Humanities News, Features, and Other Updates

Author: Heather Powers

Heather Powers is a Associate Director of Digital Content in University Marketing and Communications (UMC) at Michigan Technological University. Powers is responsible for all content aspects of UMC's recruitment and reputation web properties and proactively improves and maintains quality, benchmarks, and tests to innovate key sites and pages to meet integrated marketing, brand awareness and reputation, and recruitment goals.

PhD Student Authors book chapter

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image144711-persEdzordzi Agbozo, Rhetoric, Theory, and Culture Ph.D. Candidate, authored, with co-author Kwame Osei-Poku, a book chapter entitled “Negotiating the Gothic in African literature: a study of Amos Tutuola’s The Palm-Wine Drinkard and Besie Head’s Maru“.

Agbozo’s work is in Memories of the Caribbean futures: Reclaiming the pre-colonial to imagine a post-colonial in the languages, literatures and cultures of the Greater Caribbean and beyond, 2017. University of Curacao and the University of Puerto Rico published the book along with editors Nicholas Faraclas, Ronald Severing, Christa Weijer, Elisabeth Echteld, Wim Rutgers, and Robert Dupey.

Congratulations!

 

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Holocaust Survivor from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

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8dad3602cbacfe04d0e097ff560d42b913fa23c9Rozsa Lecture “Survivor: A Conversation with a Holocaust Survivor from the Survivors Speakers Bureau of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum”

The Museum’s Office of Survivor Affairs is proud to offer schools, civic groups, military bases, and other institutions nationwide the opportunity to hear a Holocaust survivor share his or her experiences. Every year, our survivor speakers reach hundreds of different audiences, providing thousands of people across the country and abroad with the moving and memorable experience of listening to them recount their stories of suffering, loss, and survival.

The speaker will be Peter Gorog, born Péter Grünwald in Budapest, the capital of Hungary, on March 10, 1941. Peter’s father, Árpád Grünwald, worked as an office manager at the Franklin Publishing House and his mother, Olga Schönfeld, was a hat-maker. Hear his story, and learn how his experience can inform society today.

https://www.ushmm.org/remember/office-of-survivor-affairs/speakers-bureau

 Wednesday, September 13 at 7:30 pm
Rozsa Center for the Performing Arts
1400 Townsend Drive, Houghton, MI 49931

You can purchase the tickets by either visiting our events page or through this link directly to ticketing services, tickets will be available for the event beginning September 1st.

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On the Road

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image153105-persDana Van Kooy recently attended two conferences: the British Association for Romantic Studies (BARS) in York, England (July 27-30), where she presented her essay, “Configurations of Jamaica: The Modern Narrative of Diminishing Returns.”

She then attended the North American Society for the Study of Romanticism (NASSR), which met in Ottawa, Ontario (Aug. 10-13). There, she presented a paper entitled, “Reanimating the Decorporializing Logics of Modernity and Capitalism.” Both essays contribute to her current book project about how modernity emerged from the nexus of human and environmental catastrophe: plantation slavery.

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Rhetoric Theory and Culture PhD Graduates

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PhD Grads 2017The Rhetoric Theory and Culture PhD program had five graduates receiving their degrees at Michigan Tech’s Spring Commencement on Saturday April 29.

Pictured here are faculty advisors and graduates, from left to right, Jennifer Slack, Nate Carpenter, Kirsti Arko, Joel Beatty, Stefka Hristova, Vicky Bergvall, Ann Brady, Ron Strickland and Yunana Ahmed.

Also participating in the ceremony but not present for this photo was Professor Emerita Beth Flynn.

Congratulations!

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Modern Languages Spring Celebration

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14568137_1842598435969765_4973928427164305117_nModern Languages hosts a language celebration of French, Spanish, and German.

The French-Canadian group, Maple Sugar Folk, will perform and help teach songs in French, German and Spanish.  There will also be guest performers.

There may be some games played if time allows. Refreshments will be served.

Contact Karin Schlenker, kbschlen@mtu.edu, with questions.

Tuesday, April 11th
Walker 134
5-6pm

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A Year in Germany Gives Michigan Tech Student New Insights

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Screen Shot 2017-03-16 at 2.33.40 PMWhy would someone put acceptance to a prestigious law school on hold to spend a year in Germany?  That’s just what Russell Lawson did, and he doesn’t regret a minute of it.

