Humanities Conversations

Each year, WIHR welcomes a new cohort of Research Fellows. Chosen through a competitive process, these researchers have demonstrated that they are working on compelling projects that speak to both academic and broader public audiences. In this Think & Drink, we welcome back Research Fellows who participated in the first three cohorts to talk about their ongoing writing and knowledge-making activities. All four panelists are from the Spanish faculty in UW's Modern and Classical Languages Department, which should inspire some interesting conversations and crossovers. Please join us for an engaging and thought-provoking conversation about research activities and projects in the field of Spanish.  

This video features:  

Joy Landeira | Head of the Department of Modern and Classical Languages and Professor of Spanish 

Irene Checa-García | Associate Professor of Spanish 

Conxita Domènech | Professor of Spanish 

Chelsea Escalante | Assistant Professor of Spanish  

Nancy Small is the moderator.

Contact Us:  

Please join us to meet the acquisitions staff from the new University of Wyoming Press in a lunchtime conversation titled "Getting Published: Tips from the Acquisitions team at the University Press of Colorado and University of Wyoming Press."   

Speakers include: Allegra Martschenko, Acquisitions Editor Darrin Pratt, Director Nate Bauer, Acquisitions Editor Rachael Levay, Acquisitions Editor

Check out our online conversation featuring Dr. Danielle Allen, author of Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality. We are so happy to have Launched the Democracy Lab and create new opportunities for democracy in the state of Wyoming.  

Dr. Danielle Allen is the James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University, is a political theorist who has published broadly in democratic theory, political sociology, and the history of political thought. She is the recipient of the 2020 John W. Kluge Prize for Achievement in the Study of Humanity, an award administered by the Library of Congress that recognizes work in disciplines not covered by the Nobel Prizes.  

"Danielle Allen is a uniquely thoughtful, generous, and inspiring presence. She’s a powerhouse, yet somehow approachable. She’s the single best speaker I’ve yet had the good fortune to work with for any audience interested in democracy, civic education, justice, or the future (and past) of our nation." —Executive Director Dr. Adam Davis, Oregon Humanities

If you’ve ever been enthralled by a park ranger’s story during a national historic site guided tour, listened to a docent bring the objects in a museum exhibit to life, watched the excitement on a child’s face as a zoo employee explained the care and feeding of a rare primate, or stopped to read an interpretive sign explaining the natural wonders of a spectacular state park, you have experienced heritage interpretation. This installment in the Think and Drink series will look at this uniquely compelling communicative art form.

Our panelists will explain the role of interpretation in how we experience the people, places, and natural wonders that comprise our shared heritage, the various practices used in the field, and how interpretation is being called to respond to the many roiling cultural, technological and socio-political forces at work in the world today.

Our panelists will be:

Larry Beck, Ph.D., professor in the L. Robert Payne School of Hospitality and Tourism Management at San Diego State University, former longtime National Park Service employee, author of several articles and books on interpretation including Interpreting Cultural and Natural Heritage: For A Better World, and recipient of the National Association for Interpretation’s Fellow Award, its highest honor.

Kelli English, Chief of Interpretation, Education and Outreach for John Muir National Historic Site, Eugene O’Neill National Historic Site, Port Chicago Naval Magazine National Memorial, and Rosie the Riveter / World War II Home Front National Historical Park in the San Francisco, California East Bay area, who holds a BA from Harvard University and an M.S. from the University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point and who’s twenty-plus year career with the National Park Service included a stint at Yellowstone!

Don Enright, Ontario, Canada-based freelance interpretive planner, experience advisor, travel writer and award-winning blogger of Canadian travel culture who for nearly 40 years has brought diverse skills and services to the interpretation industry including planning, writing, pre-design, market segmentation and analysis, visitor experience evaluation, content and programs development and professional development and training.

The panel is moderated by Milward Simpson, Wyoming Humanities board member and Executive Director of the National Association for Interpretation (NAI).

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

13 May 2021:

“Writing Lives: Two Biographers Discuss Their Art and Craft.”

