Events
Special Exhibitions
Screenings 10: Shirin Neshat
On View: Jan. 27 to March 3
Shirin Neshat is a multidisciplinary artist whose mostly blackand-white photographs and films have been featured in museum exhibitions and permanent collections for more than 30 years. She was born in Qazvin, Iran, and moved to the United States in 1974. After studying art in Los Angeles and attending UC Berkeley, Neshat moved permanently to New York City. Although she did not return to her birthplace in Iran until 1993, Neshat’s influential works consider the multivalent experience of women living under a fundamentalist regime. Roja (2016) is the final work in a trilogy of videos, called Dreamers, which Neshat began in 2013. Loosely autobiographical, Roja exposes the artist’s desire for reunion with her family in Iran, particularly her mother, even as it embraces Neshat’s fascination with dream states and uncanny narratives.
Hostile Terrain 94 California Adaptation Exhibition
On View: Feb. 8 to May 24
Copley Library
This spring semester, the Department of Anthropology will host an adapted version of Hostile Terrain 94. This is a participatory exhibition created by the Undocumented Migration Project that visually displays the deaths of undocumented migrants on California soil or waterways. Visitors will be asked to reflect upon U.S. border policy and the violence it inflicts on vulnerable people. The exhibition will include information on how to support humane migration and feature a creative space where visitors can write messages, produce art and leave altar offerings for the deceased migrants. The opening reception will be held at 4 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 15.
Fake News and Lying Pictures: Political Prints in the Dutch Republic
On View: Feb. 10 to May 12
Comedians, editorial cartoons and memes harness the power of satire, parody and hyperbole to provoke laughter, anger even action. These forms of expression are often traced to 18th-century artists, such as William Hogarth, but they are grounded in the unprecedented freedom of artistic expression in the 17th-century Dutch Republic. This exhibition explores the complex visual strategies early modern Dutch printmakers used to memorialize historical events, lionize and demonize domestic and international leaders, and form consensus for collective action.
For more information about University Galleries exhibitions, visit sandiego.edu/galleries.
MESSAGE FROM THE DEAN
This spring semester, join the USD College of Arts and Sciences for its many exciting music and theatre performances, special guest and faculty lectures and renowned authors who will visit the USD campus. I am pleased to announce the continuation of the Humanities Center’s “Natural Landscapes and Human Meaning” three-year series that will focus on the desert this semester.
Learn more about these events and our alumni, students and faculty from the Q&As and spotlights throughout this calendar.
To receive complete event details and for additional events, please visit sandiego.edu/events/cas
Norton,
Dean, College of Arts and Sciences
SPRING 2023 | UNIVERSITY OF SAN DIEGO
Noelle
PhD,
Humanities Center Gallery, Saints Tekakwitha and Serra Hall
(Below) Shirin Neshat, Roja 2016 (still). Single-channel video installation, duration: 17 min, 15
sec. Courtesy: Shirin Neshat, Gladstone Gallery, New York and Brussels. © Shirin Neshat
Hoehn Family Galleries, Founders Hall
(Above) Jan Saenredam, Allegory of the Flourishing State of the United Provinces , 1602. Engraving with hand coloring on paper. Krannert Art Museum purchase through the Robert and Sonia Carringer Art Acquisitions Fund. 2018-9-1
Q&A
with Emilie Amrein, DMA Associate
Professor and Chair of the Departmentof Music
Which music performances are you the most excited about this spring?
I am very excited about our four faculty recitals that will celebrate the artistic excellence of our teaching faculty, who are stunningly diverse. From Chris Adler’s performance of new and traditional music for the Khaen, a Thai mouth organ, and Maribel Velasco Ruiz and Gema Garcia Grijalva’s intimate recital of repertoire for voice and piano by women composers, many of which are from Latin America, to Ramon Negron’s program of baroque music for strings in Founders Chapel in celebration of Johann Sebastian Bach’s 273rd birthday to Ryan Nestor’s recital of contemporary music for percussion, there is something for everyone. I’m particularly excited for our students to experience the remarkable musicianship, creativity and expressive range of our fantastic teachers. Similarly, we have many ensemble concerts that feature a wide range of repertoires and cultural traditions, and we’re heading off-campus to perform in the greater San Diego community and further afield. I am particularly interested in the program the Wind Ensemble is taking on tour to Boston in the spring, as Jeff Malecki has curated some really special repertoire that is innovative and fresh, including movements from Mexican composer Carlos Chavez’s, “Chapultepec”. At the end of April, the Choral Scholars will be collaborating with composer Fahad Siadat and choreographer André Megerdichian who will be coaching our students in a creative process that is both narratively and visually engaging - that program is going to be held at the Mingei Museum in Balboa Park.
