The class of the living Dead
One comparative literature class is coming to work your braaaains...
College of Letters & Science
IN FOCUS
October 2019, Vol. 9, No.10
Fake Smiles,
Contents Feature Stories
Prof explains toll of emotional labor Math alum’s nuclear science career Zombies in the CompLit classroom Art history alum curates at The Warehouse Prof helps families navigate screen time UWM offers Jewish studies major online Student studies the dark side of volunteering Alum works to help homeless, mentally ill
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We’ve all seen (or maybe we’ve been) the cashier at the check-out line wearing a fake “customer service” smile and dealing with angry customers, but it turns out that faking emotions for the benefit of others can have a negative impact on our health. Sarah Riforgiate, an associate professor of communication, is wrapping up new research that suggests that the emotional labor that employees perform as part of their job can have physical and physiological effects. But, she added, those effects often disappear if we’re genuinely happy to wear that customer service smile.
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Riforgiate explained her research and implored us all: Please be nice to your cashiers, flight attendants, and waiters so they can respond genuinely. Sarah Riforgiate
First things first: What exactly is emotional labor? A sociologist named Arlie Hochschild founded the theory of emotional labor. The original theory addresses the way in which we work to perform emotionally for the benefit of commerce. Hochschild originally studied airline flight attendants and bill collectors. Airline flight attendants had to communicate that they were friendly, nice and sometimes even had to accept some customer harassment. Bill collectors had to fake crassness and meanness to intimidate people to collect money. Through that study, Hochschild found that when we perform emotions, it takes work. What’s interesting is we often do two types of emotional labor. There’s the first type, called surface acting, where we fake emotions. For example, “I’m pretending to smile and be nice to you. But I don’t feel any affection toward you; I’m just doing my job.” Then there’s the second type, deep-acting, which is when we re-frame the way that we think about an interaction so that we genuinely feel the emotion. At Disneyland, the happiest place on earth, there might be employees faking emotions, but there might also be employees thinking, “This is the greatest job because I’m helping people have this wonderful experience. I want them to be happy so
, Genuine Headaches
The toll of emotional labor
I’m doing these things because I really care about these people’s experience.” What were you and your coauthors looking for during your research? My coauthors are Satoris Howard from Oregon State University, Clive Fullagar from Kansas State University, and Mathias Simmons from U.S. Army Research Institute. We were invited into a technology development company to conduct the study. Technology employees spend a lot of time behind their desk. They’re not necessarily interacting face-to-face with customers. We wanted to see if there was emotional labor present in just an everyday workplace, and if employees who changed their communication by doing emotional labor had any kind of physiological or psychological consequences. We had employees participate in a daily diary study for two weeks. Every day, they reported how tired they felt, how much they had to fake emotions, how much they felt different emotions. Then we asked ourselves, did this emotional labor have any effect? And did it? What we found was that surface acting, like when you’re pretending to your coworkers that you’re happy and you’re not really happy, can lead to negative physiological and psychological effects. If you look at the first time point and the end time point for those two weeks, surface acting was associated with employees reporting more burnout. But the negative consequences are not as likely when employees genuinely feel the emotions. What’s interesting is since this is a web development company, if employees felt an emotion but they were working online, it’s quite possible they stepped away from their computer, took a deep breath, and didn’t have to fake emotions. They could respond later with a thoughtful response. So the way that we use technology might be a way of mitigating some of that demand for surface acting, which could make for happier and healthier employees. What kind of physical affects did the employees notice?
Headaches, not feeling well, colds. Employees just didn’t feel as well that day, or weren’t responding in ways that they would have if they were in their best physical health. However, small things can take a toll over time. You mentioned using technology to mitigate the toll of emotional labor. Is there anything else that workplaces can do to help their employees? Employers can give employees uninterrupted time to work. There have been studies indicating that allowing employees to do their job without that constant engagement can buffer some of the stress. Also, companies can have managers be aware of how much interaction employees are having with each other, and give employees space and time to not have to perform emotionally. Employers can also consider their hiring practices and goodness of fit. If deep acting emotional labor (truly feeling the emotions) is not creating as many negative consequences, then employers should screen prospective employees and hire people that are a good fit for the organization. That way, the employees will have to do less of that surface acting (faking emotions) because communicating emotions will feel natural to them. What can employees do? One thing they can do is be aware of when they think they’re faking emotions and see if there are ways to step away from that. Employees should at least be aware if emotional labor is causing stress for them so they can come up with other strategies that might work for their communication. One takeaway from this research seems to be that we all need to be nicer to the people who are paid to be nice to us. One of the things that I take away from my research is that emotions are so fluid. We need to think about the ways that we communicate emotions and the impact our communication has on others. So yes, be nice to customer service people. By Sarah Vickery, College of Letters & Science College of Letters & Science • UW–Milwaukee • 3
Numbers and Nukes
Mathem
Buried in the southern Nevada desert, miles from anywhere, is an underground laboratory called the U1a complex where scientists carry out experiments to ensure the safety of America’s nuclear stockpile. To reach the lab, they have to journey down a literal mineshaft, a remnant from the days of the nation’s nuclear testing. It descends nearly 1,000 feet below ground surface. That means that Sean Breckling has a very long commute. Breckling is a UWM alum who majored in mathematics and graduated in 2010 into a slumped economy. Faced with seemingly slim career prospects, he enrolled in graduate courses at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, earning his PhD in applied mathematics in 2017. Upon graduating, Breckling left Nevada to build his CV via the well-worn path of post-doctoral academic research appointments. That same path led him back to Nevada. Breckling is a senior scientist at the Nevada National Security Site, a federal research facility where scientists are tasked with helping to ensure the safety of the nation’s nuclear weapons, providing data to the Stockpile Stewardship program. “The Nevada National Security Site has a broad mission. We manage a lot of scientific research facilities,” Breckling said. This work includes “subcritical experiments,” where scientists work with chemical explosives to generate high pressure that they apply to special nuclear materials. These experiments are conducted such that a self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction, or “criticality,” is never achieved.