This panel looks at the field of Early American Environmental History. Although Environmental History is a flourishing subfield, the use of an environmental lens has been somewhat reluctantly applied to the Colonial Americas—North, South, and Caribbean. This is despite the fact that the colonization of the New World had monumental environmental consequences which continue to resonate in the present day. Panelists will address trends in the field, how Environmental History can transform our understanding of the Colonial Americas, and why it matters today.

Our panelists:

Keith Pluymers, PhD, History, Illinois State University (and author of the just-about-to-be-released No Wood, No Kingdom: Political Ecology in the English Atlantic from UPenn Press)

Scott Cave, PhD, Independent Scholar and Historical Consultant specializing in the Spanish Colonial archives

Melissa Morris, PhD, History, University of Wyoming, whose expertise is in the cross-cultural interactions that defined colonial encounters, the role of plants in driving European expansion, the dissemination of geographic and agricultural knowledge, and colonial failures in the Americas.

The panel is moderated by Dr. Ken Gerow.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

08 April 2021:

“Three Assassinations of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.”

This presentation examines the layered nuances regarding the events, federal intelligence agencies, and other entities involved in the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Our presenter is Dr. Fredrick Douglass Dixon, the director of UW's Black Studies Center.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

25 March 2021:

“Women at Work”

This panel considers how women’s labor has been historically devalued and how they have fought to make it more visible; women’s campaigns for improved labor conditions, and in particular childcare; how COVID-19 has derailed some of these gains. This week's Think & Drink is co-sponsored by UW's program in Gender and Women's Studies.

Our panelists:

Dr. Anna K. Danzinger Halperin, Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in Women's History and Public History at the New-York Historical Society. Dr. Danziger Halperin is a historian of public policy, gender, and childhood, and teaches in the joint N-YHS and CUNY School of Professional Studies Museum Studies program.

Dr. Nick Juravich, Assistant Professor of History and Labor Studies and Associate Director, Labor Resource Center at University of Massachusetts, Boston. Professor Juravich’s research interests include labor history, public history, urban history, the history of education, and the history of social movements in the twentieth-century United States. He teaches courses on labor and working-class history, public history and public memory, the history of public schooling, and the history of Greater Boston.

The panel will be moderated by Dr. Melissa Morris.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

11 March 2021:

“Women and Politics”

This panel is co-sponsored by the UW Program in Gender and Women's Studies, and it will bring together experts on women’s political involvement throughout U.S. history. We will consider how women agitated for change through formal channels and outside of them, the gains women have made in the political arena, and the work that remains to be done.

Our panelists:

Dr. Kimberly Hamlin, Professor of History at Miami University and author of the just-released “Free Thinker: Sex, Suffrage, and the Extraordinary Life of Helen Hamilton Gardener.”

Dr. Tracey Owens Patton, Professor of Communications and Journalism and African American and Diaspora Studies at the University of Wyoming and author of “Gender, Whiteness, and Power in Rodeo: Breaking Away from the Ties of Sexism and Racism.”

Dr. Nancy Small, Assistant Professor of English at the University of Wyoming and author of the forthcoming book “Paradox and Agency in Transnational Spaces: White US American Women in Qatar.”

Dr. Rosemarie Zagarri, Professor of History at George Mason University and author of (among other titles) “Revolutionary Backlash: Women and Politics in the Early American Republic.”

This panel was moderated by Dr. Melissa Morris.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

25 February 2021:

“Challenging Police Perspectives Surrounding the Controversy of Defunding.”

The Black Studies Center and the Wyoming Institute For Humanities Research co-host our Think & Drink on “Challenging Police Perspectives Surrounding the Controversy of Defunding.” This conversation will discuss the complexities and layered nuances of this controversial topic.

Our panelists are:

Aaron Appelhans, Albany County sheriff.

Jael Kerandi, a student leader at the University of Minnesota.

Kevin Lee, a police lieutenant at the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago

Mike Samp, UW police chief.

