April 2002  

Dear Colleagues,

We are nearing the end of our academic year, one that has been a difficult passage for all of us, beginning with the tragic events of Sept. 11 and ending with disappointing news about our state and university budget. Despite our less than hoped for funding, we will persist in working to maintain and enhance the quality of our liberal arts programs. With the help of our Dean’s Advisory Committee on Resource Allocation and the excellent work of our department chairs and program directors, we will adjust to the budget shortfall while still making progress on our goals. If you were not able to attend my annual college address at the end of last month, I invite you to read the text which will appear this month on our college Web site (libarts.wsu.edu). I outline there a course for our future that offers promising possibilities for enhancing the diversity and quality of our offerings through new programming and increased attention to developing external funding.

The month of April gives us the opportunity to celebrate our achievements this year, which have been many. This month, we began with the rededication of the Kimbrough Building on April 4, featuring a new composition for voice and chamber orchestra by Charles Argersinger, performed expertly by our music students. And the same day at the annual Faculty Honors Convocation, we honored Fran McSweeney, winner of this year’s Sahlin Award for Excellence in Research, Scholarship and Arts, and Don Dillman, recipient of the second university Eminent Faculty Award. In his first address to the University that day, our new provost, Robert Bates, pledged his commitment to continuing and enhancing our support of faculty excellence.

I hope that your schedules permit you to take advantage of some of the outstanding programs that our departments and programs have scheduled for this month, from the internationally acclaimed Inland Northwest Philosophy Conference, co-sponsored by the Philosophy Departments of Washington State University and the University of Idaho, to the numerous music and theatre productions by our School of Music and Theatre Arts, including the drama “Dancing at Lughnasa” and concerts by our Madrigal singers, the Crimson Revue, Big Band II and our dance program. And I invite all of you to join with the faculty and students of the Edward R. Murrow School of Communication for Daniel Schorr’s keynote address at the Murrow Symposium, to be given at 7 p.m. in Beasley Colisum on April 10.

Finally, I wish to extend a personal invitation to each of you to attend our College Awards Ceremony at 3:30 p.m. on April 26 to be held in the new Samuel Smith Center for Undergraduate Education. If there were ever a time that we need to draw together and support one another for the good things that we do, it is now. The afternoon promises to be a joyful one in the pleasant company of our colleagues. I hope that I will see you there.

As always, my best wishes to you in your continued work in scholarship, teaching and service to the University.

Barbara Couture
Dean, College of Liberal Arts

Alex Kuo, acting chair of the Department of Comparative American Cultures, professor of English and Washington State University’s first Writer-in-Residence, has been selected to receive an American Book Award for his collection of short stories, Lipstick and Other Stories. This is Kuo’s sixth published work and his first collection of short stories.
     The award, to be presented May 3 in New York City, recognizes excellence and multicultural diversity in American writing.

In June and July, Robert E. Ackerman (Anthropology) will spend three weeks as a participant in a joint American-Russian expedition to Zhukov Island off the Arctic coast of Siberia. An 8,000-year-old frozen site was discovered on the island by Russian archaeologists in the early 1990s. Further excavations will continue to uncover preserved organic tools and remains of dwellings. Tools of antler, bone and ivory have been recovered with slots cut along the edges for the insertion of stone microblades. These tools indicate that a late continuation of the late Upper Paleolithic of central Siberia was present on the island when it was still a part of the mainland.

John Irby (Communication) was one of 16 journalism professors across the country selected to participate in the “Diversity Across the Curriculum” seminar to be held in early June in St. Petersburg, Fla. at the Poynter Institute. He was awarded a full fellowship including registration, airfare and hotel costs.

The WSU Madrigal Singers, conducted by Lori Wiest (Music), traveled to California March 16-22 to perform at Disneyland, Medieval Times and Anaheim United Methodist Church, and they participated in a Vocal Industry Workshop at Disneyland where they did a studio recording and learned professional studio and audition skills. The Madrigal Singers also attended a taping of “The Price Is Right” where one member, Todd Anderson (undergraduate, Hotel and Restaurant Administration), was selected to play the game and won prizes. Bob Barker also invited the Madrigal Singers to sing 20 seconds on the show, which will be broadcast April 25.