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One of Breckling’s roles is to support the Cygnus X-ray Diagnostic Machines. He describes this system “similar to the microscopes you might have used in any science class.” However, “instead of back-lighting samples with visible light, this machine uses gamma radiation. “I do a lot of image and data processing to that end,” Breckling added. “Many of the techniques we employ would be familiar to professional photographers, but since we’re using a radiological light source, we call it radiography.” By analyzing the images captured on Cygnus X-ray Diagnostic Machine, Breckling develops quantitative tools that he and other scientists use to better understand the results of their subcritical experiments. The work is everything he could have wanted in a job. “I’ve always gravitated to the applied sciences,” he said with a laugh. “I could have wandered into any reasonably-technical vocation. I’m more focused on how I work than what I work on.”
matics alum works on nation’s nuclear safety information can be accurately resolved using as few doses [of ionizing radiation] as possible,” Breckling said. “Physicians call this ‘dose reduction.’” His project has received site-directed funding, so in addition to exploring the technical aspects of medical imaging and “uncertainty quantification,” or “UQ”, Breckling is also learning to lead a team, coordinate a budget, and manage a project. Between the multiple projects in several locations, every day is different. “There are some days I get to work hands-on with equipment, and some days I sit in my office writing code,” he said. “I like to call this work is semi-academic, in that we’re expected to publish. The work tends to be extremely interdisciplinary, which also appeals to me.” Sean Breckling works with Cygnus X-ray Diagnostic Machines, pictured above. Photo courtesy of the Nevada National Security Site.
Even so, he’s working on a lot. In addition to his projects at the U1a complex, Breckling is also the principal investigator of a research project “highly relevant” to both his work at the NNSS and medical diagnostic imaging. In CT medical imaging, physicians carefully capture multiple images of their patients from several angles, building a 3D reconstruction of the region of interest. For each image, patients are exposed to minute amounts of ionizing radiation. “We are keenly interested to quantify how much 3D
The schedule is nice too; Breckling works 10-hour shifts four days a week and enjoys three-day weekends. It’s not the kind of job he set out to do when he graduated, and it’s the kind of job that’s easy to miss if you’re a freshly-minted mathematics PhD. “People only look for jobs that they know exist. The problem is … when people go into the sciences, they tend to put these massive blinders on to A, where their talents would be useful, and B, where they would be happy,” he said. “I would advise anyone to keep an open mind, and to keep their eyes and ears open to possibilities that aren’t directly in their path.” Even if those possibilities lead you down a mineshaft. By Sarah Vickery, College of Letters & Science Sean Breckling often works in the U1a complex of the Nevada National Security Site, where experiments are carried out in subterranean tunnels like this one. Photo courtesy of the Nevada National Security Site.
College of Letters & Science • UW–Milwaukee • 5
This class bites
Comparative Lit course e
In the basement of Bolton Hall, if you listen closely, you can hear the faint sound of screams, the pop of gunshots, and the hisses and snarls of a hungry horde of rotting corpses shambling closer and closer …. It’s not the zombie apocalypse. It’s just Wednesday in comparative literature. Drago Momcilovic, a senior lecturer in UWM’s comparative literature program, is in his second year of teaching CompLit 135, a variable-topics course. Momcilovic’s is titled, “Zombie Metaphors.” The class takes a deep look at zombies in popular culture and what our fascination with these monsters says about society. On the syllabus are cult classics and fan favorites, from old George Romero movies to AMC’s “The Walking Dead.” “Folk tales are filled with monsters,” Momcilovic said. “They get us to think about what a monster shows us and what a monster warns us about. Those are the two implicit functions of monstrosity, (and) the zombie is a really specific subset of monster that is very popular today.” The rise of zombie culture Though they’ve changed from decade to decade, zombies are generally recognized as reanimated corpses on the hunt for food – usually human brains. Those bitten by zombies are doomed to become one. The concept has its origins in Caribbean and specifically Haitian culture; the monster grew out of beliefs surrounding witch doctors who could render a victim apparently dead and revive them as a personal slave. The zombie has evolved since then and seems to be today’s monster of choice. “We had vampires when I was growing up in the ‘90s,” Momcilovic remembered. “But we ran the gamut of that, and zombies made an interesting comeback. You see these different iterations all around the world – Indonesia, the Balkans, even Argentina and Japan. They’re importing different stories from Romero and American masters and authenticating them in their own cultural vernacular.”
