Cultural Studies alumni share their career pathways

The M.A. in Cultural Studies (MACS) program prepares students for careers in social, cultural, and arts fields or further interdisciplinary graduate education across the arts, humanities, and social and natural sciences.

Graduates work across diverse roles and sectors, and each winter a panel of alumni are invited to connect with students to share their post-graduate experiences and career navigations. This year students heard from Joshua Heim (’10), Meshell Sturgis (’17), and Mollie Wolf (’15). Each alum has pursued a unique pathway and passion: Joshua at the intersection of policy, arts, and community; Meshell in Ph.D. study and research; and Mollie in Jewish community youth organizing and programming.

Joshua Heim is the Deputy Director of 4Culture, King County’s Cultural Development Authority. He is responsible for long-range planning, budget development, oversight of 4Culture’s grant funding programs, community partnerships, and supporting the ever-changing cultural community of King County. He came to 4Culture from the cities of Bellevue and Redmond after 10 years in the heritage and museum field including Kaho‘oilina, a scholarly journal dedicated to preserving the Hawaiian language, and the Wing Luke Museum in Seattle.

Meshell Sturgis is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of Communication at the UW Seattle campus. She studies race and media with Dr. Ralina Joseph and is the research assistant for the Center for Communication, Difference, and Equity. The title of her dissertation, at the moment, is “The Politics of Self-Representation: How Queer Black Mixed-Race Women use “Black Girl Magic” in Alternative Media” where she looks at underground comics, self-produced YouTube videos, and artist books, and art collectives. This works extends from the work she did in the MACS program when she worked with Drs. Susan Harewood and Naomi Bragin. Meshell was a Graduate Staff Assistant for two years with the School of IAS and is a co-founder of G-LEAD, the graduate student club on the UW Bothell campus.

Mollie Wolf currently works as the Youth & Family Organizer at Kadima Reconstructionist Community, where she runs Jewish supplementary school programs for young people from birth through teens and their families. There, she works with intergenerational community members to build just and joyful Jewish futures through formal programming, inter-community collaborations, and liberatory pedagogy. She also leads leads community-wide grassroots fundraising efforts with Kadima, working to resource and support the organization and its partners. Mollie trains in and teaches Kajukenbo Kung Fu as a student of Sifu Michelle Pleasant, and is about to begin massage school as another entry point into community healing work.”