degreein astrophysics. It couldn’t. So when itcame time to apply to programs, I wasdriven by two factors: first, wanting atop-tier program, and second, wantingto be closer to New York City, myhometown. Columbia was the obviouschoice.What was your research focus?My Ph.D. research was in theoreticalcosmology—understanding theorigin of the universe. There werethree different areas of investigation:describing the statistics of how matterin the universe evolved from a relativelysmooth distribution to the structureddistribution we see today; improvingan observational test of the expansionof the universe that used a type of radiogalaxy as a unit for measuring distance;and identifying large-scale clusters ofgalaxies from data from a radio surveyof the sky. After my degree, I pursueda postdoctoral fellowship in theoreticalastrophysics at Caltech, where I did researchon the formation and evolutionof galaxies and on the properties of cosmicmicrowave background radiation.What did you like most and leastabout your time as a student atthe Graduate School?I enjoyed having the latitude to workon a wide range of research topics thatinterested me, and the chance to do sowith brilliant and supportive faculty.I didn’t mind the trips to Sicily or theFrench Alps for conferences, either.I enjoyed the subway ride least,given that I lived downtown.How did you get into yourcurrent field?When I finished my Ph.D., I had everyintention of continuing on the traditionalacademic path from a postdoc ortwo to tenure and a full professorship.A year into my postdoc, the financialmarkets were booming, and I developedan interest in financial derivativesmodeling. At first it was a purely mathematicalinterest, but as I started toapply it in practice as a part-time trader,I met with success.I decided a few months later to starta small hedge fund, which I ran whilepursuing my postdoctoral studies. Itwas invaluable experience in startingand running a business and it openedmy eyes to the worlds of finance andbusiness. After much deliberation, Idecided to explore it further, leavingacademia and the hedge fund behindto apply for quantitative trading positionsat various investment banks. I wasoffered a job as a general consultant. Inmy work, I found myself drawn to media.I spent a majority of my years workingin the media practice with a focuson digital media, innovation, marketinganalytics, and consumer marketingstrategy.After nearly a decade working atlarge- and medium-sized companies,I decided to join a friend who waslaunching a new technology startup—MediaMath—which seemed like theperfect chance to blend the skills I haddeveloped over the prior decade.Link back to contents page34 Superscript

How have you applied your degreework to your career developmentand current position?The business world, and marketingin particular, is increasingly beingdriven by data and analytics, so a strongquantitative background is a uniqueand valuable asset. A few years into mytime as a consultant, I started to explorethe application of advanced quantitativemethods to business problems suchas customer segmentation and predictivemodeling of consumer behavior.I found that I not only enjoyed it butwas valued for the ability to “bridge thegap” between designing and buildingapproaches and putting them to practicalapplication while explaining them tonon-technical audiences.In my current job, I’ve also put myquantitative skills to use by designingour bid optimization algorithm that determineshow much advertisers shouldbid on different types of ads based onthe data associated with those ads andeach advertiser’s goals.Have you found your field surprisingin any way?The things that drive success in thebusiness world are different from whatdrives success in academia. In theacademic world, research success oftencomes from applying highly specializedknowledge and skills to a very specificaspect of a discipline to discover somethingoriginal. The business world isless about originality and more aboutimpact. Decisions have to be madequickly and often on little to no data,and much of achievement hinges onpractical judgment, common sense,and people skills.What are the most challengingand most satisfying aspects ofyour work?What I enjoy most is working witha highly talented team in a dynamicsector of the market. There’s a sense ofelectricity. We’re building somethingthat could be big, that could change theway marketing is done. The most challengingis prioritizing in a fast-movingmarket.If you could give advice to currentstudents, what would it be?Don’t plan more than two years ahead.Plan to spend the next two years doingsomething you enjoy and are excitedabout, and do a great job at it. Build astrong network of contacts, colleagues,and mentors. Opportunities presentthemselves to people who arepassionate, talented, and plugged intothe world around them.Superscript 35Link back to contents page

On the ShelfFACULTY PUBLICATIONSFrom Financial Crisis to Global RecoveryPadma Desai, Economics | Columbia University PressIn this book, Professor Desai makes the complexitiesof economic policy and financial reformaccessible to a wide audience. Merging narrativewith scholarly research, she begins with a systematicbreakdown of the factors leading to America’s recentrecession, describing the monetary policy, tax practices,subprime mortgage scandals, and lax regulationthat contributed to the crisis. Desai follows with ananalysis of stress tests and other economic measuresand offers a frank assessment on whether the U.S.economy is on the mend.Selling Fear: Counterterrorism,the Media, and Public OpinionBrigitte Nacos and Robert Shapiro, Political Science;and Yaeli Bloch-Elkon, Institute for Socialand Economic Research and Policy | University ofChicago PressDrawing on an in-depth analysis of counterterrorismin the years after 9/11, the authorspresent the case that the Bush administrationhyped fear while obscuring civil liberties abuses andissues of preparedness. The media, meanwhile, largelyabdicated their watchdog role, choosing to amplify theadministration’s message while downplaying issuesthat might have called the administration’s statementsand strategies into question.PHYSICS OFSolar EnergyC. JULIAN CHENLink back to contents page36 Superscript

