Newsletter - CHASS - University of California, Riverside

DEAN’S MESSAGECollege of Humanities, Arts, andSocial SciencesSPRING 2007Vol III, Issue 3DeanStephen Cullenberg(951) 827-2762stephen.cullenberg@ucr.eduAssociate DeanStudent Academic AffairsDavid Fairris(951) 827-1564david.fairris@ucr.eduAssociate DeanSocial SciencesScott L. Coltrane(951) 827-2443scott.coltrane@ucr.eduAssociate DeanArts & HumanitiesGeorgia Warnke(951) 827-2763georgia.warnke@ucr.eduAssistant Dean & CFAOSusan Hunter Hancock(951) 827-2863susan.hancock@ucr.eduAssistant Dean for DevelopmentVirginia Davis(951) 827-4365ginny.davis@ucr.eduEditorPengyue James LinAssociate EditorChristine KitanoWritersPauline MocMy NguyenDesign and IllustrationKelvin MacDear Friends,It may be the end of the academic year butCHASS is filled with beginnings. One of the mostexciting of these is the internationalization ofour curriculum. As you may know, we began aGlobal Studies major and minor this academicyear. Directed by Professor Anne Sutherland, theprogram examines issues that transcend nationalboundaries. How will we solve the problemsof world-wide climate change or mitigate theinequalities caused by the globalization of tradeand finance or resolve health concerns raised byimport and export, travel and migration? Whatshall we do about international security now thatthe Cold War has been replaced by the threats of terrorism and the spread ofnuclear weapons? CHASS’s Global Studies program seeks to prepare studentsto become the sort of reflective citizens of the world that the 21st century willneed.But Global Studies is not CHASS’s only international initiative. In this newsletteryou will learn about the program in “Southeast Asia: Text, Rituals, andPerformance” or SEATRIP for short. CHASS now boasts a core of brilliantyoung faculty who take their orientation from the Vietnam War but are nolonger exclusively interested in military or political questions. Rather they areexamining the way the war experience is reflected in Southeast Asian andAmerican literature, film, history and culture. Let me also tell you about ourMiddle East /Islamic Studies initiative. This year we successfully launcheda cluster hire in the subject-area that is slated to bring an amazing group ofpeople to the College. Among those we are recommending for appointmentare political scientists, non-fiction and creative writers, historians and religiousscholars. If all goes well, eight new faculty in this initiative will greet our studentsin the fall.Think about the intersections between Global Studies, SEATRIP and MiddleEast/Islamic Studies. Together our students and faculty will contemplate thenecessity and/or tragedy of America’s wars and the position of the United Statesin a new world order connected by trade, finance and terrorism.The world in which we live is changing in new and profound ways and so is theCollege of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences. Our task is now, perhapsmore than ever, to prepare our students for the challenges of the new world weare all entering.Stephen CullenbergDeanStaff ContributionsSusan BealsScheryl EilanderSusan Hunter HancockCindi Smith2 Dean’s Message

DEVELOPMENT UPDATES20th Annual Tomás Rivera ConferenceThe 20th Annual Tomás Rivera Conference was held on April 28th at the Palm Desert Graduate Center. In additionto honoring the memory of the late Chancellor, this year’s event also celebrated the 34th anniversary of FestivalFloricanto, a national celebration of the arts of the people. Tomás Rivera, a Chicano poet and educator, was UCR’sChancellor from 1979 to 1984. He was the first Hispanic Chancellor in the UC system, and at 43, the youngest personever appointed to lead a UC campus.Survey Research CenterRegional policymakers and UC Riverside researchers who needpolling data to complete their studies have a new resource: The UCRSurvey Research Center. The Center, which opened in January, isan interdisciplinary project that provides researchers on- and offcampuswith the ability to poll by telephone, Internet, or mail, saidMartin Johnson, director of the Center and an Assistant Professorof Political Science. The Survey Research Center is the third projectlaunched in the last four years that will benefit researchers and regionalpolicymakers. Policy Matters is a quarterly publication started in 2006that provides research and guidance on various issues. The StatisticalConsulting Collaboratory is a fee-based consulting service that began in2004.Gluck Summer CampUC Riverside’s Gluck Summer Camp for the Arts is accepting registration from high school students who want handsonexperience in art, dance, music, theater and creative writing. The camps, organized by the Gluck Fellows Programof the Arts, are taught by UCR graduate students and are intended to encourage high school students to considerpursuing the arts in college. Founded in 1996 by a generous grant from the Maxwell H. Gluck Foundation, the GluckFellows Program of the Arts has provided funds for artists, performers, and writers to share their work with the localRiverside community. For more information, please contact the Gluck Program Coordinator, John Medina atjohn.medina@ucr.edu, (951) 827-3518.Development Updates 3