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What is driving society’s obsession with zombies these days? “The rise of computers,” he suggested. “The zombie virus and the computer virus are hand-in-hand in a lot of ways. They’ve evolved together and they’ve defamiliarized the way we interact with people. Zombies hoard together. They act as a collective, almost like a kind of network. So all of these Drago Momcilovic buzzwords like ‘network’ and ‘virus’ link these two tropes of infection.” Moreover, he added, today people fear a global pandemic. News about SARS and Ebola outbreaks mimic many of the ways fictional “zombie outbreaks” occur as well. The rise of the zombie class This is Momcilovic’s second year of teaching this class. He breaks the course into three units. The first deals with the popular American canon of zombie works, starting with Romero’s “Night of the Living Dead” and other movies, and moving onto “The Walking Dead” and World War Z, a novel penned by author and actor Max Brooks, son of the comedian and director Mel Brooks. The second unit examines precursors to zombies – works like Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein, for instance, or the 1932 film “The Mummy.” The third discusses zombies across the globe and how other cultures’ take on the monster echoes or differs from the American iteration, including the Japanese manga I Am a Hero by Kengo Hanazawa and the French television series “Les Revenants (The Returned.”) Really, the class is a sneaky way to teach critical and literary analysis.
explores society through zombies “In some sense, I’m looking for the students to practice and hone their critical analysis skills, but I also want them to go beyond the mirror aesthetic response, which is to either enjoy it or be horrified by it. I want them to actually think about this as a representation that’s telling us something about ourselves, our culture, our society, and the many things we are very unresolved about,” Momcilovic said. In one particular class period, Momcilovic opened discussion on World War Z. The novel plays like a documentary, piecing together an account of the events of a worldwide zombie outbreak. From a Russian soldier to a Japanese monk to an American politician, Max Brooks uses 43 narrative voices to outline various countries’ and cultures’ responses to fight the shambling horde. Momcilovic questioned his students: Why is the novel structured in such a way? How do zombies provide a vehicle to discuss real-life geopolitics? How does it speak to our fears about North Korea, China, and Russia? Are there parallels to the role of mass media in the book and in our society? What is the point of describing gore in graphic detail? “Blood and guts are a huge part of the zombie myth. Zombies are supposed to be disgusting,” he notes. “There is something about seeing blood and guts and gore that attracts, but also makes us want to look away. It’s paradoxical. The zombie exposes us to that graphic display.” There will be tests and paper as the semester progresses, and as a final project, Momcilovic will ask his students to make their own curated creative project featuring their own favorite zombie books, shows, movies, and games. “A lot of these students are coming into the class having seen a whole bunch of other zombie movies that I’ve never heard of,” he said. “Zombie culture permeates all of these different spheres of life that these kids are interested in.”
The greater lessons The class has been well received. “The student response has been very enthusiastic, but they’re also engaged,” he said. “I love that they talk back to me. It’s a formal lecture, but they feel comfortable enough to share their opinions.” They bring their own expertise to the classroom as well; one student identified the main character Rick’s pistol in “The Walking Dead,” and how the six-shooter fit within the show’s greater context of societal evolution. They’re also quick to grasp an overarching theme shared between dozens of zombie-related works: Humanity can often be as monstrous as the monsters they face, all in the name of survival. That’s why Momcilovic’s personal favorite zombie work is “The Walking Dead.” “To me, the things that they do in that series are probably the most innovative and gripping, because it’s not just about the zombies; it’s about the survivors,” he said. “As the series evolves, the other survivor communities become even bigger threats to the main characters than the zombies themselves. Suddenly the world becomes very unrecognizable, and it’s not because of the walking dead.” His students will discuss that and more as they spend the rest of the semester filling their braaaaains…. By Sarah Vickery, College of Letters & Science
College of Letters & Science • UW–Milwaukee • 7
Art history grad’s talents on display as curator of Laura Sims Peck’s workplace doesn’t have a lot of windows, but it sure has a nice view. Lately, her scenery has included photographs from India – a close-up shot of an elephant, two weavers working at a loom, a tiger prowling through golden fields. They’re pieces in the exhibition she helped create in her role as the curator of The Warehouse, a private art museum near Milwaukee’s downtown. Peck’s job is a little different than the typical curator’s. For one thing, The Warehouse is a museum meant to share the personal art collection of owners Jan Serr and John Shannon. For another, it works directly with local and national contemporary artists on exhibitions. In fact, the Warehouse’s current exhibit, “Jan Serr: A Painter’s Photographs of India,” is one such show, featuring the work of local artist (and owner) Serr. The exhibit opened Sept. 13 and runs through Dec. 13. This is the fourth exhibit Peck has designed for the space since The Warehouse opened in late 2018. It shares a building with Guardian Fine Art Services, a company founded by Shannon that specializes in storage, logistics, and protection of private and institutional art collections. “John and Jan think Milwaukee is an incredible arts community that deserves a venue like this,” Peck said. “They want their collection to be cared for, but they also want to see it and they want to share it, which I think is an admirable mission.” Working as the curator of a private, permanent collection is a challenge, especially when it comes to making those exhibits.