After Tobacco: What Would Happen If AmericansStopped SmokingEdited by Peter Bearman, Sociology; Kathryn Neckerman;and Leslie Wright | Columbia University PressThis book considers the economic impact of reducingsmoking rates on tobacco farmers, cigarettefactory workers, the southeastern regionaleconomy, state governments, tobacco retailers, thehospitality industry, and nonprofit organizations whomight benefit from the industry’s philanthropy. It alsoweighs how reduction in smoking will affect mortalityrates, medical costs, and Social Security and considersthe implications of more rigid tobacco control policy.Physics of Solar EnergyC. Julian Chen, Applied Physics | John Wiley & SonsIn recent years, the world has been calling for anenergy revolution. The renewable energy industrywill drive an expansion of the global economy andcreate more “green” jobs. Solar energy offers a ubiquitous,inexhaustible, clean, and highly efficient way ofmeeting the energy needs of the twenty-first century.This book is designed to give the reader solid footingin the general and basic physics of solar energy, whichwill be the basis of research and development infuture solar engineering.No Return, No Refuge:Rites and Rights in Minority RepatriationElazar Barkan, Institute for the Study of HumanRights; and Howard Adelman | Columbia UniversityPressReviewing cases of ethnic displacement throughoutthe twentieth century in Europe, Asia,and Africa, Adelman and Barkan discuss howthe emphasis on repatriation during the last severaldecades has obscured other options, leaving refugeesin camps for years. Rather than perpetuate a belief inreturn as a right without the prospect of realization,the authors call for solutions that bracket return as aprimary focus in cases of ethnic conflict.Superscript 37Link back to contents page

On the ShelfALUMNI PUBLICATIONSThe New Global Rulers: The Privatization of Regulationin the World EconomyTim Büthe, Political Science Ph.D. (2002), and WalterMattli | Princeton University PressBüthe and Mattli examine the political processin three powerful global private regulators: theInternational Accounting Standards Board, theInternational Organization for Standardization, andthe International Electrotechnical Commission. Theauthors offer both a new framework for understandingglobal private regulation and detailed empiricalanalyses of such regulation based on multi-country,multi-industry business surveys.Governing Global Finance: The Evolution and Reformof the International Financial ArchitectureR. Anthony Elson, Economics Ph.D. (1973) | PalgraveMacmillanThis book examines the origins and evolutionof financial globalization and the attemptsthat have been made at the international levelto establish a system of global financial governanceto safeguard the functioning of the internationalfinancial system. Elson explains how the internationalfinancial architecture has come to take the form that ithas, and why it was unable to prevent the recent globalfinancial crisis.The Politics of Extremism in South AsiaDeepa Ollapally, Political Science Ph.D. (1991) |Cambridge University PressIn this book, Ollapally examines extremist groups inKashmir, Afghanistan, Northeast India, Pakistan,Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka to offer a fresh perspectiveon the causes of extremism. What accounts for itsrise in societies not historically predisposed to extremism?What determines the winners and losers in theidentity struggles in South Asia? What tips the balancebetween more moderate versus extremist outcomes?The book argues that politics and interstate and internationalrelations often play a more important rolein the rise of extremism in South Asia than religiousidentity, poverty, and state repression.A Jane Austen Education: How Six Novels Taught MeAbout Love, Friendship, and the Things That ReallyMatterWilliam Deresiewicz, English and Comparative LiteraturePh.D. (1998) | Penguin PressAself-styled intellectual rebel dedicated to writerssuch as James Joyce and Joseph Conrad, Deresiewicznever thought Austen’s novels wouldhave anything to offer him. But when he was assignedto read Emma as a graduate student, he began viewingthe world through Austen’s eyes and treating thosearound him as generously as Austen treated hercharacters. Weaving his own story around those inthe novel, Deresiewicz shows how Austen’s books areabout education and are an education themselves.Link back to contents page38 Superscript