Faculty Recitals
Christopher Adler
Tuesday, Feb. 28, at 7:30 p.m. Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice Theatre
Ryan Nestor
Tuesday, April 25, at 7:30 p.m. Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice Theatre
Student Concerts
National Catholic Honor Band Friday, Feb. 10, at 3:30 p.m.
Saturday, Feb. 11, at 3:30 p.m.
USD Ministry Center
Student Recital: Angelique Brown Sunday, Feb. 12, at 7:30 p.m.
French Parlor, Founders Hall
College Band Night: Wind Ensemble and Guests Friday, April 14, at 5:30 p.m.
Spreckels Organ Pavilion, Balboa Park
Student Composers Concert Friday, April 28, at 7:30 p.m.
French Parlor, Founders Hall
A Night of Gospel Music Wednesday, May 3, at 8 p.m.
Location: TBA
Student Recital: Applied Students Thursday, May 4, at 1 p.m. Friday, May 5, at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, May 11, at 1 p.m.
French Parlor, Founders Hall
Featured Music Performances
Through Her Voice: Art Songs by Women Composers Tuesday, March 14, at 7:30 p.m.
French Parlor, Founders Hall
Join the Department of Music for a concert featuring professors Velasco Ruiz and Garcia Grijalva as they perform music for voice and piano by women composers.
Bach’s Birthday Celebration Concert
Tuesday, March 21, at 7:30 p.m.
Founders Chapel, Founders Hall
Celebrate Johann Sebastian Bach’s birthday with Baroque Music for Strings in USD’s Founders Chapel.
Special performance by Professor Ramon Negron and friends.
Diagonals
Wednesday, April 5, at 5:30 p.m.
Grossmont College
The USD Wind Ensemble will perform at Grossmont College before traveling to Boston, where they will participate in a clinic at Berklee College of Music and perform on a dinner cruise, among other activities. The concert theme will be “diag,” an image of the United States with an arrow from Mexico, through San Diego, over the Midwest, to New England. Movements include Carlos Chavez’s “Chapultepec,” David Biedenbender’s newer “Dream of Ember, Dream of Star,” and Charles Ives’ “Old Home Days.”
After the Flood: USD Choral Scholars, Fahad Siadat and André Megerdichian
Saturday, April 22, at 7:30 p.m.
Atalaya Foundation Theatre at the Mingei Museum
Join the USD Choral Scholars in the newly renovated Mingei Museum as they flex their creative muscles in devised scenes developed in consultation with composer Fahad Siadat and choreographer André Megerdichian.
Unless noted, all Department of Music concerts are free. Seating is limited. You can reserve your seats ahead of time at usdmusic.eventbrite.com; remaining seats are available at the door. For more information, please email the Department of Music at music@sandiego.edu, sign up for the email newsletter, and follow on social media at bit.ly/usd-music. Visit sandiego.edu/music for the most up-to-date event information.
A Night of Mariachi Tuesday, May 9, at 8 p.m.
Shiley Theatre, Camino Hall
Symphonic Adventures Wednesday, May 10, at 7:30 p.m.
Southwestern College
A Night of Balinese Gamelan Music Thursday, May 11, at 8 p.m.
Shiley Theatre, Camino Hall
Songs to Mother Earth
Friday, May 12, at 7:30 p.m.
Shiley Theatre, Camino Hall
A Night of Jazz Monday, May 15, at 8 p.m.
Shiley Theatre, Camino Hall
Made in San Diego Monday, May 22, at 3 p.m.
