In the introduction, Redd notes, “This book argues that to survive globalization the nation-state must evolve beyond the institution’s early conception in the 17th century. Specifically, I urge society to collectively re-imagine the following four historical properties of the nation-state: sovereignty, boundedness, unity and modernity.”

Redd also focuses on the ways in which global events are eroding and pressuring traditional political institutions. Her book, however grim the topic remains, offers an affirmative rather than apocalyptic perspective of the way in which the public and political leaders need to re-think the organization of the world. Read more.

Dr. Peter Appelbaum

In the July 2010 issue of the Journal for the Association for the Advancement of Curriculum Studies (Vol. 6), Appelbaum proposes a new form of curriculum theorizing, “retrodictive curriculum reform,” as a response to the “endless cycles of fads and policies.”

In retrodictive reform, educators imagine a future for schooling and then work backwards to write a possible history for how society managed to make the imagined future happen. In the process they create a roadmap for how to implement long-term reform in the context of short-term crises and deadlines. Read more. 

“As reported by the Chronicle of Higher Education and others, Gates said, ‘Five years from now on the Web for free you’ll be able to find the best lectures in the world. It will be better than any single university. College, except for the parties, need to be less place-based,’” writes Atkins.

Atkins writes that he is “aware of the value of online learning, but I still strongly believe in the value of place-based colleges.” Read more.

Abbey Ryan ’03

“Artist couples often share ties that resonate deeply in their professional practice as well as their personal lives,” says the Mount Airy Contemporary Artists Space website. “This exhibition explores the work of four artists and the way their work is intertwined. Hillerbrand+Magsamen are a Texas-based collaborative team that use video and installation to explore concepts of interpersonal space, memory and family dynamic. Abbey Ryan and Jury Smith are Philadelphia-based artists who share a fascination with process and layering, expressed in very different mediums. “Drawing from her ‘A Painting a Day’ still life project as groundwork, Abbey Ryan has been developing a body of work that explores the conceptual and visual relationship between figure and ground, contour and space. Working with ink, she chooses shapes that, to her, are reminiscent of a spiritual icon. The shapes are repeated and averaged; often, this distillation makes the shapes not visually distinct enough to define. Each layer of washed ink is the same value and color. The multiple contours and value variations are the result of shifting layers of the image; akin to the phenomenon of studying a still life object until it glows out of focus.” Read more at www.mountairycontemporary.com.

Ryan’s work has been written about in dozens of print and web publications, including Seth Godin’s most recent bestseller, Linchpin, and posts about her “A Painting a Day” project on BoingBoing. In conjunction with her Painting a Day project, her work is in hundreds of private and public collections all over the world.

(Photo: www.mountairycontemporary.com)

Tooker graduated with a bachelor’s in Print and Video Communications and is currently in the Master’s of Arts in English program. She recently completed her first chapbook-length collection under the guidance of Adjunct Professor Jeff Ingram. In the fall, she will begin her Master’s Thesis and plans to complete a poetry manuscript focused on the adventures and misadventures of traveling.

“The creative writing courses at Arcadia, both on the undergraduate and graduate level, have really helped me to hone my craft,” says Tooker. “Not only have I been able to work with some great professors like Dr. Wertime and Professor Ingram, but I’ve also made a lot of local literary connections. In May, I read in the Light of Unity Series, which is organized by Tamara Oakman ’10M, and I’m also in a writer’s group with some fellow graduate students and recent alumni. I would have never met these other talented writers or expanded my skills without Arcadia.”

As part of the creative portion of her Capstone Project, Amie Zimmerman ’10 created an exhibit that explored physical abnormalities stemming from gene mutations. As a Scientific Illustration major, Zimmerman focused on the medical and ethical treatment of individuals born with birth defects. From the research she conducted, Zimmerman utilized digital paintings, sculptures, and molds to recreate the physical anomalies that were popularized during the Victorian era.

“My exhibition is a recreation of a collection of specimens based on freak shows that were highly popular during the Victorian Era,” says Zimmerman. “Each specimen reflects one of the five conditions I focused I on: hypertrichosis, craniopagus parasiticus, primordial dwarfism, human horn growth, and Proteus Syndrome.  These recreations remind us of an era when some people were looked at as specimens, not individuals, and who were collected and exploited everyday of their lives for profit.” Read more.