DissertationsDepositedRecentlyAnthropologyUma Maheswari Bhrugubanda,Genealogies of the citizen-devotee:Popular cinema, religion and politicsin south IndiaNadia Guessous, Genealogies offeminism: Leftist feminist subjectivityin the wake of the Islamic revival incontemporary MoroccoAlejandra María Leal Martínez, Forthe enjoyment of all: Cosmopolitanaspirations, urban encounters andclass boundaries in Mexico CitySuren Pillay, The partisan’s violence,law and apartheid: The assassinationof Matthew Goniwe and the Cradockfour (Distinction)Zainab Muhammad Saleh, Diminishingreturns: An anthropologicalstudy of Iraqis in the U.K.Applied MathematicsNicholas McMurray Hoell, Complex-analyticmethods in reconstructiveintegral geometryWenjia Jing, Corrector theory inrandom homogenization of partialdifferential equations (Distinction)Braxton Ryan Osting, Spectral optimizationproblems controlling wavephenomena (Distinction)Applied PhysicsPaul Wesley Brenner, Confinementof non-neutral plasmas in stellaratormagnetic surfacesRobert Victor Caldwell, Synthesisand electronic transport in singlewalledcarbon nanotubes of knownchiralityXabier Sarasola Martin, Plasmas ofarbitrary neutralityArchitectureJennifer Louise Gray, Ready forexperiment: Dwight Perkins andprogressive architectures in Chicago,1893-1918Hyun Tae Jung, Organizationand abstraction: The architecture ofSkidmore, Owings and Merrill from1936 to 1956Elsa Hao Lin Lam, Wildernessnation: Building Canada’s railwaylandscapes, 1885-1929Art History andArchaeologyFabio Mariano Peter Barry, Paintingin stone: The symbolic identity ofcolored marbles in the visual arts andliterature from antiquity until theEnlightenment (Distinction)Christina Rosanna Ferando,Staging Canova: Sculpture, connoisseurshipand display, 1780-1843(Distinction)Andrea Sharon Renner, Housingdiplomacy: United States housing aidto Latin America, 1949-1973Anna Vallye, Design and the politicsof knowledge in America, 1937-1967:Walter Gropius, Gyorgy KepesAstronomyNithyanandan Thyagarajan,Investigation in time and of spaceusing the FIRST survey: Radio sourcevariability and the evolution of FR IIquasarsBiochemistry and MolecularBiophysicsDaniel T. Radoff, Molecular mechanismscontrolling synaptic vesiclefusionBiological SciencesMyungin Baek, Development of legmotor neurons in Drosophila melanogaster(Distinction)Charles Joseph David, Studies onmammalian pre-mRNA splicing:Connections to transcription andcancer (Distinction)Mariana Dorrington Quiñones,Studies on the mechanisms that contributeto the endoplasmic reticulumquality control system in SaccharomycescerevisiaeJason Gorman, Visualizing theone-dimensional diffusion of DNAmismatch repair proteins at thesingle-molecule level (Distinction)Reka Rebecca Letso, Investigatingneurodegenerative diseases with smallmolecule modulatorsJi Li, Temporal control of vulvarprecursor cell fate patterning in CaenorhabditiselegansFlorencia Marcucci, Axon developmentand synapse formation in olfactorysensory neuronsBiomedical EngineeringAmin Katouzian, Quantifyingatherosclerosis: IVUS imaging forlumen border detection and plaquecharacterizationTimothy Martens, Novel platformsfor cardiovascular repairYue Zhang, Regulation and patterningof cell differentiation andpluripotencyDelano Junior McFarlane, Computationalmethods for analyzing healthnews coverage (Distinction)Xiang Zhou, Dissecting transcriptionalregulatory networks withsystems biology approachesBusinessIsaac Max Dinner, The interpretationof marketing actions and communicationsby the financial marketsVyacheslav Fos, Three essays on corporategovernance and institutionalinvestors (Distinction)Yoko Kathleen Iwaki, The culture ofgreen: The role of cultural worldviews,psychological connectedness, timediscounting, and social norms inenvironmental decisionsJeffrey R. Parker, When shelf-basedscarcity impacts consumer preferences(Distinction)Denis Roland Saure Valenzuela,Essays in consumer choice driven assortmentplanning (Distinction)Rom Y. Schrift, Complicating choice(Distinction)Zaozao Zhang, Dynamic targetedpricing in B2B settingsCell BiologyThomas Gregory Lipkin, Actincable function and regulation inthe budding yeast, SaccharomycescerevisiaeCellular Physiology and BiophysicsJulia Eva-Sofia Sommer, Control ofneuronal circuit assembly by GTPaseregulatorsRoshni Basu, Requirement andregulation of actin polymerizationduring endocytosisKathryn Marie Lemberg, Ferroptosis:A novel form of cancer cell deathinduced by the small molecule erastinHeather Marie McKellar, Aberrantassembly and function of a hippocampalcircuit in a genetic mousemodel of schizophreniaChemical EngineeringEliot Thomas Campbell, Towarda general dehydrogenase enzymaticscaffold for industrial biocatalysisChunmei Qiu, Novel molecularengineering approaches for genotypingand DNA sequencingRoland E. Stefandl, Polymerizationin confined spaceChemistryJaclyn Irene Catalano, Ligand-proteininteractions in cytochromesRockford Winthrop Cosica,Development of palladium-catalyzedand iodine-mediated formal [4+1]annulation protocols; Progress towarda new fulvene-based organocatalyticplatform for carbonyl -functionalizationBrendan Douglas Kelly, Part I:Development of new methods formulticatalysis: Bismuth(III) triflatecatalyzedhydrofunctionalizations.Part II: Development of a novelparadigm for nucleophilic substitution:Aromatic cation activation ofalcoholsFerenc Köntés, Strategies for thecontrolled synthesis of oligomericnatural products (Distinction)Civil Engineering and EngineeringMechanicsMelissa Katherina Di Marco, Theroles and impacts of boundary spannersand boundary objects in globalproject networksClassical StudiesJames Tan, Competition betweenpublic and private revenues in Romansocial and political history,200-49 B.C.ClassicsJames Frederick Uden, The invisibilityof JuvenalSuperscript 39Link back to contents page