Moderator: Ms. Timberly Vogel, The Black Studies Center’s Director of Community Engagement and Research Assistant

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

10 December 2020:

“The Illusion of the American Dream vs. the Reality of the Death of Black Wall Street”

This discussion centers on the need to reckon with the 100th anniversary of the death of Black Wall Street through cultural, economic and political lenses,” says Dr. Fredrick Douglass Dixon, the Black Studies Center’s director and an assistant professor in the UW School of Culture, Gender and Social Justice.

Black Wall Street refers to an affluent Black neighborhood in Tulsa, Okla.’s Greenwood District in the early 1900s. It was the scene of the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921, also called the Tulsa Race Riot, one of the most severe incidents of racial violence in U.S. history. Violence broke out between white Tulsans and Black Tulsans May 31, following a newspaper report of an alleged assault of a white woman by a Black man. When the violence ended the next day, between 30 and 300 people were dead -- mostly Blacks residents -- and Black Wall Street was destroyed.

Our panelists are:

Courtney Pierre Joseph, an assistant professor of history and African American studies at Lake Forest College.

Chad Robinson, an adjunct professor in UW’s African American and Diaspora Studies.

Raymond Winbush, a research professor and director of the Institute for Urban Research at Morgan State University

Moderator: Dr. Fredrick Douglass Dixon

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

12 November 2020:

“Eradicating Racism Through Critical Self Awareness”

Our cultural Norms (and biases) are often held so deeply that we are not aware of them at a conscious level. Our panelists from the San Diego School District discuss the work they do to help individuals become more explicitly aware of biases (racism in particular) as a step towards its eradication.

Panelists:

Ebonee Weathers and Dr. Dulcinea Hern from the San Diego United School District

Moderator: Dr. Fredrick Douglass Dixon

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

22 October 2020:

“Suffrage and its Legacies: Women, Politics, and the Vote”

Renowned historian Ellen Carol Dubois will be speaking about her most recent book, Suffrage: Women’s Long Battle for the Vote, commemorating the broad sweep of the women’s suffrage movement. Dubois will have a conversation with Cathy Connolly, Professor of Gender & Women’s Studies and Wyoming state representative about the intersectional legacies of the suffrage movement, women in politics, and the ongoing fight for voting equity. The discussion will be moderated by UW’s own celebrated historian of the American West, Renee Laegreid.

Featured Speaker: Ellen Carol Dubois, Professor Emeritus, History, UCLA

Ellen Dubois is the author of numerous books on the history of woman suffrage in the US. She is the coauthor, with Lynn Dumenil, of a foundational textbook in US women’s history, Through Women’s Eyes: An American History with Documents and coeditor, with Vicki Ruiz, of Unequal Sisters: In Inclusive Reader in US Women’s History. Her most recent book, Suffrage, traces the wide historical scope of the movement to win the vote for women. The book begins in the pre-Civil War years with foremothers Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Sojourner Truth, exploring the links between the women's suffrage movement to the abolition of slavery. After the Civil War, Congress granted freed African American men the right to vote but not white and African American women, a crushing disappointment. DuBois traces the perseverance of suffrage leaders through the Jim Crow years into the reform era of Progressivism, and centers the activism of African American women, led by Ida B. Wells-Barnett, who demanded voting rights even as white suffragists ignored them.

Discussant: Cathy Connolly, Professor, Gender and Women’s Studies

Dr. Connolly’s research involves an examination of social stratification and institutions, particularly the law and the economy. She has published pieces that address issues in Wyoming including the wage gap between men and women, and gay rights. In 2008, Cathy was elected to serve in the Wyoming House of Representatives, representing House District 13 in Laramie. In her legislative capacity, Connolly has also earned certificates from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and Western Legislative academy for state leaders.

Moderator: Renee Laegreid, Professor, History, University of Wyoming

Renee Martini Laegreid specializes in the history of the American West, with a focus on gender and culture in the late nineteenth to mid- twentieth century. Dr. Laegreid has served as the UW faculty representative on the Governor’s Council for the Women’s Suffrage Celebration.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

15 October 2020:

“A Conversation With University of Wyoming President Edward Seidel and Dr. Gabrielle Allen”

Our discussion includes a vision for the Land Grant University mission in the 21st century and how the University of Wyoming can meet the statewide and global challenges we face.