Shiley Theatre, Camino Hall
Music
Photo Credit Eric Carroll
Q&A
with Ryan McGorty, PhD Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Physics and BiophysicsWhat is happening in the Department of Physics and Biophysics this spring?
We have several great events planned for the Spring 2023 semester! Our speaker series, Human Side of Science, will continue. We will also have an informational lunch for students considering a major in physics or biophysics.
Can you tell us more about the Human Side of Science Lecture Series?
Each month we invite someone working in the area of physics or biophysics to come and speak to students. In the past, speakers have included physics or biophysics professors working on various projects, alumni from our department and scientists working in industries like biotech.
What do you hope the audience will gain from attending these lectures?
The audience will learn about the different career options available to those who graduate with a degree in physics or biophysics. Audience members also learn about different topics of contemporary physics or biophysics research.
Is there anything else that you’d like to mention?
Our department also holds regular professional development and social events. Check out our social media pages, or our LinkTree at linktr.ee/usdphysics, to see when we might next hold a movie night, stargazing party, professional development seminar or a host of other activities.
DEPARTMENT OF CHEMISTRY AND BIOCHEMISTRY
So Much Water in the Atmosphere
Tuesday, Feb. 28, at 12:15 p.m.
Warren Auditorium, Mother Rosalie Hill Hall
Water is one of the most abundant resources in our atmosphere and, because of its ability to be both a hydrogen bond donor and acceptor, water can form very stable new chemical species, not considered in the chemistry of the atmosphere before. These new chemical entities can dramatically affect the chemistry in the atmosphere, including heterogeneous removal and alteration of the photochemical properties of the atmospheric species.
It also provides fundamental new insight into chemistry on clouds that have never been imagined – turning clouds into mini-chemical reactors. Dr. Joseph S. Francisco, professor of earth, environmental science and chemistry, will review both experimental and theoretical investigations of water effects on gas phase reactions. This lecture aims to provide an understanding of the fundamental concepts underlying potential water effects, imparting a framework to better understand the global effects of water chemistry in our atmosphere. Co-sponsored by the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Phi Beta Kappa.
DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS AND BIOPHYSICS
Human Side of Science Speaker Series
Tuesdays, Feb. through May, at 12:15 p.m. Shiley Center for Science and Technology, Room 232
The Department of Physics and Biophysics hosts a monthly speaker series where researchers from universities, companies and laboratories from across the country talk about their research. Lunch will be provided.
ABOUT THE COLLEGE OF ARTS AND SCIENCES
The College of Arts and Sciences is at the heart of the University of San Diego. We are a community of scholars students, alumni, faculty and friends who welcome and pursue a life of knowledge, innovation, collaboration and analytical thinking. Our philosophy is built on the enduring values of the Catholic intellectual tradition, immersing students in the concepts of free inquiry, ethical conduct and compassionate service. The college aims to establish an academic foundation for students to thrive and gain a comprehensive education, which spans the sciences, arts and social sciences.
Through our exemplary liberal arts education and rigorous scholarship, we aspire to not only educate the mind but also develop each student holistically as they prepare for success within a chosen profession. Here, students gain the intellectual footing to take on life’s work, as well as the ethical basis to define it.
WAYS TO SUPPORT
To support the College of Arts and Sciences, please contact: Tania Batson, CSPG
Director of Development
(619) 260-6890 | tbatson@sandiego.edu
College of Arts and Sciences
Founders Hall, Room 114J 5998 Alcalá Park San Diego, CA 92110-2492
Alumni Spotlight
on Jake Leonard ’16 BA
Senior Manager of Operations at DTx Pharma
When Jake Leonard graduated with a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from the University of San Diego, he never imagined he’d be working in operations at a San Diego-based pharmaceutical company six years later. He worked as a chemist at Pfizer while in college and eventually found himself enjoying managing the operations of nonclinical studies for all the drug development programs at DTx Pharma.