CommunicationsPablo Leandro Calvi, The parrotand the cannon: Journalism, literature,and politics in the formation ofLatin American identitiesJoe Hale Cutbirth, Satire as journalism:The Daily Show and Americanpolitics at the turn of the twenty-firstcenturySophie Elizabeth Guité, Hot stocksand cold comfort: A comparativestudy of optimism in financial newsand household participation inequity markets, in the United States,France, and Hong Kong, 1985-2008Computer ScienceRicardo Andres Baratto, THINC: Avirtual and remote display architecturefor desktop computing andmobile devices (Distinction)Fadi Biadsy, Automatic dialect andaccent recognition and its applicationto speech recognitionBrian Bowen, Design and analysis ofdecoy systems for computer securityRebecca Lynn Collins, Data-drivenprogramming abstractions and optimizationfor multi-core platformsIlias Diakonikolas, Approximationof multiobjective optimizationproblems (Distinction)Charles Soo Han, Synthesis, editing,and rendering of multiscale texturesSteven James Henderson,Augmented reality interfaces forprocedural tasksOren Laadan, A personal virtualcomputer recorderChi Zhang, Quantum algorithmsand complexity for numericalproblemsEarth and EnvironmentalEngineeringJonathan Scott Levine, Relativepermeability experiments of carbondioxide displacing brine and theirimplications for carbon sequestrationEarth and Environmental SciencesAmy Michelle Balanoff, Oviraptorosauria:Morphology, phylogeny, andendocranial evolutionMichelle Leigh Spaulding, Phylogenyand evolution of locomotor modesin Carnivoramorpha (Mammalia)Ecology, Evolution, andEnvironmental BiologyDaniel Francis Baker Flynn,Linking plant traits and herbivoryin grassland biodiversity-ecosystemfunctioning researchMaria Esther Quintero Rivero,Avian diversification in the Andes:Understanding endemism patternsand historical biogeographyJessica Erin Rogers, The effectivenessof protected areas in centralAfrica: A remotely sensed measure ofdeforestation and accessEconomicsEzequiel Aguirre Capurro, Essayson exchange rates and emergingmarketsJae Bin Ahn, Three essays on firms’behavior in international tradeBruno Cara Giovannetti, Essays onasset pricing and downside riskDavid Michael Grad, Essays ininternational finance and the globalfinancial crisisDavid López Rodríguez, Essays onthe political economy of redistributiveand allocation policies in competitivedemocraciesMatthew Grant Wai-Poi, Threeessays on developmental economics:Household welfareElectrical EngineeringAleksandr Biberman, Silicon photonicsfor high-performance interconnectionnetworksGilbert Rowley Hendry, Architecturesand design automation forphotonic networks on chipMariya Kurchuk, Signal encodingand digital signal processing incontinuous time (Distinction)Caroline Phooi-Mun Lai, Crosslayerplatform for dynamic, energyefficientoptical networksNa Lei, Microsystem based onCMOS multielectrode array forextracellular neural stimulation andrecordingChristine Elizabeth Smit, Characterizationof the singing voice frompolyphonic recordingsJun Wang, Semi-supervised learningfor scalable and robust visual searchEnglish and ComparativeLiteraturePatricia Owamare Akhimie, Cultivatingdifference in early moderndrama and the literature of travelLeora Bersohn, Melville’s EnglandRebecca Ann Calcagno, Publishingthe Stuarts: Occasional literature andpolitics from 1603 to 1625Bina Suzanne Gogineni, God andnovel in IndiaPaul Michael McNeil, The unforgivingmargin in the fiction of ChristopherIsherwoodNicole Ariana Seary, The ItalianateWordsworthEnvironmental Health ServicesRobert Dean Prins, Effective doseestimation for U.S. Army soldiersundergoing multiple computedtomography scansEpidemiologyMaria Argos, Genetic susceptibilityto arsenic exposure and arsenical skinlesion prevalence in BangladeshNatalie Danielle Crawford, Examiningthe association between discriminationand risky social networksamong illicit drug usersYael Hirsch-Moverman, TB or notTB: Treatment of latent tuberculosisinfection in Harlem, New YorkMatthew Raymond Lamb, Patientnon-retention, loss to follow-up,and death after ART initiation atHIV care and treatment facilities insub-Saharan Africa: The influenceof adherence support and outreachservices (Distinction)Katherine Ornstein, Caregiving overtime: The impact of the behavioraland psychological symptoms of dementiaon caregiver depressionJamie Ann Ruffing, The associationbetween bone mineral density, lifestylefactors, and body composition in a fitcollege populationFrench and Romance PhilologyMatthew Victor Bridge, A monsterfor our times: Reading Sade acrossthe centuriesMallika George Lecoeur, Conversationand performance in seventeenthcenturyFrench salon cultureSarah-Louise Raillard, Perilous pedagogies:Female education questionedin the epistolary novels of Rousseau,Laclos, Sade, and CharrièreGenetics and DevelopmentAlison Elizabeth Barber, Examiningthe role and regulation of cell-celladhesion in aggressive prostate cancerAndrew David Goldsmith, Neuronallaterality in Caenorhabditis elegans:Morphological and functionalaspectsHistorySergei Alexandrovich Antonov,Law and the culture of debt in Moscowon the eve of the Great Reforms,1850-1870James Stephen O’Connor, Armies,navies and economies in the Greekworld in the fifth and fourth centuriesB.C.E. (Distinction)Nathan Raoul Perl-Rosenthal, Correspondingrepublics: Letter writingand patriot organizing in the Atlanticrevolutions, ca. 1760-1792Anatoly Zorian Pinsky, The individualafter Stalin: Fedor Abramov,Russian intellectuals, and the revitalizationof Soviet socialism, 1953-1962Edward Andrew Reno III, Theauthoritative text: Raymond ofPenyafort’s editing of the Decretals ofGregory IX (1234)Robert Mark Savage, Where subjectswere citizens: The emergence of arepublican language and polity incolonial American law court culture,1750-1776Taco Tjitte Terpstra, Trade in theRoman Empire: A study of the institutionalframeworkMatthew Vaz, The jackpot mentality:The growth of government lotteriesand the suppression of illegal numbersgambling in Rio de Janeiro andNew York CityKareen Felicia Williams, The evolutionof political violence in Jamaica,1940-1980Maria del Pilar Zazueta Avilés,Milk against poverty: Nutritionand the politics of consumption intwentieth-century MexicoLink back to contents page40 Superscript