William Hamlin (English) has been awarded a Senior Scholar Research Grant from the Renaissance Society of America. The grant will enable him to travel to Britain in the summer of 2003 to pursue his current research on tragedy and skepticism.

Michael Allen (Sociology) and Anne Lincoln (PhD candidate, Sociology) will present their paper entitled “Intersections of Gender and Age in Hollywood: The Careers of Film Stars, 1928-1999” at a session entitled “Career Processes in Organizations, Professions, and Labor Markets” of the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association in Chicago in August.

Camille Roman (English) has been selected for the editorial board of the journal Twentieth-Century Literature, one of the leading journals in modern and contemporary literature.

Jon Hasbrouck, Sandy Bassett, Leslie Power and Linda Vogel (all Speech and Hearing Sciences) are conducting a series of workshops this spring focused on group therapy procedures for speech-language pathologists. The seminars are offered at St. Luke’s Rehabilitation Institute in Spokane.

José Alamillo (Comparative American Cultures) has been offered a postdoctoral fellowship from the University of California, Los Angeles’ Institute of American Cultures and the Chicano Studies Research Center for the 2002-2003 school year.

Val Limburg (Communication) gave a public address sponsored by the Foley Institute and Pi Sigma Alpha on March 5 on “9/11 and Media Reporting on a Higher Level.”

Stanton Linden (English) presented a paper, “Alchemical Satire in George Ripley’s Compound of Alchemy: The Chaucerian Legacy,” at a conference on “The Contribution of Alchemy to Medieval Medicine and Intellectual Life,” sponsored by the Well-come Unit for the History of Medicine at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, March 21-22. With recent publication of vol. 20, number 2, the journal Cauda Pavonis: Studies in Hermeticism has completed its 20th year under Linden’s editorship.

Gene Rosa (Sociology) was an invited group leader at the workshop “Reinventing the Use of Materials” at Princeton University Feb. 23-25.

In late May to early June, Ian Buvit and Karisa Terry (both PhD candidates, Anthropology) and their advisor, Robert E. Ackerman (Anthropology), will travel to the Chita District (east of Lake Baikal) of Russia. There they will confer with Drs. M.V. Konstantinov, V. Kolosov and S. Vasiliev of the Chita Pedagogical Institute and arrange doctoral dissertation research projects that will focus on the late Upper Paleolithic prehistory of the region.

William D. Lipe (professor emeritus, Anthropology) was honored at the annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology held March 20-24 in Denver. He and his work were the subject of a special symposium, “William D. Lipe: Researcher in Southwestern Archaeology, Leader in Public Archaeology.”
     March 28-30 the Department of Anthropology hosted the first William D. Lipe Visiting Scholar in Archaeological Method and Theory. The scholar was R. Lee Lyman, WSU alumnus and chair of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Missouri, Columbia.

Amy Mooney (Fine Arts) spoke at the Sept. 11 six-month commemorative art exhibit and reception held at the Museum of Art on March 11.

Barbara Sitko (English) presented a paper, “How University Freshman Writers Adapt an On-line Writing Environment to Revise,” at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association (AERA).

Faith Lutze (Political Science) has become a member of the executive board of the Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences. She was selected as the Western Region Trustee. In March she gave an invited presentation about alternatives to prison for National Public Radio’s “Northwest Edition” (KUOW–Tacoma).

Andrew Duff (Anthropology) was among the opening panel of speakers at the annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology in March with “Perspectives on Western Pueblo Ethnogenesis.”

Moon Lee (Communication), Carol Ivory (Fine Arts), Zheng-min Dong (Foreign Languages) and Susan Chan (Music) have received enhancement grants from the Asian American/Pacific Islander Faculty and Staff Association.

On March 2 David Stratton (professor emeritus, History) gave the luncheon talk at the 15th Annual Cougar Booster Club Luncheon and Golf Classic, WSU Southern California Alumni Association, at the Desert Island Country Club in Rancho Mirage, Cal. Stratton’s topic, “Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition,” concerned World War II historical events and cultural trends, including popular songs of the day. The luncheon attracted 125 WSU alumni and retired faculty, with about half that number participating in the golf classic.