Dr. Edward Seidel is the University of Wyoming's 28th president. Previously, in the University of Illinois System, he was Vice President for Economic Development and Innovation; leader of the Illinois Innovation Network; Founding Interim Director of the Discovery Partners Institute; Founder Professor, Department of Physics; Professor, Departments of Astronomy and Computer Science, Institute for Sustainability, Energy and Environment; and Senior Research Scientist and Former Director at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications.

Dr. Gabrielle Allen has been associate dean for research in the College of Education, professor in the Departments of Astronomy and Curriculum and Instruction, and research professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

01 October 2020:

“Moving Walls, Past and Present”

This talk begins a larger symposium called "Conversations Beyond the Walls" hosted by the University of Wyoming Art Museum and American Studies Program in conjunction with the exhibition Moving Walls: Heart Mountain Barracks in the Big Horn Basin. The goals of this series are to honor the history of Japanese American peoples incarcerated in Wyoming and beyond, and to integrate arts with complex cultural issues. In doing so, we hope to look at an historical event to address contemporary narratives such as global human migrations, dis/placement of peoples, power and control, empathy and belonging, homesteading, resiliency, diversity, and social justice issues of today. Visit the UW Art Museum website for details and registration information.

Our Speakers:

Dr. Adam Blackler, UW Assistant Professor of History

Jerry Fowler, J.D., Assistant Professor, UW College of Law

Jamie Crawford, J.D., UW Law School Golten Fellow in International Human Rights, Immigration Attorney

Aura Newlin, Board Member, Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation

This panel is moderated by Dr. Eric Sandeen, UW Emeritus Professor of American Studies; Heart Mountain Wyoming Foundation board member

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

17 September 2020:

“Rebuilding the American Dream”

We are in the midst of a global pandemic, of an awakening global awareness of racism and other “isms” of oppression (religious, gender, sexual orientation). Each of these alone is alarming and deserving of societal attention and change. Yet there is another pandemic in this country that has been mostly below the radar. Devastating unto itself, it also feeds the traumas of the issues mentioned above. Published in 2020, Tightrope: Americans Reaching for Hope, coauthored by Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, will form the basis for a Think & Drink conversation that promises to encompass many dimensions of current affairs.

According to The Washington Post, Kristof "rewrote opinion journalism" with his emphasis on human rights abuses and social injustices, such as human trafficking and the Darfur conflict. Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa has described Kristof as an "honorary African" for shining a spotlight on neglected conflicts.

The panel will be moderated by Ken Gerow.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

03 September 2020:

“Querencia: A Love or Attachment to a Place”

This panel brings together four contributors of the new anthology Querencia: Reflections on the New Mexico Homeland to reflect on their distinct relationships with New Mexico that have led to personal and scholarly pursuits of their querencia, a love or attachment to place. Join us as we discuss our connections to home, our investments in the state of New Mexico and how we are tackling new areas of scholarly research from different perspectives. We’ll talk about abolishing conquistador monuments, histories of resistance to nuclear occupation, union strikes, and how communities create alternative regional narratives to contest notions of American patriotism.

Our panelists:

Dr. Vanessa Fonseca-Chávez, Assistant Professor of English at Arizona State University

Dr. Myrriah Gómez, Assistant Professor, Honors College, University of New Mexico

Dr. Karen R. Roybal, Assistant Professor of Southwest Studies at Colorado College

Dr. Lillian Gorman, Director of the Spanish as a Heritage Language Program and Assistant Professor in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of Arizona

Moderator:

Dr. Scott Henkel, director of the Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research and associate professor in the Department of English and the Department of African American and Diaspora Studies at the University of Wyoming.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

20 August 2020:

“Taking on Technoculture: Unpacking Images, Media, and Objects.”