Southeast Asia Studies..continuedCOVER STORYProfessor Duong’s research includes postwar culturalproductions of the Vietnamese and Vietnamese diaspora.She interprets films and literature through the themesof nationalism, betrayal, and collaboration againstthe historical background of Vietnam, France, andthe U.S. She says she is especially interested in therepresentation of gender and sexuality.Professor Lam specializes in Southeast Asian literatureand visual cultures, postcolonial criticism, diasporicexpressive forms, gender and sexuality, ethnic studies,translation, tourism, and community politics. Oneof her on-going projects includes an analysis of thedevelopment of Southeast Asian and Southeast AsianAmerican studies in the U.S. academy, and of the politicsof transnational scholarship.Assistant Professor of Anthropology ChristineSchwenkel’s research focuses on the intersections oftransnationalism, visual culture and historical memoryin Vietnam. According to Professor Schwenkel, herresearch traces the transnational flows of images of theU.S./Vietnam War and shifts in the aesthetics of memoryat Vietnamese museums, war monuments, art andphotography exhibits, and tourist sites.David Biggs, Assistant Professor of History, is currentlydoing his research on the Mekong Delta, located in thesouthern-most region of Vietnam, where half the rice inthe country is produced. His research focuses on therelativity of the region’s environmental past, includingstudies of the Vietnam War’s impact on the environmentand development since the war’s end in 1975. He willalso be leading a trip with UCR Summer Sessions tothe ancient imperial capital in Hue, where he will beteaching a course on the Vietnam War (History 184) thatwill include visiting many key historical sites. Accordingto Professor Biggs, students will have the opportunityto “immerse themselves within the language, cultureand history of Vietnam,” as well as getting hands-onexperience within and outside of the classroom. “Besideslearning a new language, which I find is always importantsince we live in a globalized world; there is the addedbenefit of being in another culture that you can learnfrom,” said Professor Duong.The SEATRiP Program at the University of California,Riverside brings together faculty and students who areinterested in the arts and humanities and are drawn tothe languages and expressive cultures of Southeast Asia.The SEATRiP Program’s activities inform by usingbroader critical discussion ranges of culturally specificsensibilities. These discussions emerge out of dialoguesabout involved authors, performers and audiences,individuals, communities, ideological regimes, localpractices, and the global movement of ideas. Specificcourses listed in the program are: cultural and literarytranslation, ethnomusicology, performativity andperformance studies, dance ethnography, anthropologyof tourism, migration and Asian American studies,tradition and globalizing media technology, music andtechnoculture, ritual religious discourses, and gender andsexuality studies.Thai and Lao studies faculty include: Deborah Wong,Professor of Music, and Justin McDaniel, AssistantProfessor of Religious Studies. Indonesia and Malaysiastudies faculty include: Hendrick Maier, Professorof Literature of Southeast Asia and Indonesia andfounding Director of SEATRiP, Kurt Schwabe, AssociateProfessor of Environmental and Natural ResourceEconomics, and Rene Lysloff, Associate Professorof Music. Philippines studies faculty and researchersinclude: Sally Ann Ness, Professor of Anthropology, andPatrick Alcedo, Postdocoral Scholar. SEATRiP currentlyoffers an undergraduate Minor in Southeast AsianStudies and an MA in Southeast Asian Studies, and isplanning to offer a Major in the near future. Studentsmay take a minor in Southeast Asian Studies which,with an emphasis on language and humanities, providesstudents with the opportunity to enhance their knowledgeof Southeast Asian languages, cultures and literatures.SEATRiP Program Faculty (from left to right):Deborah Wong, Justin McDaniel, Hendrick Maier, Kurt Schwabe, Rene Lysloff, and Sally Ann Ness.COVER PHOTO (page 1, from left to right): Lan Duong, Christine Schwenkel, Mariam Lam, and David Biggs.4 Cover Story