IEOR: Operations ResearchYu Hang Kan, Quantitative modelingof credit derivativesItalianPatrizio Ceccagnoli, FTM redux:Studio sull’ultimo MarinettiSusanne Christine Knittel, Uncannyhomelands: Disability, race, andthe politics of memory (Distinction)LawIttai Bar-Siman-Tov, Separatinglaw-making from sausage-making:The case for judicial review of thelegislative processYaniv Heled, Regulation of novelbiomedical technologiesSang Yop Kang, Understandingcontrolling shareholder regimesMatthais Lehmann, From conflict oflaws to global justiceMaterials Science and EngineeringCharlton James Chen, Precisiontuning of silicon nanophotonic devicesthrough post-fabrication processesZhang Jia, Interfacial studies inorganic field-effect transistorsSean M. Polvino, Accuracy, precision,and resolution in strain measurementon diffraction instrumentsMathematicsJonathan Michael Bloom, MonopoleFloer homology, link surgery, and oddKhovanov homology (Distinction)Joelle Brichard, On using graphicalcalculi: Centers, zeroth Hochschildhomology and possible compositionsof induction and restriction functorsin various diagrammatical algebrasBenjamin Seth Elias, Soergel diagrammaticsfor dihedral groupsAllison Leigh Gilmore, Knot Floerhomology and categorificationChenyan Wu, F-virtual Abelianvarieties of GL2-type and Rallis innerproduct formulaRumen Ivanov Zarev, Borderedsutured Floer homologyMechanical EngineeringSelin Arslan, Micro-evaporatordesign and investigation of phasechange in tailored microchannelsSaba Ghassemi, Dynamics of cellularrigidity sensing on the micronand sub-micron scaleMiddle East, South Asian, andAfrican StudiesMouannes Mohamad Hojairi,Church historians and Maronitecommunal consciousness: Agencyand creativity in writing the history ofMount LebanonAndrea Leigh Siegel, Women,violence, and the “Arab question” inearly Zionist literatureMusicJustin Paul Hoffman, Listeningwith two ears: Conflicting perceptionsof space in tonal music (Distinction)Edgardo Raul Salinas, Modernity’shearing loss: Beethoven, Romanticcritique, and the music of the literaryNursingSharron Meredith Close, An exploratorystudy of physical phenotype,biomarkers, and psychosocial healthparameters in boys with KlinefeltersyndromeRoberta Louise Salveson, Expansionof the New York state newbornscreening panel and Krabbe disease:A systematic program evaluationNutritional and Metabolic BiologyRussell Erick Ericksen, The recruitmentand function of tumor microenvironmentcomponents during gastriccarcinogenesisPathobiology and MolecularMedicineRoger Lefort, Investigating the roleof APP dimerization in the pathogenesisof Alzheimer’s diseaseLatarsha Juanita Reid, Analysis ofthe RING domain and BRCT repeatsof BRCA1Seung-hyun Woo, Identificationand characterization of epithelialprogenitor niches in skinPhysicsTatia Kristina Engelmore, Electronmuoncorrelations in proton+protonand deuteron+gold collisions atPHENIXTzu-ling Kuo, Probing static disorderin protein unfolding and chemicalreactions by single-molecule forcespectroscopyMatthew Benson Lightman, DeltaI equals three halfs kaon to two piondecays using lattice QCD with domainwall fermionsHui Zhou, Probing the propertiesof molecular adlayers on metal substrates:Scanning tunneling microscopystudy of amine adsorption onAu(111) and graphene nanoislandson Co(0001)Political ScienceVsevolod Gunitskiy, From shocksto waves: Hegemonic transitions anddemocratization in the twentiethcenturyCyrus Dara Samii, Microdynamicsof war-to-peace transitions: Evidencefrom BurundiFatima Sbaity Kassem, Partyvariation in religiosity and women’sleadership: Lebanon in comparativeperspectiveJoel Robert Wuthnow, Beyondthe veto: Chinese diplomacy in theUnited Nations Security CouncilPolitical ScienceLauren Janine Aguilar, Identitythreat in same and mixed-gendernegotiations: Speech accommodationand relational outcomesKatherine Megan Nautiyal, Mastcells affect brain physiology andbehaviorKavita S. Reddy, Benefits of belonging:Dynamic group identity as aprotective resource against psychologicalthreatSylvia del Carmen Rodriguez,When school fits me: The role of regulatoryfit in academic engagementand learningReligionMimi Hanaoka, Umma and identityin early Islamic PersiaJames Patrick Hare, The garland ofdevotees: Nbhadas’ Bhaktamal andmodern HinduismYung-Fen Ma, The revival of TiantaiBuddhism in the late Ming: On thethought of Youxi Chuandeng (1544-1628)Roy Tzohar, Metaphor (Upacara) inearly Yogacara thought and its intellectualcontext (Distinction)Slavic LanguagesNina Lee Bond, Tolstoy and Zola:Trains and missed connectionsBella Grigoryan, Noble farmers: Theprovincial landowner in the Russiancultural imaginationSocial WorkJennifer Elkins, Developmentaloutcomes in a nationally representativesample of sexually abused boys:The moderating influence of familyand peer contextErica Lynne Smith, The play behaviorsof young children exposed to atraumatic eventMin Lee, Approximate conversetheoremAlon Levy, Moduli spaces of dynamicalsystems on P^nQing Lu, Bounds for spectral meanvalue of central values of L-functionsLindsay Carter Piechnik, Latticesubdivisions and tropical orientedmatroids, featuring products ofsimplicesPolina Golovatch, Smoking andhigh-fat diet: Risk factors regulatingemphysema formationChao-Ling Kuo, Characterization ofAthsq1, an atherosclerosis modifier locuson mouse chromosome 4: Identificationof Cdkn2a as a modifier locusmediating monocyte/macrophage cellproliferationPsychologySeth Caughron, Search forvector-like quark production in thelepton+jets and dilepton+jetsfinal states using 5.4-1 of run II dataJameson Rollins, Multimessengerastronomy with low-latency searchesfor transient gravitational wavesSociologyDennis Bogusz, Corporate governanceor corporate governments?Voluntary firm practices on paths toregulationVincent Antonin Lepinay, Codes offinance: Engineering derivatives in aglobal bankSuperscript 41Link back to contents page

