News from the School of IAS
Jennifer Atkinson publishes Gardenland: Nature, Fantasy, and Everyday Practice
IAS faculty member Jennifer Atkinson published Gardenland: Nature, Fantasy, and Everyday Practice with University of Georgia Press (Aug 2018). As she argues in this new study of our nation's romance with gardens, gardening literature is not just a place to find advice about roses and rutabagas; it also contains hidden histories of desire, hope and frustration, and tells a story about how Americans have invested grand fantasies in the common soil of everyday life. Given the popularity of gardening practices today, we are increasingly aware that gardens appeal to desires for beauty, community, creative expression, contact with nature, and meaningful work. Yet ...
August 6, 2018
Frances Lee publishes free syllabus on critical activist culture
Master of Arts in Cultural Studies alum Frances Lee ('18) published "Woker Than Thou: an experimental syllabus" for a ten-week course on critical activist culture. Frances makes it a free and accessible resource for educators, activists, and organizers to use and adapt to their community needs. The course facilitates open, theory-based discussion of modern aspects of leftist activist culture, including identity, call-outs, cultural appropriation, "wokeness", and ...
August 1, 2018
Sean La Marr becomes UW Bothell Vet Corps Navigator
Recent graduate Sean La Marr (’18) will serve as the 2018-2019 WA Department of Veterans Affairs/AmeriCorps Vet Corps Navigator to UW Bothell. The Vet Corps helps veterans and their families navigate Washington’s higher education and training programs as veterans adjust from military to college life. In 2010, La Marr enlisted in the U.S. Navy, and in 2011, reported to ..
August 1, 2018
Becca Price publishes “Teaching scientifically”
IAS faculty member Becca Price and Clark Coffman (Iowa State) have published a second article in a series of annotations that introduce scholars to biology education research. The original paper (by Couch and colleagues) describes practices associated with scientific teaching, an approach that involves testing hypotheses about what students are learning. The annotations explain why this paper is a model for ...
July 30, 2018
Mira Shimabukuro speaks on the Mother’s Society of Minidoka
In early July, IAS faculty member Mira Shimabukuro spoke about her research at the annual Minidoka Pilgrimage in Twin Falls, Idaho to a group of survivors and descendants of survivors who gather each year to deepen their awareness about the history and legacy of Japanese American Incarceration during World War II. Shimabukuro told the little-known story of the Mother’s Society of Minidoka, a group of Japanese Issei (immigrant) women who wrote to respond to the US government’s 1944 announcement of ...
July 27, 2018
Wanda Gregory on A Brief History of Time Travel
IAS faculty member Wanda Gregory spoke at San Diego Comic Con (SDCC) as part of the panel for the documentary “A Brief History of Time Travel” which premiered at this international convention last weekend. Wanda appears in the film which explores time travel from a variety of perspectives including ...
July 25, 2018
IAS faculty present at Latinx Studies Association Conference
IAS faculty members Jade Power-Sotomayor, José Fusté, and Yolanda Padilla presented at the Latinx Studies Association Conference in Washington, D.C. Jade Power-Sotomayor presented a paper titled: “Zumba and its Discontents: The Extravagance and Ordinariness of Embodied Latinidad” as part of a panel titled "From Broadway to Zumba: Performing Latinidades Across Sound and Body." José I. Fusté presented a paper titled "María’s Uncounted: Accounting for Boricua Subalternities in the Face of (Un)natural Disasters and Debt Colonialism” as part of a panel titled "Afro-Latinx Studies Now ...
July 23, 2018
After the MFA: Sun, moon, wind, ocean – Talena Lachelle Queen and the poetry of art in community
By Natalie Singer (’16) As a student who preceded me in the UW Bothell MFA in Creative Writing & Poetics, Talena Lachelle Queen was someone I heard about often during my time in the program but didn’t have the chance to meet until after we both had graduated. I was excited to interview Talena because to me, she represents the real-world successful example of how one can realize a practice and career in art-making and community leadership and advocacy. While writing poetry, teaching, and mothering, a juggle I also seek to balance, Talena has figured out how to activate the conversation around art, its purpose and potential, in her community. While she advances her own practice, she is driven by the motivation to make art a civic venture and the belief that communities need art to thrive. Here is an edited version of our interview ...
July 17, 2018
Dan Jacoby discusses the Janus decision’s implications for labor unions
IAS faculty member Dan Jacoby wrote a commentary for The Herald on the Supreme Court’s Janus decision, which put an end to public agency unions requiring non-union member to pay “agency fees” toward collective bargaining expenses. Jacoby argues that the Janus decision will weaker unions and put workers at risk. “…this ruling will push public policy further down the discredited path of private contracting agencies. Private contractors do bargain the terms of employment, but ...
July 16, 2018
Rob Turner and Justin Felder work to return Kokanee salmon to local creeks
The Lake Forest Park (LFP) Stewardship Foundation is partnering with IAS faculty member Rob Turner and Biology faculty member Jeff Jensen on the “Return Kokanee to Our Streams” project. Turner has undertaken the testing of catch basin filters to determine their effectiveness in removing pollutants (heavy metals and polycarbons) in stormwater runoff from local roads. Environmental Studies major Justin Felder is assisting Turner by taking samples and gathering data and has completed the project’s second scientific report. ...
July 13, 2018