On Friday, April 30, undergraduate Art and Design students at Arcadia University presented their senior Capstone Projects. Among those presenting was Ashley Cooksley ’10, an Interior Design student whose project was inspired by factories and laboratories, gears, buttons, tubes, knobs, and conveyer belts. As part of the task, Cooksley was charged with converting a 16,000-square-foot restaurant and residential space into an animation studio for a small animation company that specializes in traditional and flash animation.

“The most difficult part was working with my building because of the actual structure. I had seven floors to work with, and the building was an irregular shape,” says Cooksley.  “I also had to deal with an odd placement of structural columns and work with the windows to create a space that was both aesthetically pleasing and fully functional.” Read more.

The artistry was inspired—not just by the daily headlines, but also by Abbey Ryan, an Arcadia alum and now an Adjunct Professor. (See story on Ryan’s success with A Painting a Day, which has drawn the attention of Oprah Winfrey’s magazine.)

“It took me a long time to get to my senior year of college, most people don’t know that,” Tetreault wrote on Feb. 9, beginning the tale that would illustrate his life as well as his art. “I was on hiatus from the education system for about a year and a half-a time where I needed a healthy dose of reality (which apparently goes hand in hand with manual labor).  Anyway, here I am looking up at the towering giant that is senior thesis. It should be noted that my neck hurts. He quoted Paul Rand, ‘If you can’t make it good, make it big.’ Read more.

The article traces police tactics through the past several decades, noting that “during the last decade … cops have reverted to tougher tactics, especially when policing large, high-profile protests like the Pittsburgh summit…. This new approach, dubbed ‘command and control’ or ’selective incapacitation,’ blends elements of both previous strategies. Police may negotiate small issues, but they impose strict limits on where, when, how and even if people can protest. The new pre-emptive policy seem to have lessened the risk of widespread, violent protester-police clashes, many protest policing experts conclude, but at the expense of free-speech rights.”

“There’s definitely a tradeoff,” Noakes was quoted. “You’re using force to prevent things from happening. By doing that early, and with these less-lethal weapons, there’s no blood on the street, no obvious moment or casualty that becomes a rallying cry. Obviously you don’t want people killed, but force is force.”

Questioning the balance between upholding American’s First Amendment Rights and keeping the peace, the article examines the dramatic change of equipment and tactics, from bayoneted guardsmen of the Kent State tragedy to the permit-issued, preplanned protests of today. Read the article.

Luminita Hamilton ’10

“Since the fourth grade I have been making jewelry….We had a mini-society where we sold things with paper money, and I chose to make earrings, bracelets, and necklaces. Ever since then I have been making (jewelry), and over the years I have had great opportunities to make jewelry for weddings, Miss America Pageants, Breast Cancer Collations, American Red Heart Associations, and working one-on-one with clients.” In addition to artwork from her Capstone thesis project, Hamilton’s blog also shows jewelry she created while studying abroad for six months in Glasgow, Scotland at Glasgow School of Art (GSA).

“At Glasgow School of Art, we had project that was about choosing a painting and hopefully getting inspired by making a jewelry piece from it,” she says. Her blog shows an abstract painting and how she used some of the shapes, from sketches to the final end product. “In the end I sold the piece in Scotland, which I am very proud of. It was a wonderful experience that I have ever had in my lifetime.

“I am so passionate about making jewelry and hope to continue forever,” she says.

(Photo via luminitahamilton.blogspot.com)

Photography major Jackie Higgins ’10 is making an impact in her field. Higgins was chosen as finalist in the 29th Annual College Photography Contest. Her piece was hand-selected by Nell Campbell, photo editor of Photographer’s Forum, from nearly 14,000 photographic entries this year.

Higgin’s photograph, taken in Ithaca, N.Y., will be featured in the Best of College Photography 2010. The publication will be distributed to college libraries and photography instructors worldwide.

“With all my photographs, I try to avoid any sort of feelings or hidden meanings pushed on the viewer. Instead I choose to show people how beautiful things can be that are local to where a person lives,” Higgins says. “I just want people to see what nature is like as is, if they just look.” After graduation, Higgins hopes to work as a photographer for a nature or conservation magazine or as a wedding photographer. She’s off to a great start.