Sociomedical SciencesMegan Joy Wolff, The money valueof risk: Life insurance and the transformationof American public health,1896-1930StatisticsQinghua Li, Two approaches to nonzero-sumstochastic differential gamesof control and stoppingTyler Harris McCormick, Statisticalmethods for indirectly observednetwork data (Distinction)Amal Moussa, Contagion andsystemic risk in financial networks(Distinction)Johannes Karl Dominik Ruf, Optimaltrading strategies under arbitrageXiaoru Wu, Some nonparametricmethods for clinical trials and highdimensional dataShouhao Zhou, Bayesian modelselection in terms of Kullback-LeiblerdiscrepancySustainable DevelopmentSolomon Mendel Hsiang, Essayson the social impacts of climate(Distinction)Chandra Kiran Bangalore Krishnamurthy,Essays on climaticextremes, agriculture, and naturalresource managementAnisa Khadem Nwachuku,Critiquing economic frameworksin sustainable development: Healthequity, resource management andmaterialismTeachers College:Anthropology and EducationAkiko Murata, Brokering cultureand labor: An anthropological analysisof IT offshore labor between Japanand IndiaTeachers College:Applied AnthropologyTodd Evans Nicewonger, Fashioningthe moral aesthetic: An ethnographicstudy of the socialization ofAntwerp-trained fashion designers(Distinction)Teachers College:Applied Behavioral AnalysisAlison Mary Corwin, A functionalanalysis of the effects of the inductionof naming and observing teachermodelingon accelerated learningof academic skills for children withautismCarly Moher Eby, Effects of socialreinforcement versus tokens on thespontaneous speech of preschoolersJacqueline Maffei, The effects of theacquisition of conditioned reinforcementfor adult faces and/or voiceson the rate of learning and attentionto the presence of adults for childrenwith autism spectrum disorderTeachers College:Cognitive Studies in EducationAmanda Jane Holman Crowell,Assessment of a three-year argumentskill development curriculumMing-Tsan Pierre Lu, The effect ofinstructional embodiment designs onChinese language learning: The useof embodied animation for beginninglearners of Chinese charactersHumberto Abel Rodriguez, Howregulatory focus impacts knowledgeaccessibilityAyelet Segal, Do gestural interfacespromote thinking? Embodied interaction:Congruent gestures and directtouch promote performance in mathTeachers College:Counseling PsychologyNancy Moonhee Cha, The role ofcoping and racial identity in therelationship between racism-relatedstress and psychological distress forAsian AmericansTeachers College:Economics and EducationRadhika Iyengar, Social capital as adeterminant of school participation inrural India: A mixed methods study(Distinction)Jessica K. Simon, A cost-effectivenessanalysis of early literacy interventions(Distinction)Cecilia Speroni, Essays on theeconomics of high school-to-collegetransition programs and teacher effectiveness(Distinction)Amrit Thapa, Does private schoolcompetition improve public schoolperformance? The case of NepalYu Zhang, The determinants ofnational college entrance exam performancein China, with an analysisof private tutoring (Distinction)Teachers College:English EducationNaoko Akai, Poststructural explorationsinto relations among self,language, reader-response theories:(Im)possibilities of autobiographicalinquiryLeigh Ann Reilly, Zimbabwe ruins:Claims of responsibility within speculationson psycho-social experiences ofexile and diasporaTeachers College:Intellectual DisabilitiesAmanda Levin Mazin, Preparingteachers in autism spectrum disorders:Reflections on teacher qualityTeachers College:Mathematics EducationEdward Ham, Beginning mathematicsteachers from alternative certificationprograms: Their success in theclassroom and how they achieved itHartono Hardi Tjoe, Which approachesdo students prefer? Analyzingthe mathematical problem-solvingbehavior of mathematically giftedstudentsJenna Renee Van Sickle, A historyof trigonometry education in theUnited States, 1776-1900Nicholas Henning Wasserman,When beginning mathematicsteachers report acquiring successfulattributes: Reflections on teachereducationTeachers College:Measurement and EvaluationJisung Cha, Application of orderedlatent class regression in educationalassessmentYoon Soo Park, Rater drift in constructedresponse scoring via latentclass signal detection theory and itemresponse theoryTeachers College:Philosophy and EducationWinston Charles Thompson, Ahigher degree of justice: Consideringfairness and capability in higher educationalaccess (Distinction)Teachers College:Physical DisabilitiesRebecca Langley Wilson Jackson,The Montessori method’s use ofSeguin’s three-period lesson and itsimpact on the book choices and wordlearning of students who are deaf orhard of hearingTeachers College:Politics and EducationZachary I. Lynn, Predicting theresults of school finance adequacylawsuitsDaekwon Park, School choiceoverseas: Are parents citizens orconsumers?Jennifer Burns Stillman, Tippingin: School integration in gentrifyingneighborhoodsTeachers College:School PsychologyMoona Alidoost, Acculturation andmental health in Chinese immigrantyouthBeth Jillian Chase, An analysis ofthe argumentative writing skills ofacademically underprepared collegestudentsJeffrey A. DeTeso, Student-teacherrelationships as predictors of readingcomprehension gains in second gradeLindsay A. Reddington, Gender differencevariables predicting expertisein lecture note-takingPooja Chhagan Vekaria, Lecturenote-taking in postsecondary studentswith self-reported attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorderTeachers College:Social-Organizational PsychologyAlice Marie Cahill, Use of teams toaccomplish radical organizationalchange: Examining the influenceof team cognitive style and leaderemotional intelligenceAlice Miriam Mann, Managinguncertainty during organizationdesign decision-making processes: Themoderating effects of different types ofuncertaintyRobert Bruce Morris II, Canchameleons lead change? The effectof resistance to change on highself-monitoring leaders’ strength ofpurposeLink back to contents page42 Superscript