Ann Christenson, director of ceramics at WSU, recently attended the National Conference for Educators in the Ceramic Arts, March 13-17 in Kansas City, Mo. She was accompanied by three graduate students of ceramics, Julia Cardone, Michelle Clesse and Lin Xu, and three undergraduate ceramics majors, Lisa Fowell, Jason Laurence and Lindsay Morris.

Keith Monaghan (professor emeritus, Fine Arts) passed away in November, only to be followed in death by his wife Dodi in January. The Monaghans, who made their home in Pullman for 53 years, were remembered at a special service in Pullman on April 6.

Greg Yasinitsky (Music) recently returned from California, where he presented clinics and performed as a guest artist with the USAF Commanders Jazz Band from Travis Air Force Base. Attendance for the concert was standing room only and the response was enthusiastic with multiple standing ovations.
     This summer, Yasinitsky will present a workshop on jazz composition at Centrum, the arts compound at Fort Wooden Park in Port Townsend, and will present a course on jazz techniques at the American Band College in Oregon. Also, Yasinitsky will appear as a guest artist with the Seattle Youth Jazz Ensemble, which will premiere his new composition commissioned by the SYJE, “Puerto Nuevo.”

Buddy Levy’s (English) story “Made For TV,” a feature profile on “Survivor” Executive Producer Mark Burnett, will appear as the cover story in the April/May issue of Hooked on the Outdoors magazine. Levy interviewed Burnett in Borneo and New Zealand, as well as Los Angeles, for the story.
     Slaton White, senior editor of Field & Stream, recently purchased an essay of Levy’s called “The Setting of Wings,” which will appear in the May/June issue. Additionally, Levy’s story “The Road to Hobbitville” will appear in the June issue of SKI, a national magazine. His profile on Olympic gold medalist Dan O’Brien, called “Dan the Man: Courting Immortality,” will appear in the July issue of Phoenix Magazine.

John Mann (History) has been selected to participate in the 2002 U.S. Military Academy Seminar in Military History. Mann recently completed his PhD requirements in the public history program.

The WSU Concert Choir, under the direction of Lori Wiest (Music), toured within the state of Washington from March 5-7, recruiting and performing six concerts for high school and junior high students. They also performed as part of a workshop presented by Wiest at the Northwest Division Convention of the American Choral Directors Association in Tacoma. The WSU Orchestra, conducted by L. Keating Johnson (Music), also toured with the choir March 5-6.

Jeannette Mageo (Anthropology) presented a paper titled “Mead and Critical Cultural Relativism” at the centennial meetings of the American Anthropological Association (AAA) last fall. She also presented “Dreams and Cultural Memory” at the biennial meetings of the Society for Psychological Anthropology.
     Mageo is also organizing a double session for the 2002 meetings of the AAA titled “How Should We Understand Human Subjectivities? A Dialogue.”

The Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences will hold an open house and reception for professional community colleagues in the new Health Sciences Building, WSU Spokane, April 30 from 4-6 p.m.

Barbara Couture (Dean, College of Liberal Arts) presented a paper, “Penny Smart and Pound Foolish: Why Freshman Composition Doesn’t Make It on the Street,” at the Conference on College Composition and Communication held March 21-23 in Chicago.

Amy Mazur’s (Political Science) book Theorizing Feminist Policy will be published this month by Oxford University Press.

Kevin Haas (Fine Arts) will participate in a group exhibit at the Lorinda Knight Gallery in Spokane, located at 523 W. Sprague. The opening reception will be 6-8 p.m. May 3 and is open to everyone. The exhibit runs through June 6.

Val Limburg (Communication) published a review of two history works in the March issue of the Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media titled “Who Was First? Recent Histories in Search of the ‘Real Fathers’ of Television.” He also has an article, “One Million Dads and TV Programming Ethics,” forthcoming in Media Ethics.