Leonard credits his liberal arts education at USD, which included courses in finance, theatre and writing, for helping him to hone his best skills in this position. “I used my biochemistry degree to help facilitate conversation, but a majority of the applicable skills I use in my day-to-day are soft skills I acquired in courses outside of my specific science track at USD – like acting, psychology and finance. It is really about connecting with people in the industry and seeing what you want to focus on,” Leonard says.
Leonard wears many hats in his position, including managing nonclinical IND-enabling studies, contract management, and continuous improvement of operations at DTx Pharma, a clinical-stage biotechnology company tackling the challenges associated with treating genetic conditions.
Sciences
ART + ARCHITECTURE LECTURE SERIES
Architecture and the Housing Question
Speakers: Juliana Maxim, Shannon Starkey and Can Bilsel Tuesday, Feb. 7, at 5:30 p.m.
Humanities Center, Saints Tekakwitha and Serra Hall, Room 200
In response to the recent book, Architecture and the Housing Question, this panel will discuss thought-provoking questions, such as what it means to read and write about architecture and housing in this historical moment. And how we can incorporate the experience of recent global crises and the shocks that accompany them into new ways of conceptualizing the housing question? The housing question refers to a recurrent problem: How have the design, provision and management of shelter for large numbers around the world helped alleviate or conversely justify inequality, be it classed, racialized or gendered?
What Does the Historian’s Subject Matter?
Speaker: Edward Eigen Thursday, Feb. 23, at 5:30 p.m.
Edward Eigen is a senior lecturer in the History of Landscape and Architecture at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Eigen has a background in art history, professional training in design and a doctorate in history and theory of architecture from MIT. His work focuses on intersections of the human and natural sciences in the long 19th century in the European and Anglo-American contexts.
Almost, Maine
Written by John Cariani
Directed by Lisa Berger
Friday, May 5, at 7:30 p.m.
Saturday, May 6, at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m.
Sunday, May 7, at 2 p.m.
Vassiliadis Family Black Box Theatre
Almost, Maine, a play by John Cariani, is about love and loss. The residents of this remote, mythical, “almost-town” never fully get organized in Almost, Maine. But together – on a cold, clear, winter night – they experience falling in and out of love in the strangest ways. These life-altering experiences will change Almost, Maine … forever. Tickets are $10 for general admission; $8 for seniors, active military and students with ID. Tickets are available on Eventbrite at usdtheatre.eventbrite.com. For more information, email theatre@sandiego.edu or visit sandiego.edu/theatre
Mother Courage and Her Children
Written by Bertolt Brecht
Directed by Rosa Joshi
Friday, March 3, at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, March 4, at 7:30 p.m.
Sunday, March 5, at 2 p.m.
Studio Theatre, Sacred Heart Hall
Written in 1939, Mother Courage and Her Children is widely considered to be one of the greatest anti-war plays. We follow Mother Courage and her three children as she attempts to make a living by selling wares from her cart as the Thirty Years War drags on. For more information, visit graduateacting.com
Faculty Spotlight on Jersten
Seraile, MFA
Assistant Professor of Theatre
A graduate of The Old Globe and University of San Diego Shiley Graduate Theatre Program, Assistant Professor of Theatre Jersten Seraile, MFA, finds a particular appreciation for teaching at the institution where he polished his skills as an actor. Seraile earned his BA in theatre arts from The New School in New York City, which instilled a strong foundation in social justice and meaningful performance. Seraile focuses his courses and theatre directing on engaging communities and encouraging them to use their voices through theatre.
Seraile directed his first play at USD in November 2022 – Heroes of the Fourth Turning – a timely performance that elicited dialogue about our country’s issues. Seraile’s ultimate goal for this performance was for communities to better understand one another through meaningful conversations.
With an emphasis on risk-taking and vulnerability, Seraile urges his students to have these uncomfortable conversations to step out of their closed outlook and to grow a deeper understanding of those around them.
Unwalling Citizenship
Speakers: Teddy Cruz and Fonna Forman
Thursday, April 27, at 5:30 p.m.
Teddy Cruz and Fonna Forman are co-directors of the UC San Diego Center on Global Justice. Cruz is a professor of public culture and urbanism in UC San Diego’s Visual Arts Department and is known for his urban and architectural research of the Tijuana-San Diego border, among other projects. Forman is a professor of political science at UC San Diego who is recognized for her revisionist research on Adam Smith.