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Laura Sims Peck is the curator of The Warehouse, a private art musuem near Milwaukee’s downtown. Peck stands in front of a painting by UWM alumna Jan Serr, titled, “Trees in Water #2” from Trees in Water Series (1983, oil on linen). Photo by Sarah Vickery.
“There’s a set number and type of objects. My job, when putting together exhibits, is making sure I can find cohesive stories to tell,” she said. So, when she’s making an exhibit, she works backwards. “In some ways, it’s reverse-engineering a show. You pick a show based on the pieces that you have and build from there,” Peck said. “I work closely with Jan and John to come up with exhibits by finding pieces that work well together or fit a theme.” For instance, Serr and Shannon’s collection, which includes more than 3,600 pieces of art, contains several sculptures. Over the summer, Peck created an exhibit exploring the different mediums of those pieces – marble, wood, steel, and more – in a show
called “Carve, Cast, and Coil.” One sculpture even incorporated a houseplant. The current exhibition features Serr’s own artwork, showcasing photographs taken during two separate trips to India in 2009 and 2016, as well as several of her paintings and monographs. In addition to creating exhibits, Peck works with Guardian Fine Art Services’ staff to handle the art and create hardware for each show, arranges exhibit openings, coordinates artist talks, and helps Serr and Shannon acquire new pieces for their collection. Peck is good at this type of work because she’s done it before. While she attended UWM and worked
f The Warehouse
Welcome, Class of 2023!
toward her Master’s degree in art history and her certificate in museum studies, Peck also worked at the Union Art Gallery. There, she was responsible for curating exhibits, from finding pieces to put together in a show to installing those works of art on walls or in cases. “That opportunity was valuable because I had many different experiences installing shows and working with students,” said Peck. It also landed her in her current position: “(Serr and Shannon) knew UWM Photo by Troye Fox about me from the Union Gallery. They had seen some of my exhibits there,” she said. After she graduated in 2015, Peck accepted the pair’s offer of an internship to curate and catalogue their private collection before being announced as The Warehouse’s curator when the venue opened. Serr and Shannon often recruit from UWM; Guardian Fine Art Services and The Warehouse boast a large number of university graduates, including Katie Steffan (‘15, MA History). Serr herself is a UWM alumna. “Go Panthers,” Peck joked. As an alum, though, she has some advice for current students: Be open to all sorts of opportunities, no matter how small, obscure, or crazysounding they may be. “I took a chance on the internship when I first got the email offer from Jan and John,” she recalled. “I feel so fortunate to have a job doing what I love.” By Sarah Vickery, College of Letters & Science
UWM greeted thousands of new students during Fall Welcome Week. We wish you all the best during the 2019-2020 school year!
People in Print Jacob Carter (’19, MA English). 2019. “I’m Queer and I Had a Lot of Feelings Here’: The Archive and History’s Returns in Queering the Map.” Queering the Map On Site. Edited by Lucas LaRochelle. Fourth Space: Concordia University. Exhibition brochure. Andrew Porter (Classics). 2019. Agamemnon, the Pathetic Despot. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. https://bit.ly/2lL9nYQ
Paul Brodwin (Anthrpology). 2019. Principle and Practice in Psychiatric Ethics Consultation. Philosophy, Psychiatry and Psychology, 26(3): 207-210. Cary Costello (Sociology). 2019. Understanding Intersex Relationship Issues. In Expanding the Rainbow (eds. Brandy L. Simula, J.E. Sumerau, and Andrea Miller). Boston: Brill/Sense Publishers, 231-246. Lisa Silverman (Jewish Studies). 2019. On Jews and Property in Provincial Central Europe: Leopold Kompert’s 1848 Publications. Journal of Modern Jewish Studies, 18(4). Online. https://bit.ly/2k6krPS Mark Dietz (Chemistry and Biochemistry). 2019. Extraction with ionic liquids: Metals. In Handbook of Separation Science: Liquid Phase Extraction (ed. Colin Poole). New York, NY: Elsevier Science. Craig R. Guilbault (Mathematical Sciences) and Molly A. Moran (‘15, PhD Mathematics). 2019. Proper homotopy types and Z-boundaries of spaces admitting geometric group actions. Expositiones mathematicae/ Elsevier, 37(3): 292-313. https://bit.ly/2nygXXK Abbas Ourmazd (Physics). 2019. Cryo-EM, XFELs and the structure conundrum in structural biology. Nature Methods. Online. https://go.nature.com/2m5dTSF College of Letters & Science • UW–Milwaukee • 9
Technology’s role in everyday life can shape family discussions about screen time Smartphones can play an important role in family life, from keeping in touch through text messaging to sharing pictures from that beach vacation. But the technology that helps keeps kids occupied over the summer can serve as a distraction when school is in session. The beginning of another academic year presents a good time for parents to talk with kids about limiting screen time on their smartphones or computers. Before gathering around the dinner table for those sometimes-contentious conversations, UWM sociology associate professor Noelle Chesley says, parents should remember just how much their kids are already exposed to technology outside the house. “I think there are some good reasons for parents to think about ways to monitor screen time to the extent that they can,” Chesley said. “Keep in mind that we have a social environment now where that’s harder than ever. “Even in a lot of school environments now, we’re migrating a lot of the learning into online, putting textbooks online, having students only completing their homework online,” she added. Chesley, who is also director of undergraduate studies in sociology in the College of Letters & Science, offers more insight into the role that technology plays in family life, the discussion about setting limits and related topics. Monitoring strategies Chesley cites work from the Pew Research Center that shows that about one-third of parents are very worried about their children’s screen time, especially around four issues:
But research isn’t clear about the most effective strategies, and whether they work, Chesley said. “I would tell them that I think it’s a free-for-all right now,” she said when asked about what advice she would offer about setting boundaries. “I don’t think that we have great evidence about what works and what doesn’t.” Evolving conversations The conversations taking place now about the role of technology in social life fit into longer historical trends. For instance, in the 18th century there was concern about the “epidemic” of reading across Europe, and how books might be corrupting youth, she said. Similar debates arose when telephones and then televisions were introduced into households. Today, digital life is firmly embedded in our social experiences. “What that means is that opportunities to do things like limit screen time, or whatever we’re wanting to debate, aren’t just about personal preferences anymore, but also about the strong expectations from those around you,” Chesley said. As an example, she pointed to how social norms have changed around text messaging. “Now if you don’t respond pretty quickly back, there’s going to be social ramifications for that,” Chesley said. “That wasn’t always the case when texting was first emerging.”
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Development of verbal communication skills
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What children are sharing online over social media
Evolving norms can influence the kinds of rules that families set around technology. In the future, those conversations could also include emerging fields like virtual reality, robotics and artificial intelligence.
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Cyberbullying
Role of policy-makers
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Access to inappropriate, including sexually explicit, content
The discussion goes beyond individual parenting strategies, Chesley said, since policymakers “have struggled to keep legislation in line with emerging technology.”
Common strategies that parents use to monitor screen time include: •
Checking their children’s browsing history
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Looking through text messages
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Taking away or limiting privileges with the internet or device usage
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Some online platforms are designed to be more manipulative with kids, encouraging them to spend more time on screens, she said. Targeted advertising to children is another area of concern. “We’re not as worried about creating kid-healthy content as we should be,” Chesley said. “We had these same debates with television — we need to be legislating more content kinds of issues in our current environment.”
UWM is first in the country to offer an online Jewish studies major - plus new certificate UWM has become the first public university in the nation to offer a fully-online Jewish studies major. UWM now offers all of the classes required for a Jewish studies major over the web, providing a new opportunity for distancelearners to access a UWM education without ever stepping foot on campus. The course delivers the same classes needed for a traditional major, just in a different format. Rachel Baum, who coordinates and teaches in the program, explained that the online major is particularly appealing to working adults. Also, she noted, “Students find us because they have a deep interest in Jewish studies but their local colleges don’t offer courses in it.” Several current majors are double majoring in history and Jewish studies, both entirely online.
Noelle Chesley
Blurred lines In many fields, the use of smartphones and a rise in telecommuting have created aroundthe-clock work environments where jobs can be performed anyplace from the office cubicle to a coffeeshop to one’s bedroom. “It’s true that personal life can intrude into work, but it tends to work the other way around in most cases,” Chesley said. “That’s had some benefits for workers, but it’s also had costs for family life and relationships,” she added. “So in my work, I’ve shown that digital blurring has heightened people’s distress and it’s lowered their satisfaction with family life.” By Genaro C. Adams, University Relations
Rachel Baum
Jewish studies graduates have gone on to careers in museum work, Holocaust education, law, nonprofit administration, advocacy, the arts, and more. Students who declare the major or minor can also receive scholarships and awards from UWM’s Sam & Helen Stahl Center for Jewish Studies, whether they’re taking classes in-person or entirely online. In September, the university added another online opportunity, Baum said. Students will now also be able to complete the new certificate in Holocaust, Genocide, and Human Rights Studies completely online. The online program offers access to more students than ever before, and the university offers special pricing that allows out-of-state distance learners to pay comparable rates to in-state tuition. Distance learners also receive academic guidance from Letters & Science advisors, either over-the-phone or over the web via Skype. The major requires 30-32 credits, with the option to learn Hebrew in online classes. The university also connects students to study abroad opportunities in Israel through partnerships at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev in Beersheba and at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Online learning isn’t without challenges. Classes operate on the same timeframe that in-person classes do, and students need to stay motivated and manage their time to complete their work. By the same token, the classes offer more flexibility for students with work, family, or other time commitments. For a full list of requirements for the Jewish Studies major, visit https://bit.ly/2lcbDsf. By Sarah Vickery, College of Letters & Science College of Letters & Science • UW–Milwaukee • 11