“My talk gave a general background on Kenya, including political history, social structure and economy,” says Otieno. “I focused on how historical exclusion of pastoralist communities from Northern Kenya that date back to the colonial era have shaped the manner in which border and national security is talked about today. I gave examples that illustrated how the region is a case that shows the importance of facilitating an equity- and human rights-oriented development that focuses on human security and the role of international cooperation (including civil affairs aspects of the military) in capacity development.”

AFRICOM is one of six of the Defense Department’s regional military headquarters, was declared a fully unified command on Oct. 1, 2008. Africa Command has administrative responsibility for U.S. military support to U.S. government policy in Africa, including military-to-military relationships with 53 African nations.

Grace E. Wainwright ’10

“This year’s honoree, Grace Wainwright, has studied abroad in England, engaged in community service during her three years of involvement with the For the Women student organization, and served as a Resident Assistant for three years,” said Assitant Professor Mark Wade. ”She has excelled in her major. It is our pleasure to present the 2009-10 Bette Landman Award to Grace Wainwright, whose record of academic success and leadership embody the vision of President Emerita, Bette Landman.”

Wainwright, of Jacksonville, N.J., is majoring in History, with a minor in Theater Arts and Secondary Education certification in Social Studies. “Last spring, I attended King’s College in London, England to study history, classics and war studies.”

“Kerry has demonstrated an impressive ability to write clearly and substantively in her work in a number of disciplines,” said Assistant Professor Mark Wade. “Her works submitted for this award were written for education, English and Honors Program courses. She is an exemplary example of the Arcadia tradition of writing across the curriculum.”

Gibson, of Sugarloaf, Pa., is an Education major studying Elementary and Early Childhood and plans to pursue her master’s in Special Education in Arcadia’s 3+2 five-year program. She also plans to pursue an M.Ed. with an ESL Specialist certification and a Reading Specialist certificate. She will be studying abroad in Bangor, Wales, in the fall and hopes to teach in an urban setting.

Oster’s essay for the Belcher Prize argued in favor of the following proposition: “In the changed global context, it is better to negotiate than to bully.”

“The essay was outstanding, well-reasoned and persuasively developed,” noted Assistant Professor Mark Wade. “This fine piece of work appropriately reflects Dr. Gerry Belcher’s dedication to the influence of good writing and the power of ideas. Marci has studied in England and Italy, so far.”

Dr. Doreen E. Loury

“Dr. Loury has been an influential member of the Arcadia University community since 1991, beginning as an Adjunct Professor, continuing as an Instructor, and now, Assistant Professor of African American Studies and Director of the University’s Act 101 program,” said Dr. Steve O. Michael, Provost and Academic Vice President. “But she is so much more than that to her students. One student states, ‘She is an amazing person… a brilliant professor, and someone who has everyone’s best interest at heart. She puts her students first in regard to priority and offers you all the help she knows she can.’” “This attitude exemplifies the Arcadia Promise of a personal learning experience,” Michael said. “To carry the Promise further, another student notes that Dr. Loury also ‘challenges you so you can think outside the box, not to be confined to just where you come from, grew up, and were exposed to all of your life.… It just does not come from the head but from the heart and experience as well.’” Read more.

The award is given to that part-time instructor whom students and faculty judge to be an exemplary teacher and outstanding contributor to the Arcadia community.

“Since the spring semester of 2001, Professor Kincade has established himself as an outstanding classroom teacher at Arcadia, whose enthusiasm for teaching and desire to motivate students to do their best work is patently obvious to all who enroll in his courses,” said Dr. Steve O. Michael, Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs. Read more.

“If educating students for personal and social responsibility is a necessary component of college learning in this global century, what practices and pedagogies accelerate student learning in these areas? How can faculty weave ethical questions into courses to illuminate unexamined assumptions, encourage engagement with urgent questions of the day, and offer opportunities for ‘moral rehearsals’ where values are practiced and refined?” they asked in the session, which drew upon innovative curricular designs and pedagogies emerging from two AAC&U projects: Shared Futures: Global Learning and Social Responsibility and Core Commitments: Education Students for Personal and Social Responsibility. Research findings from Core Commitments about practices that help promote students’ moral formation were shared.