Paige Ouimette (Psychology) is co-editor of two books currently in press, Gender and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder: Clinical, Research, and Program Level Applications and Trauma and Substance Abuse: Causes, Consequences, and Treatment of Comorbid Disorders.

Andrew Duff (Anthropology) has just had a book published by University of Arizona Press, Western Pueblo Identities: Regional Interaction, Migration, and Transformation.

Richard Hines (General Education) will have an article in the fall issue of Montana: The Magazine of Western History titled “First to Respond to Their Country’s Call: The First Montana Volunteer Infantry and the Spanish-American War and Philippine Insurrection, 1889-1899.”

Carol Ivory’s (Fine Arts) article “Revisiting Late Nineteenth Century Sculpture in Te Henua Enana, the Marquesas Islands” has been published in Pacific 2000, Proceedings of the International Congress of Easter Island and Pacific Studies.

Tahira Probst’s (Psychology) chapter titled “Physical, mental, and sexual harassment in the workplace: Assessing the role of race, gender and sexual minority status” will appear in Handbook of Mental Health in the Workplace, due out in May.

New publications for Greg Yasinitsky (Music) include “Jambalaya,” “Magic Hour” and “Diamond Back,” all for jazz band.

Ann Christenson (Fine Arts) was featured at the Jayne Gallery as part of the “Floating Ceramic Sculpture” exhibit in connection with the National Conference for Educators in the Ceramic Arts. Her exhibit “Generations III” also ran in the New York City A.I.R. Gallery Feb. 26-March 15.

Maureen Schmitter-Edgecombe (Psychology) will publish “Effects of aging on implicit covariation learning” in Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition.

Jeannette Mageo (Anthropology) edited and wrote three chapters for a book to be published by SUNY Press, Dreaming and the Self: New Anthropological Perspectives.
     Mageo also has two articles accepted for publication in the Journal of Anthropological Research, “Towards a Multidimensional Model of the Self” and “Myth, Cultural Identity, and Ethnopolitics: Samoa and the Tongan Empire.”

Paula Williams (Psychology) has had “Examination of the neuroticism-symptom reporting relationship in patients with type 2 diabetes” accepted for publication in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.

Barbara Couture’s (Dean, College of Liberal Arts) chapter “Writing and Truth: Philosophy’s Role in Rhetorical Practice” appears in Rhetoric and Composition as Intellectual Work, recently published by Southern Illinois UP.

Nesaraj Vamadevan (MA candidate, Sociology) will present a paper entitled “Authenticity” in the social psychology section of the 2002 American Sociological Association annual meeting this August in Chicago.

Laurie Carlson (PhD candidate, History) presented a paper titled “Producing the Perfect Body: Cattle Breeding and Eugenics” at the American Society for Environmental History conference in Denver March 22. This paper drew from several strands of research Carlson has been pursuing at WSU.

Dallen J. Rose (MA candidate, English) has been invited to present papers at two international conferences this summer. His paper titled “John Cam Hobhouse’s Journey to Albania: Contextualizing, Confirming, and Complicating Orientalism in the Levant” will be part of the “Oriental Topographies” panel at the Romantic Orientalism conference in Wales, while his paper titled “‘A war more than civil’: Byron, Hobhouse, and the Matter of the Elgin Marbles” has been accepted for reading at the annual North American Society for the Study of Romanticism conference in Ontario, Canada.

Melissa Hubley and Ellannee Richardson, both Sociology undergraduate majors, were recently awarded Cougar Pride Academic Salute Awards. This award was created in 1998 to recognize 12 student athletes each year who best exhibit high ideals through academics, athletics and community service.

Michael Egan (PhD candidate, History) had an article published in the prominent European journal Environment and History titled “Subaltern Environmentalism in the United States: A Historiographic Review.” This article originated as a WSU graduate seminar paper.
     Additionally, Egan and another History graduate student, Jeff Crane, organized and presented papers on a panel at the American Society for Environmental History conference in Denver in March. The panel included presentations and comments from some of the leading scholars in the field of environmental history, including Samuel Hays, Vera Nor-wood and Robert Gottlieb.