Naira Musallam, Examining theperceived internal and external effectivenessof NGOs in the Palestinianterritories: The role of complexity,resilience and job adaptabilityTeachers College:Sociology and EducationIsabel Anne Martinez, Makingtransnational adults from youth:Mexican immigrant youth in pursuitof the Mexican dreamMichelle Jhaleh Van Noy, Credentialsin context: The meaning and useof associate degrees in the employmentof IT techniciansTheatreMirabelle Ordinaire, The stage onscreen: The representation of theatrein filmSuperscript 43Link back to contents page

AnnouncementsKatherine Allen Jae Woo Lee Tyler BickfordThe University’s 2011 PresidentialTeaching Award was presented tothree graduate students at this year’sConvocation. Awardees were Ph.D.students KATHERINE ALLEN, Earthand Environmental Sciences, and JAEWOO LEE, Computer Science; andPh.D. graduate TYLER BICKFORD,Music. The Award was also presentedto faculty members RICHARD KORBof Germanic Languages and JILL S.SHAPIRO of Ecology, Evolution, andEnvironmental Biology. The PresidentialTeaching Award is given annuallyto current Columbia studentsand faculty who have had a significantinfluence on the intellectual developmentof students at the University.JAMES MANLEY, Julian ClarenceLevi Professor of Life Sciences andformer chair of the Department ofBiological Sciences, has been nameda member of the National Academyof Sciences. His research focuses onunderstanding the mechanism andregulation of gene expression andhow these processes become deregulatedby disease.Professors MAXWELL E. GOTTES-MAN, Biochemistry and MolecularBiophysics; MARK MAZOWER, History;JAMES SHAPIRO, English andComparative Literature; and SHOU-WU ZHANG, Mathematics, wereelected to the American Academy ofArts and Sciences and will be inductedat a ceremony in Cambridge,Massachusetts in October 2011.Cellular, Molecular, and BiophysicalStudies Ph.D. student EL-ADDAVID AMIR was awarded theHoward Hughes Medical Institute InternationalStudent Research Fellowshipin recognition of his exceptionalacademic achievements in science.The fellowship supports internationalstudents for years three through fiveof the Ph.D. program.Thirty doctoral students receivedthe National Science Foundation’sGraduate Research Fellowship thisfall term. Among them are DANIELD’ORAZIO, Astronomy; KRISTENLEE, Biomedical Engineering;MICHAEL PERALTA, Chemistry;CATHERINE POMPOSI, Earth andEnvironmental Sciences;ELLIOTT ASH, Economics;KARSTEN GIMRE, Mathematics;and JULIET DAVIDOW, Psychology.The fellowship recognizes outstandinggraduate students in science,technology, engineering, and mathematics.LIA CORRALES and ERIKA HAM-DEN, Ph.D. students in the Departmentof Astronomy, received fellowshipsfrom NASA’s Earth and SpaceScience Program, which supports theresearch training of talented individualsin earth and space sciences.NAOMI ROBBINS, MathematicalStatistics Ph.D. alumna (1971), wasnamed an Associate Fellow of theSociety for Technical Communicationfor having achieved eminence inthe field of technical communicationthrough contributions to the profession,consulting corporations andorganizations on the effective presentationof data for wide audiences.Link back to contents page44 Superscript

Professors IOANNIS MYLONOPOU-LOS, Art History and Archeology, andLIZA KNAPP, Russian Literature,received the 2011 Faculty MentorshipAward. The award is given everyyear by Graduate School of Arts andSciences students to faculty memberswho have gone above and beyondtheir duty to support and guide students.Sociology professor SHAMUS KHANand assistant history professor EVANHAEFELI have been appointed asnew Dorothy and Lewis B. CullmanCenter fellows at the New York PublicLibrary. The Cullman Center offersfellowships to academics, writers, andresearchers whose work will benefitfrom access to the collections at thelibrary.Gordana Vunjak-NovakovicBiomedical Engineering professorGORDANA VUNJAK-NOVAKOVICreceived the BioAccelerate NYC Prizefor her research involving growingbone in a laboratory for the rebuildingof bones in a patient’s head and face.The prize awards critical fundingto researchers so they can completework on healthcare and biomedicalproducts that will be brought tomarket.Ecology, Evolution, and EnvironmentalBiology associate professorMARIA URIARTE was awarded afive-year National Science FoundationLong Term Research in EnvironmentalBiology grant for her work on theimpact of climate change in neotropicalforests.Political Science Ph.D. graduateCYRUS SAMII received the Warren J.Mitofsky Student Paper Award fromthe New York Chapter of the AmericanAssociation for Public OpinionResearch. In the paper “Who wantsto forgive and forget? Transitional justicepreferences in post-war Burundi,”Samii used original survey data tostudy justice preferences during thetransition from conflict to peace.RICHARD BULLIET, Professor ofMiddle Eastern History, has podcasthis courses History of the World to1500 CE and History of the ModernMiddle East on iTunes. All courselectures are available in video formatand are free to the public.Professor KARTIK CHANDRAN,Earth and Environmental Engineering,received a $1.5 million grant fromthe Bill and Melinda Gates Foundationto fund a project developing andimplementing human waste-to-biodieseltechnology in Ghana.Superscript 45Link back to contents page