“Our portion focused on the AU Undergraduate Curriculum and specifically the Global Connections Experience and Reflection and Global Connections Intellectual Practices as key places in the curriculum where social responsibility is fostered,” they said.

Dr. Ellen Skilton-Sylvester

The chapter that Skilton-Sylvester co-wrote with Adjunct Instructor of Education Keo Chea-Young, a doctoral candidate at the University of Pennsylvania, is called “The Other Asians in the Other Philadelphia: Understanding Cambodian Experiences in Neighborhoods, Classrooms and Workplaces.” 

Skilton-Sylvester and Chea-Young will be on a panel with other contributors to the book at the Historical Society of Philadelphia (1300 Locust Street) on Wednesday, April 14, at 6 p.m. This event is free and open to the public. To find out more, go to the events calendar for the Historical Society at www.hsp.org/default.aspx?id=10 or register for the event at www.globalphiladelphia.eventbrite.com. Read more.

Arcadia faculty presenting at the conference were: Dr. Christopher M. Brown, Adjunct Professor of Political Science; Dr. Amy Cox, Adjunct Professor of Political Science; Sandra Jones, Adjunct Professor of Political Science and Program Coordinator for Arcadia’s International Peace and Conflict Resolution program; Dr. Angela Kachuyevski, Assistant Professor of Political Science, master’s program in International Peace and Conflict Resolution; Dr. Dan A. Moscovici, Adjunct Professor of International Studies; and Dr. Jennifer A. Riggan, Assistant Professor of International Studies. Dr. Norah Shultz, Dean of the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Studies, attended the Title VI project director’s meeting, which is held within the ISA, and a symposium held at Tulane’s Stone Center for Latin American Politics on “Revolutionary Cuba: Memory, Culture & Politics.” Dr. Fredrick O. Wanyama, a Senior Lecturer from Maseno, Kenya, and Arcadia’s Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence, also attended the conference.

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The distinguished panelists will examine multiple ways in which curatorial activities can interrogate and engage risk. “In this time of insecurities, rather than turning toward safety, what is a risky project/idea—financial, political, artistic, intellectual, aesthetic, moral, organizational, conceptual, administrative—for curators and artists? Is there creative release in the pleasure of ideas when risk is embraced rather than avoided? How do you access the successes and failures of risky projects? Or has risk become simply trendy? What is really at stake? And for whom?”asks the Moore Web site. Admission is free and open to the public. Pre-registration via e-mail is requested. For more information and to R.S.V.P. to 215-965-4027 or jkaplan@moore.edu.

“For six weeks of the past two summers, Arcadia has hosted five high school student participants in the Philadelphia Youth Network Summer Program who were assigned to us through Foundations Inc.,” Dalton says. Departments including Conference Services, Library and IT, Enrollment Management., Student Affairs, Facilities. and Multicultural Affairs have served as on-campus worksites for the students.

“In addition to being provided with the opportunity to earn money and gain valuable work experience,” Dalton says, “the students also were provided mentoring by a recent Arcadia graduate (Sterling Green in 2008 and Alycia Costagliola in 2009) who met on a weekly basis with the students and coordinated development workshops in collaboration with Academic Advising (Academic Advising and the Collegiate Experience, Learning Resource Development), Career Development (Career and Academic Development), the Sociology Department (Images in the Media), and Financial Aid (Basic Financial Aid Information).”

In the article, Murphy compares the story with  The Crucible, where the town is on a witch hunt. Her character is at the forefront accusing Susannah of being a loose girl. “No wonder, I say, she is being raised by her drunken brother Sam,” says Murphy.

The article also states that Murphy, a soprano, has received numerous awards, including scholarships from the Pottstown Symphony Orchestra and the Kennett Symphony Orchestra.  She was the soprano soloist and section leader at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Chestnut Hill, Pa., for nine years.

