Faculty

English Professor and Graduate Students to Present Keynote Panel

October 2, 2020

From left to right: Stephany Bravo, Emery Petchauer, Vanessa Aguilar Emery Petchauer, Associate Professor in the Department of English, will virtually present a keynote panel, “Breaking and Making: Hip-Hop Aesthetics Across Place, Sound, and the Moving Image,” along with graduate students Jared Millburn, Vanessa Aguilar, and Stephany Bravo as part of the Sound Studies, Writing, and Rhetoric Conference. The graduate…

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Emergency Response Archive of Puerto Rico Receives Mellon Foundation Grant

October 1, 2020

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation has awarded Michigan State University a $325,000 grant to support the first phase of the “Emergency Response Archive of Puerto Rico,” a digital open-access repository of Puerto Rican artifacts of disasters pertaining to Hurricane María (2017), the Guayanilla earthquakes (2020), and COVID-19 (2020). The project involves collaboration between MSU, the University of Puerto Rico-Río Piedras,…

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Putting Tests to the Test: Assessing High-Stakes Exams for Second Language Learners

September 11, 2020

While earning undergraduate degrees in French and Philosophy, Paula Winke was inspired to blend her interests in language learning, research, and social justice. Today, she’s an applied linguist, researching the ethics and effectiveness of foreign language testing as Professor in the Department of Linguistics and Germanic, Slavic, Asian, and African Languages and Director of the Second Language Studies Program Winke works in foreign language…

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Closing the Health Care Gap Through Patient Engagement, Partnership

August 10, 2020

Michigan State University researchers have been awarded a $3.75 million grant from the National Institutes of Health for research focused on decreasing cardiovascular disease risk morbidity and mortality for minority and low-income populations with diabetes mellitus. Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of diabetes-related morbidity and mortality. The researchers have found that better patient engagement and communication between patients and physicians may…

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Professor Publishes Poetry Compilation Addressing Trump Administration

July 16, 2020

Cheryl Caesar, Associate Professor in the Department of Writing, Rhetoric, and American Cultures, recently published a book, Flatman: Poems of Protest in the Trump Era, which is a compilation of 40 poems that explore the actions of the Trump administration from September 2018 to May 2019. It’s an artistic response to the emotions evoked within Caesar during the Trump presidency. “The process of writing this…

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Renovating Learning Through Compassion and Innovation

July 13, 2020

After 10 years and two terms as Chairperson of Michigan State University’s Department of Theatre, Professor Kirk Domer is returning to the faculty. His time as Chairperson, he says, has been defined by three words: renovation, innovation, and compassion. He has built a reputation of leading from a place of compassionate and collaborative risk-taking, using the art of theatre to serve as a civilizing agent in society. He summed up his tenure as Chairperson by saying: “My goal has…

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Paula Winke Named Director of Second Language Studies

July 7, 2020

Paula Winke, Professor in the Department of Linguistics and Germanic, Slavic, Asian, and African Languages, has been appointed Director of the Second Language Studies Program in the College of Arts & Letters, effective August 16, 2020, through August 15, 2024. The Second Language Studies (SLS) Program is an interdisciplinary research and pedagogy program whose members investigate the acquisition and teaching…

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Examining the Power of Pop Culture to Shape Perception, Issues, and Trends

July 2, 2020

Kinitra Brooks grew up connecting ideas, asking questions, and demanding the freedom to do so. Today, the Associate Professor in MSU’s Department of English continues to push boundaries through her study of Black women, genre fiction, popular culture, and the work of conjure women as intellectual history. “Basically, I teach and research Black women creating weird stuff,” Brooks said. “That includes Black women…