THESIS EXHIBITIONS AND PRESENTATIONS
Visual Arts Senior Thesis Exhibitions
Visual Arts Center, Sacred Heart Hall, Room 102
These exhibitions showcase the works of graduating visual arts students. Call the Department of Art, Architecture + Art History at (619) 260-2280 or visit sandiego.edu/art for specific dates and gallery hours.
Graduate Theatre Program Class of 2023 Thesis Presentations
Monday, April 17, at 7 p.m.
Studio Theatre, Sacred Heart Hall
Join the graduating class of The Old Globe and University of San Diego Shiley Graduate Theatre Program as students perform original one-act plays fully written and directed by the class of 2023. Tickets are available on Eventbrite at usdglobe.eventbrite.com. This event is free. For more information, visit graduateacting.com.
PRESENTED BY USD’S UNDERGRADUATE THEATRE PROGRAM
PRESENTED BY THE OLD GLOBE AND UNIVERSITY OF SAN DIEGO SHILEY GRADUATE THEATRE PROGRAM
Theatre and Art
Humanities Center
Q&A
with Brian Clack, PhD Professor of Philosophy and A. Vassiliadis Director of the Humanities CenterWhat can you tell us about the Natural Landscapes and Human Meaning initiative?
This is an exciting undertaking for us and will extend over a three-year period. This new initiative, “Natural Landscapes and Human Meaning,” is an ambitious project, stretching across six semesters and consisting of a series of panel discussions, exhibitions, special lectures and classes for our students.
What inspired you to launch this three-year project?
In the spring of 2020, I co-taught a class with Environmental and Ocean Sciences Professor Beth O’Shea, PhD, on “Death Valley and the Natural Sublime.” In this class, the peculiar landscape of the desert was subjected to investigation from the perspectives of geology and philosophy. The philosophical component of this class was centered on Edmund Burke’s great work from 1757, A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful. Burke’s contrast between the qualities of things that are beautiful (smoothness, smallness, delicacy, mildness, etc.) and those that are sublime (vastness, obscurity, a capacity to provoke astonishment and terror) are helpful in understanding the appeal of a range of landscapes, not simply deserts. It seemed, therefore, that the entire apparatus of the Humanities Center could swing into action to stage focused explorations of each of the landscapes enumerated above. How can we learn more about the humanities through landscapes?
Attention to the landscapes that surround us can actually be a very fertile way to begin thinking about those dimensions of the human experience that form the basis of humanistic inquiry. Dramatic landscapes inspire us to think about our place in the world, and they often provoke literary and aesthetic responses in us. Moreover, fixing our attention on landscapes allows us to do something that has always been dear to our hearts at the Humanities Center, namely, to explore phenomena from the combined perspectives of the arts and sciences. By adopting this interdisciplinary framework, our series is revealing much about the varied landscapes in the world and the value of the combined scientific and humanistic investigation.
KNAPP LECTURESRed and Black Alchemies of Flesh: An Audience with Tiffany Lethabo King, PhD
Wednesday, March 15, at 5 p.m.
Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice Theatre
Associate Professor of Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies at University of Virginia, Tiffany Lethabo King’s work is animated by abolitionist and decolonial traditions within Black studies and Native/Indigenous studies. In her Knapp Chair Lecture, Dr. King will discuss themes from her forthcoming book, Red and Black Alchemies of Flesh: Conjuring a Decolonial and Abolitionist Now, in which she invokes both Black and Native queer feminist thought to link to the power of the erotic.
Murals and Social Justice: The Creative Journey of Guillermo “Yermo” Aranda and the Chicano Mural Movement in San Diego
Monday, April 17, at 6:30 p.m.
Warren Auditorium, Mother Rosalie Hill Hall
Better known as Yermo within the numerous communities where he works, Guillermo Aranda is a multimedia artist who was born and raised in San Diego within a family of artists, craftspeople and musicians. With close to 100 murals to his name located throughout California, Yermo will speak to his creative contributions to the Chicano Art Mural Movement that has yet to be fully documented.