Dr. Dina Pinsky

According to the abstract: “Studying American Jewish feminism from the 1960s and ’70s, Jewish Feminists examines how second-wave feminist activists retrospectively construct their identities as Jews and how these constructions have changed throughout their lives. Dina Pinsky argues that these Jewish feminists experience a sense of ambivalence as both feminists and Jews as they ask how being Jewish makes them different from other women (or feminist men). Drawing from interviews with more than two dozen second-wave feminist Jews, of which five are men, Pinsky describes how these identities sometimes coincide or contrast. The book demonstrates that Jews share a unique relationship to gender, influenced by their experiences and perspectives as Jews. Pinsky adds to the feminist dialogue about cultural difference and intersectionality by exploring the narratives of a group that has long been absent from this discussion.” 

Pinky’s book also was listed  The Chronicle of Higher Education July 29s supplement The Chronicle Review Books & Art Section under Women’s Studies.

Dr. Warren R. Haffar

Recognizing that U.S. campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan have shown that military force alone cannot ensure peace in all conflicts, Haffar addressed questions such as: How can the U.S. successfully integrate the tools of peacebuilding into its statecraft? At what point do poverty, disease and climate change threaten national security? What role can non-governmental actors play in supporting government led efforts? Special envoys can help bring attention and diplomatic muscle to resolve conflicts and global challenges but they also bring with them their own “special” problems. Will the Obama administration’s reliance on special envoys increase the ability of the U.S. to deal with major international issues or complicate our diplomatic options?

Dr. Norman Johnston

An expert on the subject of prison architecture, Johnston explores answers to important questions: “What was life like for the Marquis de Sade in the Bastille? When was there a bar selling liquor and beer behind prison bars in Philadelphia? In modern times are there gangs in prisons? What sort of work do prisoners do (the chances of making license plates are slim)? How dangerous is life inside a prison? Should the inmates then carry a weapon or not? Do prisoners get lonely and miss emotional intimacy? If so, what do they do about it and might that include sex? There is no question that most inmates would rather be someplace other than prison, so how do some try to escape? If they cause enough trouble for the prison, they probably will be sent to a supermax institution. What is that like?”

A section at the end of the book also provides information about costs—“how much to build a prison and how much to keep an inmate a year as well as how many Americans are locked up after sentencing compared to other countries. There is also a directory of prison museums in this country, Europe and Latin America.”

Gregg Moore

Moore met with Ai to discuss the selection of works to be included in the exhibition at Arcadia. Moore also met with Tinari, Director of the Office for Discourse Engineering in Beijing, and one of four authors included in the exhibition catalog. Opening on Feb. 17, the show will run through April 18 and is scheduled to coincide with the spring 2010 conference of the National Council on Education for the Ceramic Arts (NCECA) to be held in Philadelphia (March 31 to April 3). After its presentation at Arcadia, the exhibition is scheduled to travel to the Museum of Contemporary Craft (Portland, Ore.) where it will open in June.

Michelle Reale, '96, '99M,

"I was thrilled to be nominated for a Pushcart Prize!" says Reale. "Writers shouldn't need recognition, but we work hard so it is nice when it comes our way! But really, my focus is always just on the writing—as cliché as it sounds, and I know that it does, in the end, the writing itself, the work and the craft, are all that really matter."

Read "Snow Blind." For more information about the Pushcart Prize, visit www.pushcartprize.com.

The biennial prize honors the best book of poetry translated into English from any European language (including Russian, Irish, etc.) in the prior two-year period. Publishers in 24 countries submitted 85 books to this year's competition, and the field was very strong, including translations by John Ashbery, Marilyn Hacker, Avi Sharon, Trevor Joyce, Elena Shvarts, James O'Connor, and many other distinguished practitioners. The judges were Elaine Feinstein, a noted translator of Akhmatova and Tsetaeva, and Stephen Romer, a highly regarded anthologist and French translator as well as a fine poet who's most recent book, Yellow Studio, has been short-listed this year for two major British poetry awards (T. S. Eliot Prize and the Forward Prize).

"I'd like to thank Arcadia for making it possible for me to attend the prize ceremony," said Couch. "It was a great honor and pleasure to meet so many leading members of the British poetry community (and the cultural attaché to the Chilean embassy in London), and to represent Mistral, Arcadia, and American poetry at the reading."

Editor's Note: When reporters want to know what makes an Illinois prison that might house Al Qaeda suspects "state of the art," they asked Dr. Johnston, the world's foremost author on prison architecture.