ACADEMIC & ATHLETIC EXCELLENCEResearch by UCR psychology professor Lawrence D. Rosenblum and graduate students Rachel M. Miller andKauyurmari Sanchez confirm that seeing a person’s face makes it easier to hear their words. Rosenblum’s paper,Lip-Read Me Now, Hear Me Better Later: Crossmodal Transfer of Talker Familiarity Effects, will appear in the Mayissue of Psychological Science.Carlos Rendon, a current CHASS College Computing (C 3 ) Programmer Intern, has been accepted into the Ph.D.program in Computer Science at UCLA. Carlos has been actively involved with activities on campus, from guidingfreshmen as a Bear Facts orientation counselor to juggling with the Juggling Club. In addition to his work with C 3 ,Rendon has worked on the Homeland Security Grant (2005)and the Integrien Corporation (2006) through the statisticalcollaboratory. Carlos will be graduating in June with a B.S. inComputer Science.Christine Kitano, current C 3 Editor Intern and AssociateEditor of the CHASS Quarterly Newsletter, has been selectedas a University Fellow at Syracuse University in New York,and will be studying poetry in the MFA program in the fall.While at UCR, Christine has been the recipient of twoCreative Writing Gluck Fellowships, a cellist with the UCROrchestra and Chamber Orchestra, and Editor-in-Chief ofMosaic, UCR’s undergraduate art and literary journal. Shewill be graduating Magna Cum Laude in June with a B.A. inCreative Writing.C 3 Interns: Carlos Rendon and Christine KitanoCHASS Honors Women’s Basketball TeamOn April 27, CHASS held a reception honoring thewomen’s Highlander basketball team. The team, allCHASS students, stood before the camera holdingplaques made especially for the occasion.“It is amazing that all the players are CHASS majors,”Dean Stephen Cullenberg stated. Cullenberg gave abrief speech, acknowledging the difficulty of studentathletes to maintain a vigorous academic and athleticbalance. He encouraged the faculty to attend thegames, which he adds many have been doing,including Chancellor France Cordova.“I am veryproud of the young women and the coaching staff in both their personaland academic lives,” says Stan Morrison, Director of Athletics.Head Coach John Margaritis said he had great admiration for whatCHASS has done for the team, as well as being very grateful. “This isa great time for the student athlete’s life,” said Margaritis, thanking theuniversity.Kemie Nkele was voted the most valuable player in the Big Westconference, and Head Coach John Margaritis was voted Coach of the Year.Academic & Athletic Excellence 5

FACULTY ACCOMPLISHMENTSSteven Brint, Professor of Sociology,has conducted a study on the NoChild Left Behind Act. His researchshows that 80% of polled SouthernCalifornia teachers disagree with thestandards set out by the act. Accordingto Brint, NCLB stifles creativity in theclassroom and gives curriculum controlto legislators over teachers.Christopher Buckley, Professor ofCreative Writing, has been awardedthe Guggenheim Fellowship, oneof the most prestigious fellowshipsavailable for advanced professionals.Fellows are appointed on the basis ofdistinguished achievement in the pastand exceptional promise for futureappointment. Buckley was one of ninepoets who were selected in the category of Creative Arts.This year’s 189 fellows were selected from a pool ofalmost 2,800 applicants.Jennifer Doyle, Associate Professorof English, has been named a finalistin Arts and Culture category in the 19thannual Lambda Literary Awards for hernew book, Sex Objects: Art and theDialectics of Desire. Winners will beannounced May 31 in New York City.Justin McDaniel, Assistant Professorof Religious Studies, was awardeda $30,000 NEH Seed Grant for hisproposal to create virtual tours ofBuddhist monasteries in Thailand.McDaniel will lead a team ofdocumentary filmmakers and monksin Thailand to create a digital archiveof five monasteries. The end resultwill be a free-access website thatwill include three-dimensional representations of themonasteries, interviews with monks, and pictures ofancient manuscripts.Juliet McMullin, Assistant Professor ofAnthropology, has led the Ed BlakelyCenter for Sustainable SuburbanDevelopment to a $1.17 million grantfrom the National Institute of ChildHealth and Human Development.The grant will fund a study of culturaldifferences that affect child supervision.Yolanda Moses, Professor ofAnthropology and Special Assistantfor Excellence and Diversity, servedas chair and helped to develop theRACE Project, a website (www.understandingrace.org) and exhibit thatwill tour museums around the countrythrough 2011. Moses was one of eightcurators of the project and served onthe national advisory board.Lawrence Rosenblum, Professor ofPsychology, has an article in the Mayissue of the journal PsychologicalScience, published by the Associationfor Psychological Science. Lip-Read MeNow, Hear Me Better Later: CrossmodalTransfer of Talker Familiarity Effects,examines the relation between howwe hear and see people, and how onesense affects the other. He has foundthat a person’s facial expressions play an important rolein communication. These results have implications forindividuals with hearing impairments as well as for brainlesion patients.Maurya Simon, Professor of CreativeWriting, has written a libretto whichwas used in the production of a newopera, Tamar, at the University ofRhode Island. Simon’s new book,Cartographies is forthcoming from RedHen Press (in Granada Hills) in the Fallof 2007.Susan Straight, Professor of CreativeWriting, was a finalist for the LosAngeles Times Book Award for herlatest novel, A Million Nightingales. Thefirst in a trilogy, A Million Nightingalestraces the story of Moinette, a slave inearly 1800s Louisiana who has to buyher own son. Straight is currently atwork on the second installment in theseries which will follow the descendantsof Moinette through to Hurricane Katrina.Ivan Strenski, Professor of ReligiousStudies and Holstein Endowed Chair,will be granted the degree of DoctorHonoris Causa on June 14 by theUniversity of Lausanne, Switzerland inrecognition for his accomplishments inthe study of religion.6 Faculty Accomplishments