Columbia University’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences AlumniAssociation would like to congratulate three special alumni.Link back to contents page2011 CAA Alumni MedalistDALE CHAKARIAN TURZA’74 M.A. in Art History and ArchaeologyMs. Turza has been active in the GSAS Alumni Association since 1998, and Chairmanof the Association’s board of directors for over ten years. She has served on the AdvisoryCommittee for the Armenian Oral History Project for Columbia University Libraries,and the University’s Art History and Archaeology Advisory Council. Her outstandingdedication and service to Columbia was recognized at the 2002 Master of Arts Convocation,where she received the Dean’s Award for Distinguished Achievement. Mrs. Turzais a white collar litigation partner in the law office of Cadwalader, Wickersham, and Taft,LLP, specializing in international criminal and national security law. Mrs. Turza andher husband Peter Turza established the Turza Family Endowment for the benefit ofGSAS students. They are the proud parents of three Columbia graduates, Kristin ’02CC,Lauren’04CC, and Allison ’07CC, ’15GSAS. Their son-in-law, Daniel Bajger ’07CC, isalso an alumnus.2011 Graduate School of Arts and SciencesDean’s Distinguished Achievement Award (Ph.D.)JOHN MATTESON’92 M.A, ’95 M.Phil., ’99 Ph.D. in English and Comparative LiteratureDr. Matteson is a professor of English at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, wherehe has taught literature and legal writing since 1997. He received the 2008 PulitzerPrize for his biography Eden’s Outcasts: The Story of Louisa May Alcott and Her Father(2007). He has written articles for The Harvard Theological Review, Architectural Record,CrossCurrents, New England Quarterly, Streams of William James, and other publications.He is currently working on a book tentatively titled The Lives of Margaret Fuller: A Biography.Dr. Matteson earned an A.B. in history from Princeton University and a J.D. fromHarvard University2011 Graduate School of Arts and SciencesDean’s Distinguished Achievement Award (M.A.)PETER STRAUB’66 M.A. in English and Comparative LiteratureMr. Straub is an American author and poet, most famous for his work in the horrorgenre. His works include Julia (1975), his first horror novel which was later adapted intothe film “The Haunting of Julia,” Ghost Story, Shadowland, and Floating Dragon. He alsowrote suspense thrillers such as Koko, Mystery, and The Throat. Mr. Straub co-wrote thenovels The Talisman and Black House with his friend and fellow horror writer, StephenKing. Most recently, he has written Pork Pie Hat (2010), The Juniper Tree and Other Stories(2010), A Dark Matter (2010), and Five Stories (2007), which won the Bram StokerAward. In addition, he has received literary honors such as the World Fantasy Awardand International Horror Guild Award.Is there something we should know?Tell us about GSAS alumni achievements by emailing gsasalumni@columbia.edu.46 Superscript

The GSAS Alumni Association invites you to meetCarlos J. AlonsoDean of the Graduate School of Arts and SciencesThursday, September 22, 2011Reception: 6:00-7:30 p.m.BRASSERIE 8 ½9 West 57th StreetNew York, New YorkFor more information contact gsasalumni@columbia.edu.Dear GSAS Alumni,THANK YOU to the nearly 3,500 alumni and friends who madegifts to the GSAS Annual Fund last academic year. Gifts totalled arecord-breaking $912,000, all of which was used to providefinancial aid to graduate students. This great show of supportis an encouragement to all of us.Sincerely,Carlos J. Alonso Dale Chakurian Turza Angela JiaDean President ChairGSAS GSAS Alumni Association Graduate Student Advisory Council(GSAC)If you would like to make a gift to GSAS in the new academic year, go to https://giving.columbia.edu/giveonline.For more information about the GSAS Annual Fund, contact Kate Jones atkaj2137@columbia.edu or 212-851-7964.Superscript 47Link back to contents page

HelpfulLinksColumbia YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/user/columbiauniversityColumbia iTunes U: http://itunes.columbia.edu/Columbia Calendar of Events: http://www.columbia.edu/events/today.htmlColumbia Athletics: http://www.gocolumbialions.com/Graduate School of Arts and Sciences: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/gsas/Graduate Student Advisory Council: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/gsacGraduate School of Arts and Sciences Alumni Association: http://www.columbia.edu/cu/gsasalumni/Give to provide financial aid to graduate students: https://giving.columbia.edu/giveonline/We want to hear from you!Write to us and share your news,content ideas, letters to the editor,events of interest, awards, works just published, etc.Superscript: gsaseditor@columbia.eduhttp://www.columbia.edu/cu/gsas/superscriptLink back to contents page48 Superscript

Superscript 49Link back to contents page