Natural Landscapes and Human Meaning: The Desert Tuesdays, from Feb. 21 to April 25, at 4 p.m. Humanities Center, Saints Tekakwitha and Serra Hall, Room 200
Last fall, the Humanities Center commenced an ambitious three-year exploration of the connection between the human imagination and the diverse array of landscapes in our world. Having focused on the ocean in the first part of this series, the center now turns its focus on the desert. The center will host two gallery exhibitions showcasing the desert-laden work of Emma Stibbon and Shirin Neshat. At the same time, in a wide-ranging series of panel discussions and presentations, scholars from multiple disciplines will reflect upon the inspiring, frightening and evocative power of desert landscapes.
A First Look at the Desert: What It Is and What It May Evoke February 21
Minerva Lecture: Marie Simovich and Mike Wells on The Anza-Borrego Desert February 28
The Imaginative Desert: Representations in Art and Literature March 14
Just Deserts: Emma Stibbon in Conversation with Derrick Cartwright March 21 (Virtual Event)
Religion, Spirituality and the Desert March 28
Ken Layne’s Desert Oracle April 4
The Desert and the Wilderness: Perspectives from Science and Philosophy April 11
Border Crossings: The Desert in Our Time April 18
The Desert as Home April 25
Just Deserts: Southwestern Landscapes by Emma Stibbon
On View: March 13 to May 15
Humanities Center Gallery, Saints Tekakwitha and Serra Hall
Emma Stibbon is a British artist whose work considers the complexities of extreme environments. Her depictions of arctic ice and glacial melt have been celebrated in exhibitions throughout Europe. Since 2018, Stibbon has expanded her inquiry of harsh landscapes to include the deserts of the American Southwest. Just Deserts is the first survey of Stibbon’s work in California and Arizona. Just Deserts follows Some Bodies: Oceanic Imagination in Contemporary Art as the second in the planned series of six exhibitions focused on the themes of Natural Landscapes and Human Meaning at the Humanities Center Gallery.
FEATURED GUEST LECTURES
Ghostly Ideals: The Hauntology of Black Religious Leadership
Thursday, Feb. 9, at 12:15 p.m.
Zoom Meeting: 942 3453 9520
In profound and problematic ways, the life, death and afterlife of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. have served as materials for constructing a ghostly ideal of charismatic sociopolitical leadership. Utilizing Jacques Derrida’s concept of hauntology, Kyle E. Brooks, assistant professor of homiletics, worship, and Black church and African diasporic studies at the Methodist Theological School in Ohio, makes the case that the genealogy of Black religious leadership in sociopolitical life has been haunted by a mythology of Black male clerical authority.
Visions of Sappho
Wednesday, Feb. 15, at 5 p.m.
Humanities Center, Saints Tekakwitha and Serra Hall, Room 200
Renowned as an extraordinary lyric poet of her lifetime, Sappho of Lesbos has been a literary celebrity for more than 2,500 years. Her poetry seems charged with powerful self-expression. So, what did she look like? Or rather, what have her readers, over the centuries, wanted her to look like? Presenting fresh visual evidence, Nigel Spivey, senior lecturer in classics at the University of Cambridge, considers the “portrait” of Sappho in its various symbolic forms.
The First Black Archaeologist
Friday, Feb. 17, at Noon
Humanities Center, Saints Tekakwitha and Serra Hall, Room 200
Professor John W. I. Lee discusses his book, The First Black Archaeologist: A Life of John Wesley Gilbert, which investigates the pioneering work of John Wesley Gilbert, an African American classical scholar, teacher, community leader and missionary born into slavery in rural Georgia in the middle of the Civil War. The book follows Gilbert’s career from the segregated schools of Augusta, Georgia, to Brown University, to his hiring as the first Black faculty member of Augusta’s Paine Institute, through his travels in Greece, Europe and the Belgian Congo.
This was Paris in 1970: The Computer, the Archive and the Undergraduate Curriculum
Thursday, March 30, at 4 p.m.