McNair scholar explores how volunteering Volunteers travel with the best of intentions, but that doesn’t prevent the worst of consequences. That’s according to new research by Emily Crain-Castle, an international studies major and a McNair scholar at UWM. She spent the summer conducting research that examines the impact of the volunteer industry on developing nations. While her work is still on-going, she’s uncovered some chilling facts: When young people go abroad to volunteer, they’re often harming more than they’re helping. “My research question was, what factors influence the impact on communities during an international volunteer program? I looked into medical volunteering, missionaries, people that are going on spring break,” she explained. “Volunteer tourism is a multi-billion-dollar industry. People are making tons of money on this, but I’ve found not many individuals in the U.S. are looking at this in academia.” As a McNair scholar, Crain-Castle conducted her research over the summer under the guidance of Paru Shah, an associate professor of political science. UWM’s Ronald E. McNair Post-Baccalaureate Achievement program prepare undergraduate students for doctoral
studies. McNair participants are either first-generation college students with financial need, or members of a group that is traditionally underrepresented in graduate education, and have shown strong academic potential. Crain-Castle found that every year, thousands of people from developed nations travel to lend their time and talents at places like medical clinics, orphanages, and schools in developing nations – places such as Africa, South America, and southeast Asia. While they often travel with the desire to make a positive impact on the world, she says that their efforts can many times harm the area where they volunteer. Her research over the summer identified four key areas of negative impact: •
International studies major Emily Crain-Castle stands in front of her poster outlining her research at a conference in Austin, Texas. Crain-Castle is a McNair scholar and spent this summer studying the impact of volunteering in developing nations. Photo courtesy of Crain-Castle.
Economy. “For instance, we as westerners bring things like donated shoes or clothing into these countries, but they actually take away from the (local) economy. People won’t buy clothes or shoes locally and support business owners,” Crain-Castle said.
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Or, she said, people volunteering to do work for free may displace local workers who would have been hired to perform the job instead.
“We believe different things and we go about things differently,” Crain-Castle said. “Going with that mindset into a community and not having that education, we could end up doing things the wrong way.”
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Lack of Education. Training for volunteers varies wildly depending on which organization they travel through. Many times, volunteers will lack cultural understanding about the area they’re visiting.
Worse yet, some volunteers aren’t qualified in the areas where they’re trying to serve – as medical practitioners or counselors, for example. Crain-Castle points to the story of Renee Bach, who founded a medical clinic in Uganda and was later accused of performing clinical procedures on children, despite the fact that she is not a doctor.
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g can harm •
Colonization. Crain-Castle worries that volunteer tourism sets up underdeveloped nations to be dependent on other countries’ goodwill. She calls it a new kind of colonization, less violent but still reminiscent of the way global empires exploited their colonies for resources.
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Power and Privilege. Race and ethnicity are undeniable factors at play when it comes to the volunteer industry. Most volunteer abroad opportunities are in countries where the majority of citizens are non-white.
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“If you look up volunteer (opportunities), you’ll always see a white person at the center of it. It’s a marketing strategy,” Crain-Castle said. She worries that these messages perpetuate racial stereotypes.
These are only preliminary findings. Crain-Castle’s research was hampered because little work has been done in this area. There are no formal numbers and no statistics. She’s had to rely on narratives and interviews from locals who have interacted with volunteers. This semester, “I hope to create a survey and use it here, in some form, or work with a nonprofit organization that is doing this work. Data would be collected and we’d go to host communities and ask, how do you feel about this work being done? Do you like it? Is it benefitting you?” Crain-Castle said. “I can’t really do that since I’m here and have a lot of barriers, geographically.” She’s also corresponding with Benjamin Lough, an associate professor of social work at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He’s conducting a 15-country study to determine the impact of local volunteering on community resiliency, and Crain-Castle hopes to study his data to inform her own research. Before anyone gets the wrong idea, Crain-Castle recognizes that many of the countries working with volunteers do need help to do things like create accessible medical care or build infrastructure. Just, she asks, be aware of volunteering’s impact. “Educate yourself on the country, the people, their history. I think people need to step back and realize that you’re just an individual within in a larger context,” she said. “Don’t have a big ego going into it.” Crain-Castle will have an opportunity to do that first-hand; she travels abroad to Africa in December to complete field work for her major. By Sarah Vickery, College of Letters & Science
Alumni Accomplishments Kenneth Cammilleri (’13, Master of Public Administration and certificate in nonprofit management) was tapped as the new city administrator of Scandia, Minnesota. Cammilleri previously worked in Pine City, Minnesota, and also served as the assistant city administrator in Washburn, Wisconsin. https://bit.ly/2kEQA1u Kirk Behrendt (’94, BA Communication) was profiled in the Milwaukee Business Journal for his inspirational YouTube videos that encourage dentistry professionals to make changes for better workplace and personal happiness. Behrendt is the owner and CEO of Act Dental. https://bit.ly/2kChEyl
Kirk Behrendt
Cindy Angelos (’75, BA International Studies) was one of the first women to become a train conductor in the Midwest in 1974. She was recently featured on TMJ4 News as a pioneer in the field who became the first female brakeman on the Milwaukee Road train line, and was later promoted to conductor. https://bit.ly/2koeUo5 Allan Cogan (’16, BA Political Science; ’18, MS Cultural Foundations of Community Engagement and Education) has joined the Pacific Legal Foundation in Washington, D.C. as a Research Associate.