Students Selected to Attend NSF Summer Research Program at UCLAAWARDSTwo CHASS undergraduate students have been selected to attend a prestigiousNational Science Foundation summer research program at UCLA this summer.Yasmeen Welton and Alquincia Boston, both junior Sociology majors, werenominated by Assistant Professor Scott Brooks of Sociology. The National ScienceFoundation (NSF) Science & Technology Centers (STCs) Undergraduate ResearchExperience is a program that gives students a chance to gain hands-on researchexperience. There are 17 STCs, located at different prestigious universities aroundthe United States. Each center has a specific research focus, but as a whole theprograms focus is on such fields as the biological sciences, computer and informationsciences, engineering, geosciences, and mathematical and physical sciences.Yasmeen Welton (left)and Alquincia BostonProfessor Alexandra Maryanski of Sociology states how wonderful the news is. “I had Yasmeen and Alquinca in myprimate societies classes last quarter and they were terrific students,” she said, praising Welton and Boston and theirabilities.HAcademic Excellence AwardStudent Graduation Awards RecipientsHHHHHOutstanding Achievement AwardClaire Class EnglishJefferson Baniqued Art (Studio)Eamon Conklin Art (Studio)Shawn Shahani Art History/Administrative StudiesKelli Lau Borba Business AdminstrationRamez Mikhail Classical StudiesSean Reynolds Creative WritingUrsula Mencini DanceClaire Class EnglishAmanda Moreno EnglishJeffrey Haynes PhilosophyJessica Coffield Philosophy/Law and SocietyChristina Gregory Political Science/International Affairs/HistoryAllison Tackman PsychologyMuzlefa B. Shenghur Religious Studies/Political ScienceAmanda Mazzotti Sociology/Law and SocietyShirin Behrouzfard TheatreNeil Sampson TheatrePaul Jacques TheatreHHHTomás Rivera AwardsPamela MikkelsenAustin HaighDance/BiologyPolitical Science/Law and SocietyStaff Who Make a DifferenceMingji (Matthew) Chu (pictured far left), a programmer analyst in theCHASS Dean’s Office, is the winner of the Staff Assembly Staff WhoMake a Difference Award for Technical. Chu is recognized for hiscommitment to the UCR community and his drive to provide CHASS withup-to-date technology for both instruction and administration.Awards 7

ALUMNIAlumni NewsMichele Adams and Scott Coltrane’s article, FramingDivorce Reform: Media, Morality, and the Politics ofFamily, was chosen as Family Process’(www.familyprocess.org) March 2007 Featured Article.Their article explores the history of divorce reform andhow American society has changed from making divorce“better” to making marriages “healthier”.After completing his Ph.D. in2003, SEATRiP (SoutheastAsian: Text, Ritual andPerformance) invited PatrickAlcedo to be its first postdoctoralscholar. This position allowed himto further strengthen PhilippineStudies at UCR by teachingcourses in Philippine dance,literature, culture, and Tagalog.On March 8th, Barbara Kerr,President of the CaliforniaTeachers Association (CTA), wason campus discussing majoreducation issues in California.Kerr received her B.A. in Englishat UC Riverside and has been anactive member of the CTA since1995.Stefani Schaeffer, a 1996UCR graduate, beat eighteencontestants and millions ofapplicants to win the sixth seasonof The Apprentice. Enthusiasmwas one of the key characters thatmade her stand out from the othercontestants. Schaeffer majored inEnglish at UCR before attendinglaw school.Alumni Association Service AwardsThe UC Riverside Alumni Association recognizedthree CHASS alumni at the 2007 Alumni Awards ofDistinction Banquet, which was held on Saturday,April 21. The following individuals received awardsfor excellence in their professions and service totheir communities:Distinguished Alumnus AwardEdward J. Blakely (History, Political Science,and Economics, B.A., ‘60)Oustanding Young AlumnusDaniel Goldmark (Music, B.A., ‘94)Honored Alumni Award, CHASSJoel Reynolds (Political Science, B.A., ‘75)University of California, RiversideCollege of Humanities, Arts, & Social Sciences3413 Humanities and Social Sciences BuildingUniversity of California, RiversideRiverside, CA 92521Presorted StandardU.S. Postage PAID8 Alumni