In my experience reporters and their subsequent stories range from impressive for their ability to grasp and assemble complicated topics to incompetent for failing to understand and write a story about the information which they had received. The story "What makes a prison state of the art," which appeared in the Washington Post’s online Slate magazine, is an example of the latter.

The sub-heading to the question posed by the title was "It's triangular." In the telephone interview I tried to generalize on the architectural characteristics of past prisons as well as new ones. I said many of those new prisons have a layout consisting of small triangular units of cells, usually connected by a secure corridor to other units. The Slate story described the modern prison as a large single triangle, something that would be absurd. In addition, the prison in Illinois being considered as a repository for Guantanamo detainees did not have the layout described so inaccurately in the Slate story.

Later on the reporter wrote that early American prisons were "cavernous open spaces…"—whatever that meant. They were a series of large rooms about classroom size as I described them. There were other errors of fact as well as gaps, probably partly as the reporter tried to cull the information to shorten the story, which made his account a tangle of misleading information alongside accurate facts. They did spell my name correctly at the end in the credits—a very, very mixed blessing!

Kleckner's presentation was on designing and creating costumes and masks for the production, and with the help of actors from the Haunted Poe production showed how the makeup and prosthetics are applied. She also demonstrated the “Red Death” mask and Punch-and-Judy style puppets, describing their used in the show.

Outside of the work that Kleckner is doing at Arcadia University, she also has been involved in the following shows: Fractured Scarytales: The Black Cat for her puppet company Little Bunny Voodoo, The First Day of School for 1812, Haunted Poe for Brat Productions, The Long Christmas Ride Home for Azuka Theater, and This is The Year That Is for 1812.

This course examines these relationships from a variety of perspectives-the domestication of animals (history); various creation stories, including Genesis (anthropology); social construction of the roles other-than-human-animals play in the everyday life of human animals (sociology); and, finally, representation in film and other forms of media. Ultimately, the goal of the course is to provide a comprehensive look at the complexity and contradiction inherent in human animal/other-than-human-animal interaction.

“Exhibited projects are responses to our recent study of African Fractals and the challenges of cross-cultural border crossings,” says Dr. Peter Appelbaum, Professor of Mathematics Education and Director-at-Large of the Undergraduate Curriculum. “Orientation statements explaining the work will again be available in a binder near the entrance to the gallery, and comments are again encouraged in our visitors’ log.” Read more. (Photos)

Each student received a certificate formally inducting him or her into the Education Department of Arcadia University and indicating that he or she is now an officially designated Pre-service Teacher.

Students honored were: Alexandra Armstrong, Kathryn J. Baker, Maureen E. Bentz, Victoria J. Bollinger, Melanie I. Carty, Kellie L. Clay, Joseph Clementi, Tiffiani Nicole Coper, Ellen E. Costello, Caitlyn Curtis, Amanda V. Decia, Dana N. DiLorenzo, Kristen L. Dovell, Amy L. Dunn, Christina L. Fallstick, Elizabeth A. Gallagher, Christa J. Greagori, Nicole C. Harhart, Jesica K. Hirschhorn, Stephanie L. Hoesch, Stefani L. Jones, Courtney E. Knowlton, Gina LaCroix, Kimberly R. Lane, Sara Ladue, Alice J. Luczak, Danny Ly, Grace Wainwright, Devon S. Weiss, Rebecca G. Wenner, Kaitlyn E. Wright, Kimberly A. Milligan, Stephanie Muraca, Devra L. Nusbaum, Jennifer R. Posey, Jessica A. Richman, Amanda L. Ryan, Sara Ashley Saha, Melissa M. Signore, Timothy S. Smith, Jean E. Stanton, Samantha E. Sunbury, Angela M. Taurino, Stephanie M. Thomas and Samantha R. Troyer.Read more. (Photos)

As part of Arcadia's commitment to integrative learning, students from three first-year seminars recently attended Star Trek: The Exhibition at the Franklin Institute. The three seminars were The Night Skies of Pennsylvania, led by Assistant Professor of Education and Coordinator of Science Education Julia Plummer; Travel To The Stars: Science Fiction From Star Trek, Star Wars, and Beyond!, taught by Associate Dean of the Honors Program and English Instructor Bill Meiers' '93M, '96M; and The World of King Arthur: From Malory to Monty Python, taught by Linda Pizzi, Director of the Education Enhancement Center.

