The Office of Student Academic Grants and Awards announced the 2016 Carson undergraduate summer research grants and College Colloquium summer research grants. The following list includes the student name, sponsor, working title and short description of each research project.
2016 Carson Undergraduate Summer Research grants
Madelon Bergan (sponsor Pam Moro, Anthropology)
A Temporary Chamber Ensemble as a Community: Exploring the Role of Adult Music-Making as an Affinity Group
The project includes attending and documenting the history of the annual Ashland Chamber Music Festival, analyzing it from the perspective of anthropology as an affinity group.
Emma Giron (sponsor Tabitha Knight, Economics)
Determining Possible Relationships Between the Real Minimum Wage and the Cost of Living in Seattle
The project examines the impact of the minimum wage increase in Seattle, Washington.
Ari Hoffman (sponsor Rebecca Dobkins, Anthropology)
Learning from Tucson’s Mexican American Studies Project: San Francisco’s Ethnic Studies Future through the Looking Glass
The project explores the history, curriculum and pedagogy of the Tucson Unified School District’s Mexican American Studies Department, and the lessons it provides as San Francisco Unified School District prepares for and develops its own ethnic studies programs.
Madison Immel (sponsor David Gutterman, Politics)
Walking as Exploration in Cities and Mountains
The project will explore walking as a practice through literature and the creation of a collection of written work.
Abigail Lahnert (sponsor: Sarah Sentilles, Religious Studies)
Museums of the Odd: An exploration of what we value and the human relationship to objects
The project explores the impulse of collecting and the creation of cultural value through unusual collections and museums that collect them.
Carol Li (sponsor: Maegan Parker Brooks, CCM)
Discourses of Aloha: Understanding the Colonial Paradise that is Hawai’i
Analyzes the discourses of Hawai’i as an exotic paradise, to examine the effects of colonialization on Hawai’i’s institutions, people, and culture.
Lindsay Lutes and Abigail Manoucheri (sponsor: Susan Coromel, Theatre)
Vincent and Jo: The Story of How Vincent Van Gogh became Vincent Van Gogh
The students will research and illuminate the life of Johanna Van Gogh and her connection to and influence upon the legacy of her brother-in-law, Vincent Van Gogh, the artist, through writing and producing a solo performance piece focusing on Johanna.
Kees McGahan (sponsor: Briana Lindh, Biology)
Modeling Plant Phenology Changes with Climate Factors
Plant communities are being negatively impacted by anthropogenic global warming. Typically changes in plant phenology are modeled using only temperature variables. Using a unique 50-year dataset from the Willamette campus, this project will find which variables best describe the changes in plant flowering date and then model these changes.
Ellen Rumley (sponsor: David Altman, Physics)
Measuring the Effect of a Myosin Mutation Associated with Heart Disease on Trafficking by Multiple Motors
Myosin are motor proteins that convert chemicals into mechanical energy to move across actin in cells. Recently, specific myosin mutations have been linked to a heart disease (HCM). The project aims to study the kinetics of these mutations in multiple-motor conditions to pinpoint properties that potentially contribute towards development of HCM.
Phoebe Wagner (sponsor: Rebecca Dobkins, Anthropology)
Decolonizing Cultural Education: A Study of Māori Language, Arts and Crafts in Rotorua, New Zealand
The project investigates the effects of cultural education within indigenous communities. The process of decolonizing education will be examined within culturally-competent curricula in New Zealand schools.
Zachary Ward (sponsor: David Gutterman, Politics)
No Country for Old Religion
This project will seek to understand the interaction between religious nones and sacred spaces. It will pay special attention to different types of sacred experiences, and attempt to document and digitize each for the outside viewer.
College Colloquium Student Research grants
Benjamin Bajema (sponsor, Cecily McCaffrey, History)
Injustices of Japanese American Internment During WWII
Benjamin will travel to Japanese American Internment Camps in the Southwest to better understand life in the camps; he will document the experience through photography and translate his findings into a traditional Japanese print.
Michael Chergosky (sponsor, Sally Markowitz, Philosophy, and John Peel, music):
Undertow
Since the 1950’s, musicians and other artists in the West have become increasingly influenced by Buddhism. In the spirit of John Cage, among the first to apply Buddhist thought to his work, Michael intends to write a piece of music for an ensemble of bull kelp (Nereocystis sp.) and piano.
Gonzalo Garcia Reyes (sponsor: Janet Lorenzen, Sociology)
Activism and the Visibility of Trans Issues Within the Larger Context of the LGBTQ+ Movement
The project will explore “issues of activism and identity relating to detained undocumented trans people of color,” analyzing “maintenance of identity in such confining situations, as well as their construction of this situation as a social problem.”
Nora Kirsch (sponsor: Ana Montero, Spanish):
Between the Holy and the Erotic: Medieval Sexuality and Church Architecture in Spain
The project will examine erotic sculptures on Spanish Romanesque churches to understand connection between medieval religion and sexuality, and contemporary sexuality.
Olivia Orosco (sponsor: David Gutterman, Politics):
Exploring Payments for Ecosystems Services: A Photojournalistic Approach
The project will document the human reality behind Payments for Ecosystem Services in Guatemala’s Western Highlands. The photographs and the personal stories they tell will be “powerful tools in humanizing the environmental crisis, consequently promoting compassion and hopefully inciting action against the climate change that threatens us all.”