Lawson, who earned his Bachelor of Science in Mathematics with a minor in economics at Michigan Technological University in 2016, has been accepted into the University of Michigan Law School, but he chose to spend this year participating in the Congress Bundestag Youth Exchange program.  In Germany, he’s going to school, working a job, immersing himself in the culture.

Lawson calls the competitive program, known as the ‘’Parlamentarisches Patenschafts-Programm’’ in German, a “cultural exchange program aimed at promoting understanding and cooperation between the two countries.”  It includes 75 participants chosen from all over the US, representing a majority of states and multiple fields of study. “We have engineers, bio chem majors, those who study music, politics, international relations, two welders and four chefs/bakers, really a diverse group,” Lawson explains.

Read the full story.

In the News: The Monroe News (Minnesota) published a feature article about Russell Lawson, a Michigan Tech student who is spending a year on a fellowship in Germany.

by Mary LeDoux, student writing intern

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Michigan Tech Alum in episodes of “This Is Us”

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Eric Michael JohnsonEric Michael Johnson, who graduated with a degree in Scientific and Technical Communication in 2012, was featured in an article in the Duluth News Tribune for earning a role as the drumming instructor in two episodes of the NBC drama “This Is Us” (Season 1, Episodes 13 and 14).

While at Michigan Tech, Johnson created a parody video of Al Yankovic’s “White and Nerdy” for a digital media course. In the article, Johnson recalls his time filming the video:

“It celebrates the geek, nerd culture at Michigan Tech. It is a celebration of that because I absolutely identify as a big sci-fi geek,” he said. Being in front and behind the camera in creating the video, he said “it was right around then that I really started to fall in love with the idea of filmmaking.”

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Modern Language Film Series

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The Department of Humanities, Modern Language Program, presents 3 language films.

All films will screen in Walker 134

Screen Shot 2017-02-20 at 2.13.01 PMFebruary 23, 2017, 7:00 PM
Spanish Affair (Martinez-Lazaro, 2014)
In this romantic comedy, Sevillian Rafa is so smitten with Amaia, a Basque woman, that he’ll do whatever it takes to win her heart – no matter how outrageous.

 

Screen Shot 2017-02-20 at 2.13.09 PMMarch 23, 2017, 7:00 PM
C.R.A.Z.Y. (Vallee, 2005)
Born on Christmas Day, 1960, Zac knew he was different from his four brothers but was desperate to fit in.  During the next 20 years he tries to live a lie, but a life full of surprise and unexpected experiences leads Zac to accept his true nature.

 

Screen Shot 2017-02-20 at 2.13.18 PMApril 6, 2017, 7:00 PM
Barbara (Petzold, 2012)
In this impeccably crafted Cold War thriller, a Berlin doctor is banished to a rural East German hospital as punishment for applying for an exit visa.  Barbara is a subtle portrait of a woman caught between her desire for freedom and her sense of responsibility.

 

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SPLASH! for Modern Languages and Study Abroad

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Screen Shot 2016-11-03 at 1.06.36 PMCome celebrate and hear about study abroad! Study abroad information session and celebration.

  • Gain a broader perspective of the world
  • Earn Tech credits
  • Make International friends
  • Enhance Career prospects
  • Minor/International minor credits

Get your questions answered about study abroad programs and destinations. Learn about study abroad alumni experiences and the applicatoin process and financial aid and scholarships.

There will be entertainment, food, refreshments, and a raffle.

For more information please contact Ramon Fonkoue or IPS

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Student Spends a Summer in Germany

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image147648-rsideEthan Klein, a third year mechanical engineering student with a minor in German at Michigan Tech has always had a fascination for Germany and German culture.

So you can imagine how excited he was to have been chosen to participate in a Cultural Vistas Fellowship program in Germany.

Cultural Vistas Fellowship awards a select group of students the opportunity to travel abroad, with the goal of increasing understanding of innovation and entrepreneurship in a global market. The two-month program destinations include Germany, India and Argentina. The students undergo an intensive two-day training program in New York prior to departure, preparing them to live and work in their selected countries; they then share their experiences in New York once again, when they return.

Klein, whose fascination with German history is fueled by his family ancestry, was thrilled to have the opportunity to not only go to Germany, but to secure an internship where he and his team members worked on a testing apparatus for linear led lighting systems.

When Klein was younger, his family hosted a German exchange student, Matthias Straubinger. Klein’s family kept in contact with Matthias over the years. Klein was very pleased to be able to spend time with Matthias while in Germany. The two toured some of the local sights, including a historic park in the Grunewald Forest and a castle built in 1542 by Prince-Elector Joachim II.

Read the full story.

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