The Franklin Institute Web site describes the exhibit as featuring "the world's most comprehensive collection of authentic Star Trek objects and transports visitors into parallel universes of the future and past." Read more.

The Art and Design Department opened the gallery with FADE, a freshman exhibition, on Oct. 20. There are 19 works in the show, including 14 two-dimensional works made with a variety of materials including conte pencil, charcoal, sharpie, ink and pencil. There are five superhero costumes made with a variety of materials including fabric, copper, embroidery thread, fake leaves, rocks and bells. “The 2D work ranges in size from 8.5"x11" to 18"x36" and the 3D work is life-size since they are costumes the students wore for critique,” says Carole Loeffler, Assistant Professor of Art and Design and Coordinator of Foundations.

“The Landman Library Student Gallery exists to showcase work made and installed by students. It is important for our students to learn the professional practice of installing an exhibition and to begin to understand the effect of their work on an audience,” adds Loeffler. The jurors for FADE were Art and Design faculty members Karen Misher and Maryann Worrell, and the student juror was Lydia Jacobs '10.

In other Art and Design news, the student art club (DADA) hosted a screening of one of the episodes from ART21 Season 5 on Oct. 8 on the University Theater MainStage. The agenda for the evening was to screen the episode Compassion and have DADA run a discussion session followed by a reception. “We plan on having another film screening of the movie Who Does She Think She Is about women artists, and DADA is working furiously on the Empty Bowl Dinner event,” says Loeffler. The Student Gallery in Landman Library opens Oct. 20.

Assistant Professor of Theater Arts Jonathan Shandell is currently teaching the first-year seminar, Beyond the Broadway Blockbuster: Exploring Thoughtful Theater, with a primary goal in mind. “My goal is to engage students with live theater that might not be familiar to them: in other words, something other than Broadway-style musicals,” he says.

The class recently saw a performance at the Philadelphia Live-Arts festival titled The Last Cargo Cult by performance artist Mike Daisey.

Shandell knew that students would find the show to be different. “The performance was highly unconventional for those students only familiar with Broadway theater,” he says. “One man sat behind a desk on a bare stage and told stories for almost two hours. The stories were tales from his own life, centered on his visit to a remote South Pacific Island where the native peoples do not use money. The performance posed serious and difficult questions about the role of money in American society and in our everyday lives.” Read more.

When Biology student Alexis Kiesel '09 took the Homes, Housing and Homelessness course taught by Instructor of Sociology Alex Otieno, she did not know what to expect. Soon, however, she was “forced into situations in which I was neither comfortable nor confident, and I developed new skills as well as faith in myself.” Otieno calls this deepening one’s sociological imagination.

Kiesel and her classmates didn’t just examine urban homelessness and poverty from a historical perspective, the class also required volunteer tutoring in North Philadelphia. “Students completing the course gained an understanding of the key issues that contribute to as well as possible explanations for lack of affordable homes, urban homelessness and extreme impoverishment from a comparative historical perspective,” says Otieno. Read more.

"My collaborators and I have been working on pantos for seven years now," says Peterson. "I was thrilled. Cinderella was the sixth; Snow White in Follywood, which goes into rehearsal next week, will be the seventh. These awards mean for me that this very populist form of theater is also recognized by my Philadelphia peers as having artistic merit....which has been one of my aims as a writer." Petersen wrote Cinderella with Michael Ogborn for the People's Light and Theatre Company's annual family holiday show in December 2008.

Dr. Hugh Grady

The Aesthetics and Subjectivity Conference, according to the Royal Holloway Web site, "brings together some of the most exciting writers working today on this cluster of topics. We are delighted to welcome from Arcadia University Professor Hugh Grady, author most recently of Shakespeare and Impure Aesthetics (CUP 2009) and Professor Andrew Bowie, recognised expert in the field and author of Aesthetics and Subjectivity: from Kant to Nietzsche (2nd ed. Manchester University Press 2003)…. 'Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,' they say. But recent critics writing on the aesthetic argue such sentiments reduce artistic experience to relativism and commodification. Rather than merely absorbing beauty into subjectivity, such critics contend that art—as art—is deeply and dynamically dialectical; it creates a productively provocative tension with the person(s) who hear, watch or read it." Read more.