Humanities Center, Saints Tekakwitha and Serra Hall, Room 200
Catherine Clark, associate professor of history and French studies at MIT, will explore her work at the intersection of machine learning and photographic urban history via the 100,000 photographs of a 1970 amateur photography contest launched to document the city of Paris. She will also reflect on the challenges and possibilities of funding research in digital humanities and shaping the undergraduate teaching of computing in the humanities.
ILLUMEStudent Spotlight on Taylor Polcyn ’25 BA
Communication Major
Taylor Polcyn, a communication major at the University of San Diego, juggles a full course load, participates in USD’s Kappa Delta Zeta Rho chapter and is a part of the LT3 Dance crew. She also manages her personal TikTok account with 544,000 followers. A model from Chesterfield, Missouri, Polcyn took a leap of faith, moving across the country to attend the University of San Diego, where she didn’t know anyone. Leaning on her faith in God, she dove into college life and built a new support system on campus. Not only does Polcyn work hard to achieve her academic goals in communication and public relations, but she is also an avid volleyball player.
Polcyn joined TikTok in 2019 to share creative videos around dance and mental health. A current TikTok sensation, she has garnered more than 25 million likes on her videos. As a mental health advocate, Polcyn is known as one of the most moving young women on TikTok. She gained popularity on the platform through her vulnerability in sharing about self-love and urging us all to be kinder to ourselves.
“I’ve always loved creating content, especially using TikTok as a creative outlet. Since I started receiving an overwhelming amount of love and support online, I’ve felt even more grateful to have this platform to showcase my personality and the things I’m passionate about.”
A Conversation With Dr. Oswaldo Estrada on Writing and Migration
Thursday, Feb. 23, at 5:30 p.m.
Learning Commons, Room 202 Dr. Oswaldo Estrada is a fiction writer, essayist and professor of romance languages at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. His research focuses on otherness, coloniality and gender studies. He was a recipient of two International Latino Book Awards in 2020, for Las Locas Ilusiones y Otros Relatos de Migración, and in 2019 for Luces de Emergencia for best collections of short stories. Estrada will provide a reading and reflection regarding the role of writing fiction in the processes of migration and exile. Co-sponsored by the Enhanced Student-Faculty Interaction Fund, the Humanities Center, Languages Cultures and Literatures, and the Latin American Studies Program.
Psychological Sciences Alumni Dinner
Thursday, Feb. 23, at 6 p.m.
This program will be an excellent opportunity for psychological sciences alumni to network, mentor and connect with fellow graduates and former professors over dinner. The Department of Psychological Sciences continues to grow every year. The department will highlight some of the changes made throughout recent years and discuss future goals. Suggested ticket donation is $35. Please register by going to toreronetwork.sandiego.edu/022323.
THESIS EXHIBITIONS AND PRESENTATIONS
Honors Program Senior Thesis
Colloquium
Saturday, May 6, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Learning Commons
The university and surrounding community are cordially invited to attend the Spring 2023 Honors Colloquium, during which students graduating from USD’s Honors Program will present their original thesis projects. This conference-style event features presentations by more than 70 students across 25 different majors from all three undergraduate units at USD. Join us for all or part of this incredible showcase of exceptional undergraduate student scholarship. Abstracts and a program will be available leading up to the event date.
LINDSAY J. CROPPER MEMORIAL WRITERS SERIES
James Hannaham, Fiction Writer
Thursday, Feb. 23, at 6 p.m.
Warren Auditorium, Mother Rosalie Hill Hall
James Hannaham is a writer and visual artist. His novel, Delicious Foods, won the PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award and was a New York Times Notable Book. He has shown work at Open Source Gallery, The Center for Emerging Visual Artists and won Best in Show at Main Street Arts’ 2020 exhibit Biblio Spectaculum. In 2021, he released Pilot Impostor, a multigenre book inspired by a Fernando Pessoa anthology, to considerable acclaim. A dessert reception and book signing to follow.
For more information, visit sandiego.edu/cas
(Left) Photo Credit Isaac Fitzgerald
Special Events usdcas
or follow us on social media.
La Gran Terraza