Research updates, observations, and opportunities from the Humanities Research Institute.
Latest Posts
- The Story of Family and Belonging in Contemporary France
Daniel Nabil Maroun (French and Italian) is a 2025–2026 HRI Faculty Fellow. His current research project, “The Politics of Kinship: Writing Queerness, Filiation, and Race in Contemporary France,” reexamines the story and legitimacy of family as a social construct in France, exploring how different queer populations reconstruct what constitutes a family through new forms of kinship that are not tied… Read more: The Story of Family and Belonging in Contemporary France - Sport Studies Research Cluster Brings Interdisciplinary Lens to an “Inherently Human Activity”
Caitlin Clarke (Health and Kinesiology), Jesse Couture (Health and Kinesiology), and Jacob Fredericks (Recreation, Sport, and Tourism) are co-directors of the HRI 2024-25 Research Cluster “Interdisciplinary Sport Studies.” They discuss how collaboration and interdisciplinary work to help bridge the gap between faculty engaging with sport from a variety of perspectives. HRI Research Cluster funds support the efforts of scholars with shared interests to… Read more: Sport Studies Research Cluster Brings Interdisciplinary Lens to an “Inherently Human Activity” - “Searching for the Nexus” Between Two Movements
Chelsea Birchmier(Psychology) is a 2024–2025 HRI Graduate Fellow. Her project, “‘Searching for the Nexus’ Between Two Movements: Fight for $15 and Possibilities for Black Worker Struggle in St. Louis, Missouri,” investigates how Black liberation and labor movements have both coalesced and diverged, using community psychology to understand individuals and communities functioning within local political systems. Learn more about HRI’s Campus Fellowship… Read more: “Searching for the Nexus” Between Two Movements - “Dangerous Photographs”: The Power of Images in Shaping Narratives of Appalachia
Sharayah L. Cochran (Art History) is a 2024–2025 HRI Graduate Fellow. Her research project examines the injurious potential of documentary photographs. Learn more about HRI’s Campus Fellowship Program, which supports a cohort of faculty and graduate students through a year of dedicated research and writing in a collaborative, interdisciplinary environment. What is unique about your research on this topic? My dissertation,… Read more: “Dangerous Photographs”: The Power of Images in Shaping Narratives of Appalachia - Shining with Possibility: Representations of Gender and Sexuality in Late 19th and Early 20th Century Spain
Lázaro García Angulo (Spanish and Portuguese) is a 2024–2025 HRI Graduate Fellow. His project, “‘Yet Another Woman-Man’: Representations of Gender Nonconformity in Spain, 1880–1939,” seeks to analyze the multiple, and sometimes contradictory, narratives that developed in media around the subject of gender nonconformity, and their evolving relationship to questions of race, class, modernity, and national identity. Learn more about HRI’s Campus Fellowship… Read more: Shining with Possibility: Representations of Gender and Sexuality in Late 19th and Early 20th Century Spain