Diane Curewitz (PhD candidate, Anthropology) was recently accepted as a Registered Professional Archaeologist.

Richard Kerr’s (MFA candidate) solo show of recent paintings ran March 7-29 at the Littman Gallery in the Smith Memorial Center of Portland State University.

Michelle Clesse (MFA candidate) opened three ceramic shows recently. Two were in Omaha, Neb., at the Period Gallery; “All Media IV” ran Feb. 7-28 and “Contemporary IV” ran March 6-27. Additionally, Clesse’s ceramics will be exhibited at the Dogwood Festival Invitational Art Exhibition April 5-27 at the Lewis-Clark Center for Arts and History in Lewiston, Idaho.

Julie Silvera-Jensen (MA candidate, Music) is co-winner of a Down Beat Student Music Award in the College Jazz Vocalist category. These international awards are highly competitive and determined by a distinguished panel of jazz professionals, who review recordings submitted by applicants from around the world.

Sara Ewert (PhD ’00, History), now teaching at Weber State University, organized and chaired a panel at the American Society for Environmental History conference on environmental activism in America in the 1960s and ‘70s.

Dorothy Zeisler-Vralsted (PhD ’87, History), assistant provost at the University of Wisconsin, LaCrosse, has received a $902,083 three-year American history teaching grant from the U.S. Department of Education. As project director, she will coordinate intensive, ongoing professional development in history education for 20 middle and high school teachers from various parts of Wisconsin. Next fall Zeisler-Vralsted will become chair of the UW-L history department.

Sam Regalado (PhD ‘87, History), professor and chair of history at California State University, Stanislaus, is a visiting professor at the University of Wisconsin, LaCrosse, this spring. He is conducting seminars and giving special presentations on his research specialty, Latinos in major league baseball, as well as consulting with students individually and with small groups.

Robert Droessler (MFA ’98, ceramics) and Brendan Regan (MFA ’97, photography) opened a two-person show at Gallery 63 Eleven in Seattle, which will run through April 10.

Of the eight-member MFA class of 2001, half are employed in their field of expertise, teaching at the college level. Joel Allen (sculpture) and Cynthia Zyzda (ceramics) are assistant professors of Fine Arts at Eastern Montana University, Billings. Karen Kaiser (drawing) is adjunct professor of Fine Arts at Spokane Community College. Ryan Belnap (photography) is adjunct professor of Fine Arts here at WSU. Ryan and Sarah Belnap (also MFA ‘01) are the proud parents of a daughter, Ashni, born March 24. She is 7 pounds, 8 ounces, and ready to make art!

Cary Collins (PhD ’01, History), a public school teacher in Maple Valley, Wash., has won his second Charles Gates Award, given jointly by the Washington State Historical Society and the Pacific Northwest Quarterly, published at the University of Washington, for the year’s best article by a beginning historian. His winning PNQ article, “A Future with a Past,” was on the Native American woman Hazel Pete. This is the first time anyone has won the award twice.

In December, Alabama Senator Larry Dixon (MA ’70, History) received the Auburn University Montgomery Alumni Associa-tion’s 2001 Community Service Award. The association credits Dixon with improving the quality of life of residents and increasing “the stature and prestige of AUM.” Senator Dixon is serving his fifth term in the Senate after serving one term in the House of Representatives.

Student Art Exhibits
The 2002 MFA Theses Exhibit will open at the WSU Museum of Art on Friday, April 12, and run through May 11. Students featured in the exhibit are:

Julia Cardone, ceramics
Richard Kerr, painting
Nik Meisel, sculpture
Rafael Mendoza, sculpture
Nathan Orosco, sculpture
Ann Porter, mixed media

Gallery II will exhibit the First Year Reviews of current graduate students in Fine Arts on the following dates:

April 8-12: Jeanne Mohr (painting), Grey Fowles (photography)
April 15-19: Debe White (drawing)
April 22-26: Lana Leishman (photography), Lance Sinnema (drawing)
April 29-May 3: Michelle Clesse (ceramics)
May 6-10: Leslie Holt (painting), Lin Xu (ceramics)

