Academics

Tales of Water and Sand: When a Molecular Biologist Gets Out of the Lab

Monday, June 2 | 3:10-4:20 p.m.
Wriston Auditorium

What makes an organism successful and competitive in an environment? What is needed for an animal to be an efficient vector for disease transmission? What is the role of the immune system in these processes?

To answer some of these questions, Dr. Maria Castillo’s (New Mexico State University) laboratory group focuses on two topics: the ecoimmunology of the freshwater snail Physela cuta in relation to its invasive capacity and the desert-adapted kissing bug Triatoma rubida as a trypanosome vector of Chagas disease in New Mexico.

“Decolonization, Activism & Hope: Changing the Way We See Native America”

Thursday, June 5 | 1-2:30 p.m.
Warch Gallery

The Ethnic Studies Department invites you to attend an interdisciplinary student research poster session in Warch Campus Center Gallery. All are welcome to stop by at any time!

Student Poster Titles:

Resurgence in Indigenous Food Sovereignty Through Seed Rematriation: Responsibility & Reciprocity, Ava Anderson

Blood Quantum, the One Drop Rule, and Society’s Racial Expectations: Are You Even Half?, Lee Richman

The Creation of Cuisine: Storytelling Through Traditional Indigenous Foods, L Wilkins

Surviving Together: Native Responses to Domestic and Sexual Violence, Caroline Murray

The Balancing Act of Birth: How Can We Embody Care, Culture, and Celebration?, Gilliana Hope

Home Is Where the Heart Is: Rematriation in the Center of the Bay, Taylor Chukes

Weaving Resistance & Remembrance Through Indigenous Fiber Arts, Fiona Black

Zaagi ’idwin: The Solidarity of Blacks & Natives Through Time, Kymari Hart

Woven Identity: The Cultural Story of the Huipil in Mexico, Thomas Popoca

Palestinian Political Prisoners & Poetry, Danielle Bruce

Learning Beyond the Borders: The Future of Latino Education, Isaac Arriola

Saturday, May 24 | 8 a.m.-12:15 p.m.
Main Hall

Student presenters will represent almost every department in the humanities and social sciences. This is one of the highlights of the academic year, and everyone is welcome to attend.

Schedule of Events

Session 1: 9-10:30 a.m.

Room 104 – Moderator, Madera Allan (Spanish)

• Daisha Rivas – “Las mujeres en las comunidades garífunas de Honduras”
• Mattigan Haller – “La medicina intercultural”
• Riley Winebrenner – “Percepciones y usos del lenguaje inclusivo entre los estudiantes de español en Lawrence University”

Room 105 – Moderator, Mason Wheelock-Johnson (Classics)

• Jackson Bertman – “Cicero’s Representation of the Gracchi through the Perspective of Agricultural Metaphor”
• Sophia Eckdale-Dudley – “Conceptual Metaphor in Ancient Romans Ritual: LOVE IS FIRE”
• Delia Lipkin – “The Answer is Beneath Us: Katabasis in Modern Media”
• Silas O’Connell – “Truth and Knowledge from Imitative Fiction”

Room 201 – Moderator, Erica Scheinberg (Musicology)

• Alex Alden – “The Pachelbel Pseudo-Portrait: Wishful Thinking in an Unmonitored Digital Age”
• Garrett Myers – “Blurring Boundaries: Artifice, Sincerity, and Identity in Jacob Collier’s WELLLL”
• Eli Jordan – “The Face of Another: Mitski and the Real Self”

Room 211 – Moderator, Alexandra Galombosh (Linguistics)

• Matthew Carlson – “Developing an Opera Corpus for Subject-Specific Vocabulary Acquisitions in L2 Italian Learners”
• Tanvi Thatai – “Using Conceptual Blending to Analyze Gestures Used in Operatic Singing Instruction”

Room 216 – Moderator, Claire Kervin (English)

• Evelyn Best – “Toni Morrison’s Denver: Moving Us Forward”
• Beatrice Kennedy-Logan – “‘To Preserve These, Our Bodies, Breathing and Unaccounted For’: Little Dog’s Written Memorial in Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous”
• Deirdre Spaulding – “Fashion, Aesthetics, and Politics: Exploring the Legacy of Vivienne Westwood”

Room 401 – Moderator, Victoria Kononova (Russian)

• Audrey Deppen – “Pursuing Happiness: Ambiguity and Perspective in Chekhov’s Short Stories”
• Isabel Dorn – “Examining the Impacts of Globalization on Sex Trafficking in Post-Soviet States”
• Miranda R. Kirsche-Follmann – “Empyreal Trans*cendence: A Trans Dialogue on Saint Ksenia Petersburgskaia or Andrei Fyodorovich”

Room 404 – Moderator, Melissa Range (English)

• Anna Dlugi – “Poetry and Music: Florence Earle Coates and Amy Beach”
  Winner of the 2024 Richard A. Harrison Award for Research in the Humanities and Social Sciences

Session 2: 10:45 a.m.-12:15 p.m.