While technology is often associated with greater objectivity, neutrality, and efficiency, critical humanities scholarship has demonstrated how technologies are constituted within, and often actively reproduce, unequal power dynamics in society. This interdisciplinary panel will turn common-sense beliefs about technology on their head in order to highlight the embedded value judgements, power relations, and historical roots and resonances that condition how technologies shape society and culture. Drawing from both their research and teaching, panelists will discuss how they challenge received understandings about technology in order to highlight its relationship to issues of ethics, equity, and racial justice. Their discussion will tackle how technologies intersect with policing, surveillance, and racial violence, and shape understandings of the self, others, and society. The panelists' hope is that participants will leave the conversation with a greater awareness of how technologies can challenge and contribute to both oppressive and emancipatory futures.

Our panelists:

Megha Anwer, clinical assistant professor and the Director of Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity at Purdue University’s Honors College

Faithe Day, CLIR Postdoctoral Fellow in Data Curation within the Libraries and School of Information Studies and African American Studies and Research Center at Purdue University

Lindsay Weinberg, Clinical Assistant Professor in the Honors College at Purdue University

Moderator:

Dr. Scott Henkel, director of the Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research and associate professor in the Department of English and the Department of African American and Diaspora Studies at the University of Wyoming.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

06 August 2020:

“The History and Reality of Protest and Race in America”

Dr. Martin Luther King once said, "riots are the language of the unheard." It remains of upper importance to critically analyze this quote as a means to dissect the history of protest in America. This panel will examine the history and reality of protest in America with the primary focus on the impact of race on social movements. This conversation will center specific social movements, including the American lynching movement, civil rights, Black Power, and Black Lives Matter, to investigate the differences and similarities of social conditions that sparked these movements. The panel participants will discuss if the current protest over the death of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor will change the systematic inequalities that constitute white privilege.

Our panelists:

Dr. Sundiata Cha-Jua, Professor, African American Studies and History, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

Dr. Leslie McLemore Professor Emeritus, Jackson State University

Dr. David Stovall, Professor, University of Illinois-Chicago

This panel is moderated by Dr. Fredrick Douglass Dixon and introduced by Bethann Garramon Merkle.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

23 July 2020:  

“Billionaire Wilderness: The Future of Wealth and the West”  

This week’s Think & Drink featured a book talk with Dr. Justin Farrell, author of “Billionaire Wilderness: The Ultra-Wealthy and the Remaking of the American West.”  Justin Farrell is a professor and author at Yale University, and proud first-generation college student from Wyoming. His research tackles questions of environment, politics, human culture, and policy using a mixture of methods, blending ethnographic fieldwork with large-scale computational techniques from network science and machine learning. His books and articles have won national awards, and were used in his recent testimony before the U.S. Senate Special Committee on the Climate Crisis. Justin teaches classes on the American West, public lands, and research methods.  

Billionaire Wilderness takes you inside the exclusive world of the ultra-wealthy, showing how today's richest people are using the natural environment to solve the existential dilemmas they face. Justin Farrell spent five years in Teton County, Wyoming, the richest county in the United States, and a community where income inequality is the worst in the nation. He conducted hundreds of in-depth interviews, gaining unprecedented access to tech CEOs, Wall Street financiers, oil magnates, and other prominent figures in business and politics. He also talked with the rural poor who live among the ultra-wealthy and often work for them. The result is a penetrating account of the far-reaching consequences of the massive accrual of wealth, and an eye-opening and sometimes troubling portrait of a changing American West where romanticizing rural poverty and conserving nature can be lucrative―socially as well as financially.   Moderator: Dr. Scott Henkel, director of the Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research and associate professor in the Department of English and the Department of African American and Diaspora Studies at the University of Wyoming.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

09 July 2020:

“What We’ve Lost, What We’ve Found: Three Creative Writers on Responding to Environmental Change”

This week’s Think & Drink topic is "What We’ve Lost, What We’ve Found: Three Creative Writers on Responding to Environmental Change." In this program, three authors of time-and-place memoirs will discuss their encounters with loss and change in the natural environments and cultures associated with their work.  Such encounters invite choices and concerns as to voice, form, subject matter, and more. What does one include or leave out, and why? How effective are overt opinions and messages in personal reflections? How can one person’s story make a difference in a time when many stories, many issues, compete for attention? Finally, they will address aspects of losing and finding during the coronavirus pandemic. What has this global infection taught us?

