Please join us in congratulating Professor Jeremy Pressman for being selected as the recipient of the Graduate Faculty Career Mentor of the Year Award for the 2021-2022 academic year!
Congratulations to all of our 2022 POLS Award Recipients! The ceremony was wonderful and we are proud of all of you for your accomplishments!
This week for People of POLS we interviewed Professor Hertel! Swipe or keep reading below to see the interview!
Why political science?
For me, I have a very interdisciplinary Undergraduate degree, I majored in International Relations, and I also did a master's in international Affairs which was interdisciplinary as well. They often drew on History, Economics, Political Science, and area studies. I found that I really needed a single tool kit that would help me define myself within a field as opposed to being so interdisciplinary that it was hard to know what that tool kit was. I wanted to focus on institutions that marginalize people, I was really interested in how people stay poor, not as a fault of their own, but rather imbedded in systems of oppression and marginalization. Political Science gave me a chance to really look at the institutions that affect people's lives and the way that people shape their own institutional responses to that through social protest and mobilization. So, Political Science because I’m interested in Politics as a field because I'm really interested in potential ways of changing the structures that give rise to people's marginalization.
If you could go back in time and meet any political figure, who would it be and why?
Eleanor Roosevelt. I have always been really interested in economic justice issues and I am a Human Rights scholar with a focus on economic rights. I think Eleanor Roosevelt both helped us establish the modern Post WWII Human Rights framework by leading the process for the drafting of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. She also married that with very profound social activism in the United States around racial and economic justice and I just find her a very compelling and interesting person. I am extremely intrigued by a person who uses their privilege, voice, and space in society to make a difference. She came from a very elite background and she had some significant family challenges to overcome but instead of being embittered or inwardly focused she chose to use that adversity as a spring board to helping other people overcome adversity.
We would like to extend another congratulations to Professor Orozco Mendoza and Professor Ahmed Zaki for being University of Connecticut Humanities Institute Scholars!
This week UConn celebrated the promotion and tenure of 69 faculty! Three of those faculty were from our Political Science Department! We would like to congratulate Professor Professor Cai, Professor Morse, and Professor Singer on their promotions and awards!
UConn was well-represented at the 2022 International Studies Association Annual Meeting in Nashville, March 28-April 2. Professor Sterling-Folker organized an informal luncheon gathering for those who could make it on Friday, April 1 to catch up, reminisce and exchange news. In attendance were 4 Ph.D. alumni, 2 current Ph.D. students and 2 faculty members. From left to right: Jennifer Sterling-Folker (UConn faculty), Rosemary Shinko (alumni, currently Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education for American University’s School of International Service), Brian Urlacher (alumni, currently Department Chair of Political Science at the University of North Dakota), M. Aynal Haque (current Ph.D. student), Douglas Becker (Associate Professor at USC Dorfside & a producer/host of Scholars Circle Radio), Miles Evers (UConn faculty), San Lee (current student) and Marc O’Reilly (alumni, currently Chair of the International Studies Committee at Heidelberg University).
Today's Book Spotlight is Statelessness and Contemporary Enslavement" by Jane Gordon! You can read more about Professor Gordon and her book here. Be sure to come check out our bookshelf in our office (Oak 409) to see more books by our amazing faculty!
What are the political messages of the art and architecture that surround us? Are they anarchist, fascist, socialist, or environmentalist? Do they reinforce racism, sexism, capitalism, and imperialism? Or do they criticize hierarchal structures and challenge systems of power? Defining politics as “struggle for power,” the course examines some major belief systems and political ideologies and analyzes their positions on power relations and their expressions in visual art. It offers students a new way of looking at art.
This course will run Asynchronously during Summer Session 1. Syllabus link is in our bio!