Room 104 – Moderator, Rosa Tapia (Spanish)

• Aria Djamali – “Feminismo y Carmen Boullosa”
• William Seigl-Gesin – “Censura y memoria en Argentina, 1985, de Santiago Mitre”
• Sofia Williams – “Lo femenino, la identidad transgénero y lo monstruoso en El beso de la mujer araña de Manuel Puig”

Room 201 – Moderator, Brigid Vance (History)

• Aleksandra Jimerson-McKinnies – “Burned in Berlin, Banned in Boston: Censorship of Booksellers in Germany and the U.S. During the Interwar Period, 1919-1939”
• Paul McMahon – “The 2010 Guangzhou Cantonese Protests and Language Policy in China”
• Irina Starostin – “A Study of Media Consumption and Attitudes of Russian Citizens Towards Foreign Countries”

Room 211 – Moderator, Alexandra Galombosh (Linguistics)

• Mirella Ramos – “A Cognitive Linguistics Inspired Method for Teaching Russian Prepositions”
• Eitan Price – “Using Sound Change to Study Phonological Representations: The Case of American English Diphthongs”

Room 216 – Moderator, Austin Segrest (English)

• Kaitlin Buelow – “Reading in the Age of the Algorithm: Social Media Discourses and Defining What It Means to Read with Colleen Hoover”
• Elizabeth Rienstra – “Feminine Virtues Do Not Stifle America’s Path Forward: Breaking Down the Reaganite Politics in the American Girl Books”
• Nina Schifano – “Desire, Disobedience, and Drag: My Lesbian Fangirling of Emily Dickinson, Aaron Copland, and Alena Smith”

Room 401 – Moderator, Mark Jenike (Anthropology)

• Myra Johnson – “Construction Safety: Enforcement and Knowledge in Commercial and Residential Settings”
• T.K. Marr and Gabby DeBoer – “Fruit and Vegetable Consumption among Fox Valley Third Graders”

Room 404 – Moderator, Jason Brozek (Government)

• Cao Le Quynh Anh – “The Inclusivity Trap in Peace Negotiations: Explaining the Breakdown of Myanmar’s Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement (2011-2015)”
• Tahlia Moe – “The ‘Other’ Caitlin Clark Effect: The White Racial Frame and the Manufactured Rivalry Between Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese”

Friday, May 30 | 4:30 – 6:30 p.m.
Wriston Art Galleries

An exhibition of selected works by Lawrence University’s 2025 senior studio art majors:
Jimi Aguilar | Mollie Davis | Onyx Disla | Cesar Donaire | Edythmae Frodl | Lara Herkenrath | Adrian Kaiser | Berkeley Krell | Emmeth Murphy | Claire Paquin | Izzy Puello | Eleanor Seelaus | Shelby Stoddard | Day Terry | Mariana Zendejas

Exhibition runs May 30 to June 21, 2025
Gallery hours:
Monday – Friday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Saturday, 12 to 4 p.m.
Sunday, closed

Free, open to the public and accessible
Parking on the corner of College Avenue and Meade Street

Email: wriston-gallery@lawrence.edu
IG: @lawrenceuniart

Friday, May 30 | 4:30-6:30 p.m.
Wriston Lobby

An exhibition of selected works by Lawrence University’s 2025 senior studio art majors. Opening reception with refreshments.

Thursday, May 29 | 4:30-5:45 p.m.
Main 201

You may have heard about the $500,000 Mellon grant recently awarded to support collaboration between LU colleagues and the College of the Menominee Nation. This event will give us a chance to learn more about the work and the thinking that led to the grant. It should also give us a chance to talk about one of the main concerns of the grant – issues of environmental justice and sustainability. Presenters will include Greg Hitch (Environmental Studies), Claire Kervin (English), and Sigma Colon (Environmental Studies and Ethnic Studies). All are welcome, so please join us!

Congratulations to the winner of our 2025 Off-Campus Programs Photo Contest!

Madeline Forman ’25 submitted the winning photo, “The Neverending Staircase,” taken inside the Vatican in Rome, Italy.

To check out this and the rest of the amazing entries in this year’s contest, go to our OCP SharePoint site.

Congratulations to our Madeline, as well as our other participants, and, thank you, LU Community, for voting!

A culmination of the Biology Senior Experience at Lawrence

Friday, May 16 | 2-7 p.m.
Warch 324-Somerset Room

At this event, senior biology, biochemistry, and neuroscience students will present their self-designed Senior Experience projects to the Lawrence University community.

This is a come-and-go event where you can drop in and attend for as long as you are able. Students will be presenting posters as well as other products to display their senior experience projects.

Language Outcomes in a Japanese-English Dual Language Program in the U.S.

Wednesday, May 7 | 4:30-6 p.m.
Main 201

This talk provides an overview of dual language immersion in the U.S., with a focus on two-way immersion (TWI) programs. In TWI programs, a balanced number of students from each target language group are enrolled in a class, allowing for greater exposure to the second language through peer interaction compared to one-way immersion programs. This study examines how elementary school children in a Japanese-English TWI program in the U.S. develop their speaking skills, as measured by the ACTFL Assessment of Performance toward Proficiency in Languages (AAPPL), and their pronunciation accuracy, assessed through acoustic analysis (i.e., voice onset time).