Gallery III BFA Senior Exhibitions will be ready for viewing beginning on the following dates:

April 8: Lindsay Morris, Kururu Murata
April 15: Wilbert Fields, Scott Stepaniuk, Erin Klasey
April 22: Jason Laurence, Rebecca Stiner, Christy Schontzler
April 29: Tyson Chester, Derek Wilkinson, Heidi Steinkraus
May 6: Penny Hummer, Jen Cole, Nick Keyser

Veteran CBS newsman and NPR senior political analyst Daniel Schorr will be the featured speaker at this year’s Edward R. Murrow Symposium on Wednesday, April 10. Schorr will be at the University’s bookstore from 10:30 to 11:45 a.m.to sign his book, Forgive Us Our Press Passes: America and the Media, which is also the title of his free public presentation at 7 p.m. that evening at Beasley Coliseum. The Emmy-winning broadcaster is the last of Murrow’s legendary CBS news team and helped start CNN with Ted Turner.

All are invited to attend the College of Liberal Arts Awards Ceremony, to be held Friday, April 26, at 3:30 p.m. in CUE 518.

The event will feature the Distinguished Faculty Award, Distinguished Alumni Award, Outstanding Staff Award, Outstanding Graduating Senior Award, Mullen Excellence in Teaching Award and the inaugural College Fellows Award and Dean’s Distinguished Contribution Award.

Two outstanding women from the College of Liberal Arts were recognized at the Women’s Recognition Luncheon held March 28.

Lori Irving, a Psychology faculty member at WSU Vancouver until her death last spring, was honored posthumously with the WSU Faculty Woman of Distinction Award. Irving was founder and coordinator of the Columbia River Eating Disorder Network, a community-based organization that provides education on the treatment and prevention of eating disorders. She advised the Vancouver campus’s GLBA, Psychology Club and NOW Club and was twice recognized by students for her teaching.

Schannae Lucas (PhD candidate, Political Science) received the WSU Student Woman of Distinction Award for her commitment to enhancing the lives of others through the promotion of diversity and community service. Lucas organized WSU’s “Week Against Hate,” and her research involves how treating drug offenders may impact women and people of color.

The College of Liberal Arts held its third Authors’ Recognition Ceremony March 29.

The ceremony began with the announcement that Alex Kuo (Comparative American Cultures, English) would receive the American Book Award for Lipstick and Other Stories.

Featured authors were Eloy González (Foreign Languages), Stanton Linden (English) and Raymond Sun (History). Jack Dollhausen (Fine Arts) displayed one of his interactive works of art, which flickered enthusiastically as the authors spoke about their books.

Following an intermission for conversation and refreshments, attendees were treated to a musical performance by jazz vocalist Julie Silvera-Jensen (MA candidate, Music), shown at right, accompanied by Charles Argersinger (Music) on keyboard.

The School of Music and Theatre Arts has been awarded $625,000 from the Allen Foundation for Music. The money will be used to complete the recording studio in the recently renovated Kimbrough Music Building.

“It’s the biggest thing that’s ever happened to the music program,” says Erich Lear, program chair of the Kimbrough project and former director of the School of Music and Theatre Arts.

It has been nearly 10 years since conversation began about refurbishing Kimbrough Music Building, and the dream included a recording studio. The revamp of the building was completed a year and a half ago, but funding to outfit the recording studio came up short. Today there is studio space, gleaming hardwood floors, acoustics and lighting, but no equipment. The custom cabinets and consoles are empty.

“This money will allow us to research and purchase the best and latest technology,” says James Schoepflin, director of the school. And it will happen quickly. The plan is to review the existing but dated equipment list, make revisions and substitutions where necessary, and purchase and install the equipment before the fall semester.

An existing position in the school is already earmarked for a recording engineer. An endowment fund for equipment and facility maintenance will be established with a portion of the funds received from the Allen Foundation for Music.

The Allen Foundation for Music supports creativity, innovation and public participation in all forms of American popular music. Through grants to projects and programs in the Pacific Northwest, the foundation promotes experimentation across disciplines, provides access to artists and art forms not readily available and encourages individuals to discover their own creative potential.