Faculty Spotlight 2024–2025

M/Otherhood examines intersections of gender and sexual identities, (non)normative social roles and responsibilities, and diverse modes of being and becoming associated with caretaking and taking care.

 Jocelyn Marshall, affiliated faculty in Visual & Media Arts and Writing, Literature & Publishing, and Homa Sarabi, Director of Production and affiliated faculty in Visual & Media Arts have an upcoming exhibition M/Otherhood presented by the FeministFuturists artist collective. 

Opening night is Sunday, January 12 from 12-2pm at the Parish Center for the Arts in Westford, MA.

How do we navigate the ongoing feminist concern for the violence of silence and/or being silenced, especially in regard to women and queer histories?

Jocelyn Marshall,  affiliated faculty in Visual & Media Arts and Writing, Literature, and Publishing, has recently had an academic book review published in JCMS: Journal of Cinema and Media Studies titled “Queer Way of Feeling: Girl Fans and Personal Archives of Early Hollywood by Diana W. Anselmo (review).”

Exploring and historicizing the ways fakeness has become embedded in an array of performative objects—software, TV, plastics, and the Internet—Assistant Professor Jucan links the residues and darker sides of Cartesian metaphysics with the ever-expanding purview of global capitalism.

Ioana Jucan’s, assistant professor at the Marlboro Institute, 2023 book Malicious Deceivers: Thinking Machines and Performative Objects  was awarded the New York University 2024 Callaway Prize for the Best Book on Drama, Theatre, and Performance Studies.

Mneesha Gellman was recently selected to be part of the Institutes of International Education IIE Global Community for Women’s Leadership (GCWL).

Mneesha Gellman, associate professor at the Marlboro Institute, was awarded the IIE Centennial Fellowship as part of the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program and is one of 50 recipients of the inaugural Global Community for Women’s Leadership (GCWL). The program connects past participants from more than 200 IIE-administered international exchange programs, with the aim to empower and equip emerging and established leaders from diverse professional fields, regions, and career stages.

Professor Claire Andrade-Watkins recently received a three-year grant from the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts (RISCA).

Claire Andrade-Watkins, professor in the Marlboro Institute for Liberal Arts & Interdisciplinary Studies, has been awarded a multi-year grant from the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts.  She will use her award to support digital and archival documentary projects,  cover studio expenses, archival and preservation supplies, digital/archival restoration, editing, travel, and research.  Read more in Emerson Today.

Mneesha Gellman has also received a $324,200 grant from Ascendium Education Solutions.

Mneesha Gellman, associate professor at the Marlboro Institute and director of the Emerson Prison Initiative, has been awarded the grant as part of a joint initiative with the American Institutes for Research called “Identifying and Scaling Programmatic Technical Assistance Resources in Higher Education in Prison.” The grant will support the Emerson Prison Initiative in refining and packaging a suite of resources aimed at program implementation and continuous improvement.

Emerson Professor featured in a collection of the year’s best essays, selected by Pulitzer Prize–winning critic Wesley Morris and series editor Kim Dana Kupperman.

WLP Distinguished Professor Jerald Walker has six essays appearing in the prestigious Best American Essays anthology in the upcoming 2024 edition.

What considerations and challenges emerge when a brand is getting ready to expand internationally?

Brent Smith, Dean of the School of Communication, and Sereikhuoch Eng, assistant professor in the department of marketing communication, have co-authored a chapter titled “BROWN Coffee and Bakery: Taking the Home-Brewed Success Internationally” in Utilizing Case Studies in Business Education (2024).

What social democratic strategies can be employed against far-right populist challenges?

Ian McManus, assistant professor at the Marlboro Institute for Liberal Arts & Interdisciplinary Studies, has co-authored a paper titled “A path forward: social democratic strategies and responses to far-right populist challenges” for the August 2024 issue of European Politics and Society journal.

How do tongue strengthening exercises impact exercise outcomes, adherence, and participant confidence and motivation?

Lindsay Griffin, assistant professor in the department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, co-authored a paper titled “Biofeedback and Exercise Load Affect Accuracy of Tongue Strength Exercise Performance” for the August 2024 issue of Dysphagia Journal.

What factors contribute to consumers’ willingness to pay premium prices for integrated offerings?

Sereikhuoch Eng, assistant professor in the department of marketing communication, has co-authored a paper titled “Consumers’ Willingness to Pay a Price Premium for Integrated Products: A Moderated Mediation Model of Hedonic Value and Perceived Quality” in the August 2024 issue of Journal of Marketing Development and Competitiveness.

What are various methods in cinema that can be used to constitute an anti-colonial practice for a filmmaker?

Kathryn Ramy, a filmmaker and anthropologist with the department of visual media and arts, has authored a chapter titled “Anti-Colonial Cinema Practices: Dialogical, Experimental, Photochemical Film Praxis in Puerto Rico” in The Palgrave Handbook of Experimental Cinema (September 2024).

How does imagining different relations to heritage in the context of present political claims around land, territoriality and culture lead to the possibility of life-sustaining transboundary survival?

Nelli Sargsyan, associate professor at the department of Marlboro Institute for Liberal Arts & Interdisciplinary Studies, has co-authored an article titled “Life-sustaining transboundary survival: rethinking Armenian struggles for heritage” in the September 2024 issue of International Journal of Heritage Studies.

What are the implications of result findings that indicate that commonly used standardized language tests do not adequately predict language irregularities produced by some older autistic children and adolescents during spontaneous discourse?

Ruth Grossman, professor in the department of Communication Sciences and Disorders, has co-authored a paper titled “Normal but Different: Autistic Adolescents Who Score Within Normal Ranges on Standardized Language Tests Produce Frequent Linguistic Irregularities in Spontaneous Discourse” in the September 2024 issue of Autism & Developmental Language Impairments.

How have contemporary Afro-Latin American novelists transformed a centuries-old European genre to address key aspects of the diaspora in various Caribbean and Latin American countries?

Rosario Swanson, professor with the department of writing, literature and publishing, has published an article titled “Coming of Age in the Afro-Latin American Novel: Blackness, Religion, Immigration” in the October 2024 issue of the Canadian Journal of African Studies.

What are current media visibility and representation challenges for Afghans in American cultural imagination?

Hazeta Atef, assistant professor with the Department of Journalism, has authored an article titled “The Representation of Afghans in the American Sitcom United States of Al: Examining the Burden of Representation and Challenges of Media Visibility” for the October 2024 issue of Howard Journal of Communication.

What key takeaways can we provide esports professionals and enthusiasts from an analysis of real-world examples, case studies, and future trends to gain insight into the industry’s dynamic nature?

Kevin Mitchell, professor from the Department of Communication Studies, has co-authored a chapter titled “Esports Public Relations” in the Routledge for Handbook of Esports (2024).

How can we make space for equitable civic and educational experiences by adopting a framework of structure, action, and agency in service of an imagined and inclusive future?

Paul Mihailidis, professor from the Department of Journalism, has co-authored an article titled “Developing a framework for equitable media literacy practice: Voices from the field” for the August 2024 issue of Community, Culture, and Critique.

How are Venezuelan migrants framed in newspapers based in Trinidad and Tobago?

Sharifa Simon-Roberts, assistant professor from the Department of Communication Studies, has co-authored an articled titled “In Search of a Safe Harbour: The Framing of Venezuelan Migrants in Mainstream Newspapers in Trinidad and Tobago” for the October 2024 issue of Migration and Development.