Passings David Mackelm (’87, BA General Studies) passed away on Sept. 3 at age 72. Mackelm attended UWM and earned his bachelor’s degree before he joined the Navy and graduated from the Navy’s Pensacola Photo School. In his nine years of service, Mackelm ran Navy photo labs and served as a combat photographer/motion picture specialist in Vietnam from 1966-69. He earned several awards and honors before receiving an honorable discharge. Mackelm later worked as a photographer and media specialist at UWM until he retired in 2011. A full obituary is available at https://bit.ly/2kH4ZtI. College of Letters & Science • UW–Milwaukee • 13
Laurels and Accolades Winson Chu (History) has received a fellowship for experienced researchers from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. He will be based at the Center for Holocaust Studies in Munich, Germany, for the 2021 academic year, where he will pursue his monograph project on the German criminal police. Tim O’Brien (Sociology) and his co-author, Oren PizmonyLevy, received the Section on Sociological Practice and Public Sociology’s Publication Award for Significant Contributions to Applied and Public Sociology. Their awardwinning paper, “Going public, gaining credibility: Student perceptions of publicly engaged scholars,” was published in Tim O’Brien Sociological Perspectives and explores how students regard their professors as more credible when those professors are publicly engaged. https://bit.ly/2lHtFm6
Gwyn Wallander (Letters & Science advising) was chosen to receive a 2019 Don Racheter Impact Award at the Midwest Assocation of Pre Law Advisors (MAPLA) conference. She was selected by her peers for the award, which recognizes her work as a prelaw advisor and her support of MAPLA membership. https://bit.ly/2nuZLlU
Chris Quinn (Biological Sciences) received a $1.7 million, 5-year grant from the National Institute of Mental Health for neuroscience research related to autism. His project is titled, “Investigation of how axon development is disrupted by the autismcausing Timothy Syndrome mutation.” Chris Quinn Bonnie Klein-Tasman (Psychology) was elected to the Board of the Clinical Child and Pediatric Psychology Training Council, which oversees education and training that ensures state-of-the-art skills in work with children, adolescents, and families at the doctoral, internship, and postdoctoral levels.
14 • IN FOCUS • October, 2019
Alum finds satisfactio One of the people Kaila Binger worked with had six children and had been chronically homeless for a year – living on the streets, in derelict housing or couch surfing. When the woman finally called Binger’s office for help, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee alum was able to connect her to resources that helped the woman change her life. “It’s been about a year ago now since she called, but she was able to find housing with enough bedrooms to house herself and her children,” Binger said. Binger is a program coordinator for Foundational Community Supports, a Seattle Medicaid program that helps mentally ill and homeless people find and maintain housing and employment. The program is under the umbrella of Blue Cross Blue Shield and Anthem of Seattle. “It’s an extremely rewarding job,” she said. Crediting UWM Binger, who graduated in 2014 with a bachelor’s in psychology, credits what she learned at UWM for preparing her for the work she is now doing. “I am thankful for my experiences, good and difficult, at UWM and for how it prepared me for the world at large.” Foundational Community Supports is a pilot program to illustrate that housing and employment for homeless people with mental illnesses and substance abuse disorders helps improve long-term health outcomes. Assisting those with the greatest need not only benefits the individuals and their families, but the health of their communities and the state as a whole, Binger said. “The Medicaid clients that we serve tend to be the most costly,” she said. “However, their health tends to improve exponentially with an appropriate job and a roof over their head. That’s the point of the program. For me, my motivation is to help people in my community in a direct way, and I get to do that.” Research course helps As part of her job, she has to provide data to the state of Washington to support the value of the program. A research course she took as part of her psychology program at UWM has provided great guidance in that effort, Binger said. “I had some professors that really changed my life.” One of them was Pamela Schaefer, a faculty member who taught the statistics course and has guided Binger’s thinking as she does research.
on in helping homeless and mentally ill
Kaila Binger, who graduated in 2014 as a psychology major, credits what she learned at UWM for preparing her for her work helping the mentally ill and homeless. Photo courtesy of Kaila Binger.