Scott Rawlins (Fig. 2B and C) and Kyle Kuckenbill (Fig. 2 A,D,E-H).

Luckenbill is a Research/Curatorial Assistant on the Ichthyology Staff at the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences. According to the Academy's Web site, "Kyle's first experiences at the museum came through the Academy's REU (Research Experience for Undergraduates) program, funded by the National Science Foundation, during the summer of 2002 in the Botany Department where he did some work with the collection as well as digital imaging and illustration. Kyle is currently assisting John Lundberg, through a NSF grant, in his research involving the discovery and description of the world's catfish species. (See his work.) His duties include digital imaging of preserved specimens and skeletal material, X-raying specimens, clearing and staining specimens, preparing skeletons, and preparing figures for publication. He is also working with Mark Sabaj, assisting with care and maintenance of the fish collection. Kyle's other interests include teaching, through the Scout Badge program here at the Academy, and working as a freelance scientific illustrator. He has done work for the Paleontology Dept. at the American Museum of Natural History, and is currently working with Academy Paleontologist Ted Daeschler, providing illustrations for his publications."

The Philly Fiction II Web site notes that Liz Kerr "a Philadelphia native, holds dual Irish and American citizenship. She is a registered nurse on the Heart Transplant Team at a Philadelphia hospital and is pursuing a master's degree in English. She is a cofounder of Franklin's Paine Skatepark Fund, a non-profit dedicated to building public skateboard parks in Philadelphia, and is an officer in the Ancient Order of Hibernians. She lives with her family in Jenkintown." She gave a reading of her work in September at the Moonstone Arts Center.

"'Think globally; act locally.' In the context of ecological sustainability, these words suggest an important outcome we want all our students to achieve: the ability to frame their individual choices and actions in a global environmental context," the authors write. "Interdisciplinary teaching that combines ecology and studio art provides a unique way to pursue this outcome. By merging these two disciplines, we have found a means of connecting our students' local experiences of personal consumption with a globalized understanding of science and art." Read more about how they "designed the course to weave subject matter together in a truly interdisciplinary fashion, rather than to alternate subjects in a multidisciplinary manner."

Black's stories and essays have appeared in numerous publications, most recently One Story, Colorado Reivew, The Southern Review and The Best Creative Nonfiction, Vol. I (Norton, 2007). She is a three time recipient of Special Mention from the Pushcart Prize and First Prize winner of the 2005 Pirate's Alley Faulkner/Wisdom Writing Competition (Short Story Category). Black resides in the Philadelphia area with her husband, three children and their Tibetan Terrier. Her first story collection Yesterday's News and a still untitled novel are both forthcoming from Random House and will also be published in six other countries—including Italy.

Shakespeare and Impure Aesthetics,

"I have chosen these plays because they all treat the aesthetically central themes of sexuality and mortality within worlds which, in varying degrees, create thought experiments to examine characteristics of modernity in interaction—characteristics including free-flowing subjectivity, identity crises, challenges to tradition and traditional identities, autotelic or Machiavellian power politics, and aestheticized deaths unconnected to Christian salvation," Grady notes. "My argument is that this is the terrain of what later theorists in the Frankfurt School, their sources, and developers would call the aesthetic. The first half introduces the concept of the aesthetic used here and investigates Shakespeare's prescient construction of an idea of the aesthetic before the coining of the term in 1750, with attention of the relation of art to sexuality (A Midsummer Night's Dream) and to capitalism (Timon of Athens). The second half focuses, in discussions of Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet, on how death and mourning become aesthetic resources in these plays."

A review by Professor John J. Joughin, University of Central Lancashire, states that "Grady offers a timely corrective to those who continue to view the aesthetic as an outmoded and idealized category—a straw target that was ritually bowled over in the first wave of cultural theory. Instead, he offers 'impure aesthetics' as a 'place-holder' for that which is 'repressed elsewhere in the system'. In the process he repositions the aesthetic as a dynamic and critical concept—one that post-dates Shakespeare's plays but continues to prove crucially informative in our reinterpretation of the playwright's work."