Our speakers are Janisse Ray, Ann McCutchan, and Drew Lanham.

Nature writer and environmental activist Janisse Ray’s first book, Ecology of a Cracker Childhood, brought attention to the loss of the longleaf pine ecosystem that covered the pre-settlement Southern coastal plains. Her work resulted in the rise of communities calling for its restoration, with millions of acres of longleaf pine replanted. Ray has won an American Book Award and the Eisenberg Award for Writing that Makes a Difference. She lives on an organic farm in coastal Georgia.

Ann McCutchan’s fourth book River Music: An Atchafalaya Story, follows Acadian sound documentarian Earl Robicheaux on a musical, visual, literary, and historical tour of Louisiana’s Atchafalaya River basin, where bayous, swamps, marshes, and river delta country have long sustained nature and culture, even as industry has changed the landscape and the people. McCutchan has received awards from the Association of Educational Publishers and the Texas Institute of Letters.  She lives in Wyoming.

A native of Edgefield, South Carolina, Drew Lanham is the author of  The Home Place: Memoirs of a Colored Man’s Love Affair with Nature which received the Reed Award from the Southern Environmental Law Center and the Southern Book Prize, and was a finalist for the John Burroughs Medal. He is a birder, naturalist, and hunter-conservationist. Lanham studied zoology and ecology at Clemson University, where he earned a PhD in 1997 and where he currently holds an endowed chair as an Alumni Distinguished Professor.

The panel will be moderated by Ken Gerow, professor of statistics at the University of Wyoming, and a member of the Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research steering committee.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

25 June 2020:

“Race, Protest, and Democracy”

Protests against racial injustice have erupted in the past weeks--in small Wyoming towns and in cities around the world. The Black Lives Matter marches and movement shine a light on racial injustice, the militarization of police in the United States, the crisis of mass incarceration, and more. What do these uprisings tell us about political change? How do the current uprisings fit into the history of protest? How to understand the uprisings together with the COVID pandemic, which has hit communities of color particularly hard? How to understand the relationship between the uprisings and the upcoming election?

Speakers:

Dr. Cedric de Leon, who is Director of the UMass Amherst Labor Center and Professor of Sociology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. His research is on race, labor, and party politics in the United States, India, and Turkey. He has written five books, including Crisis! When Political Parties Lose the Consent to Rule and The Origins of Right to Work. In a previous life, he was an organizer, rank-and-file activist, and local union president in the American Labor Movement.

Dr. Robyn Spencer, who is a historian that focuses on Black social protest after World War II, urban and working-class radicalism, and gender. In 2018-2019 she was Women’s and Gender Studies Visiting Endowed Chair at Brooklyn College, CUNY and she is currently an Associate Professor of History at Lehman College. She has written widely about the Black Freedom movement. Her book The Revolution Has Come:  Black Power, Gender, and the Black Panther Party in Oakland was published in 2016.

Dr. Lilia Soto, who is an Associate Professor of American Studies and Latina/o Studies at the University of Wyoming with affiliations in the Gender and Women’s Studies Program and the International Studies Program.  She received her Ph.D. in Comparative Ethnic Studies from the University of California, Berkeley in 2008.  Currently, Soto is the Director of the Latina/o Studies Program and Associate Director of the School of Culture, Gender, and Social Justice. Soto’s first book, Girlhood in the Borderlands: Mexican Teens Caught in the Crossroads of Migration published in 2018 by New York University Press-Nation of Nation Series, couples the temporalities of migration with age, gender, and sex as intersecting categories of analyses and the bearing these have on the lived experiences of Mexican teenage girls raised in transnational families.

Moderator:

Dr. Scott Henkel, director of the Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research and associate professor in the Department of English and the Department of African American and Diaspora Studies at the University of Wyoming.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

11 June 2020:

“Economies of COVID-19: Is Social Distancing Worth It?”

Social distancing saves lives but imposes costs on society due to reduced economic activity. We use epidemiological and economic forecasting to perform a rapid benefit-cost analysis of controlling the COVID-19 outbreak. A key unknown factor is the speed of economic recovery with and without social distancing measures in place. Does it work? Is it worth it?

Speakers:

Linda Thunström, Department of Economics, University of Wyoming

Steve Newbold, Department of Economics, University of Wyoming

Jason Shogren, Department of Economics, University of Wyoming

Moderator:

Ken Gerow, professor of statistics at the University of Wyoming, and a member of the Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research steering committee.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

28 May 2020:

“Misinformation, Militia Maneuvering, and Moving Forward in the Age of Pandemic”

Speakers:

Betsy Gaines Quammen, author of “American Zion: Cliven Bundy,” “God and Public Lands in the West.”

David Quammen, author of “Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic.”

The Bundy family, who are Mormon, are currently agitating against disease related restrictions. What does it mean and what does it cost, in the midst of a pandemic, when sectors of our population believe science is a hoax? How is the pandemic being handled nationally amid contagion, conspiracy theorizing, militia saber-rattling, and economic hardships?

Moderator:

Ken Gerow, professor of statistics at the University of Wyoming, and a member of the Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research steering committee.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

14 May 2020

“A Historical Perspective on Politics in Times of Crisis”

Speakers:

Adam Blackler, University of Wyoming

Kathryn Julian, Westminster College

Lauren Stokes, Northwestern University

Moderator:

Ken Gerow, University of Wyoming

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

7 May 2020

"Pandemics in Historical Perspective"

Speakers:

Michael Christopher Low, Iowa State University

Elise A. Mitchell, New York University

Jacob Steere-Williams, College of Charleston

Moderator:

Dr. Melissa Morris, assistant professor of History and American Studies and member of the Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research steering committee

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

30 April 2020:

"Democracy in America and Around the World: Pre and Post Covid-19."

This event is co-sponsored by the Wyoming Humanities Council and the UW Office of Engagement and Outreach.

Speakers:

Dr. James Arvanitakis, Milward L. Simpson Visiting Fulbright Professor, School of Politics Public Affairs and International Studies, University of Wyoming; Associate Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies at Western Sydney University

Dr. Jason McConnell, Assistant Professor of Political Science, School of Politics, Public Affairs and International Studies

The panel will be moderated by Dr. Jean Garrison, Director of the Office of Engagement and Outreach and Professor of International Studies and Political Science.

This event is also part of the Malcolm Wallop Civic Engagement Project and the Mellon Foundation Democracy and the Informed Citizen Initiative.

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

This podcast is part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

23 April 2020:

“Women and Wyoming's Politics”

Speakers:

Senator Tara Nethercott, Wyoming State Senate District 4, and Partner with Woodhouse Roden Nethercott, LLC

Britney Wallesch, Founder and Executive Director of Black Dog Animal Rescue and candidate, Wyoming State Senate, District 6

Rebekah Smith, Director, Wyoming Women's Foundation

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.

These videos are part of our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.

16 April 2020:

“Healing Individuals, Healing Communities”

Speakers:

Dr. Mary E. Burman, Professor, Fay W. Whitney School of Nursing

Dr. Matt Gray, Professor of Psychology

Jess Ryan, MS, Owner of Our Real Work

The Wyoming Institute for Humanities Research strives to be an engine for producing interdisciplinary research in the humanities; a community for faculty, students, and the public; and a model of democratic education fit for our land-grant university.  

These podcasts are from our Think & Drink series of talks, which are informal conversations by humanities faculty, researchers, and practitioners on a range of topics.   

9 April 2020:  

“Dr. Eric Hayot: How to Think Like a Humanist, and Why."  

Speaker:   

Dr. Eric Hayot is a distinguished Professor of Comparative Literature and Asian Studies and Director of the Center for Humanities and Information at the Pennsylvania State University. He is the author of several books, including "On Literary Worlds" (Oxford, 2012), and "The Elements of Academic Style" (Columbia, 2014).