“Part of my job is taking data from the project and showing the state of Washington that having adequate employment and housing directly improves health outcomes for individuals with Medicaid. Pamela Schaefer got me into empirical data and being really critical of it, being a good researcher and knowing what is good information and what isn’t always good information.” Binger became interested in studying psychology while working in community outreach at Meta House in Milwaukee, a nonprofit that helps women overcome drug and alcohol addiction and rebuild their families. “I really got interested in helping people with particular things like mental health or substance abuse issues because I found with the right resources, they can be successful with their life.” Jobs ‘very rewarding’ While some students may see a bachelor’s degree in psychology as of limited value on its own without a master’s or doctorate, Binger said that was not the case
for her. When she moved to Seattle, she found her degree an asset in finding a job in the health care field, and that eventually led to her current job, where she is making good money without a master’s degree. “I would say to other students there are absolutely jobs out there that are very rewarding. They are not necessarily the ones you expect. Even if you’re not coming out of college getting ready to be a therapist, there are a lot of options out there.” She likes, she said, that she is able to provide help to people directly. “This is my dream job. I’m now in a role where I can actually effect change, which is a really great place to be. I get to talk to a lot of people who are going through the worst days of their life, and I’m able to help them find a job and housing.” By Kathy Quirk, University Relations College of Letters & Science • UW–Milwaukee • 15
Upcoming Events Sun
October 2019 Mon
October 1 - December 19
Art History Exhibit: Work+Water. 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Emile H. Mathis Gallery (Mitchell Hall). The gallery is open Monday-Thursday and is free and open to the public. https://bit.ly/2nyKCQy
October 2
ICE on Campus: Know Your Rights. 4 p.m. Enderis 107. Emilio de Torre, Wisconsin ACLU. Sponsored by Cultures & Communities. https://bit.ly/2n1bd8T
October 3
Planetarium Event: Under the Mesoamerican Sky. 6 p.m. Manfred Olson Planetarium. Includes a musical performance by Browns Crew, free food, and stargazing shows at 6 and 7:30 p.m. https://bit.ly/2m8syfK United We Read. 7 p.m. Riverwest Public House (815 E. Locust St., Milwaukee). Readings by English Department faculty and students: Valerie Laken, Amanda Reavey, and Seth Copeland.
October 4 - October 25
Planetarium Show: Creepy Cosmos. Manfred Olson Planetarium. Fridays at 7 and 8:15 p.m. Tickets are $6. https://bit.ly/2PybcCy
October 4
Geography Colloquium: Applying GIS to support Green Infrastructure at MMSD. 3 p.m. AGS Library. Emily Champagne, GIS Supervisor at Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District (MMSD). Urban Studies Lecture: Placing Health Disparities – Sociospatial Polarization and Women’s Health in a Changing City. 3 p.m. Union 191. Sara McLafferty, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Probabilities of African Origins: The Collapse of the Kingdom of Oyo and the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, 1816-1836. 3 p.m. Curtin118. Henry Lovejoy visualizes the probabilities of African origins of enslaved people in diaspora by using GIS software. Sponsored by the Center for 21st Century Studies. https://bit.ly/2n8iIKU
October 11
Geography Colloquium: Extent of Social Curation as a KPI for Public Health Campaigns by Brands. 3 p.m. AGS Library. Purushottam Papatla, UWM. Cosmoplastics, or Bollywood’s Global Gesture. 3:30 p.m. Curtin 368. Bhaskar Sarkar, UC-Santa Barbara. Sponsored by the Film Studies program and the Vilas Trust. 16 • IN FOCUS • October, 2019
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October 15
The Art of Fiction Craft Talk with René Steinke. 2 p.m. Mitchell 361. Alumna and Guggenheim fellow Rene Steinke presents. Part of 50 Years of Creative Writing at UWM celebrations. Fiction Reading with René Steinke. 7:30 p.m. Hefter Center. Alumna and Guggenheim fellow Rene Steinke reads from her work. Part of 50 Years of Creative Writing at UWM celebrations.
October 16
Space Crazy! Kids’ Letters to Astronauts in the Early Space Age. 7 p.m. Manfred Olson Planetarium. Roshanna P. Sylvester, University of Colorado-Boulder. Free and open to the public. https://bit.ly/2lsVuyM UWM Creative Writing Program’s 50th Anniversary Celebration and Alumni Reading. 7:30 p.m. Alumni reflect on program history. Readings by Camille Banks, Debra Brenegan, Peter Burzynski, Christi Clancy, Lindsay Daigle, Chris Fink, Janet Jennerjohn, Stephen McCabe, Jozi Tatham, and Thomas Vollman.
October 17
Ctr. for Latin American and Caribbean Studies Fall Reception. 3:30 p.m. NWQ B2479. Geosciences Colloquium: Great Technology to Industry Adoption, the Long Road of Commercialization. 4 p.m. Lapham N103. Beth Conerty, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Poetry Reading: Derrick Harriell. 7:30 p.m. Hefter Center. Alum and award-winning poet Derrick Harriell reads from his work. Part of 50 Years of Creative Writing at UWM celebrations.
October 24
Dean’s Distinguished Lecture in the Natural Sciences. See back cover.
In the Media and Around the Community As economists and citizens worry that a recession might loom, William Holahan (emeritus Economics) opined in the Tampa Bay Times that a large national debt might not be a bad thing. https://bit.ly/2kb3dkz
Raising the Milwaukee County sales tax by 1 percent would have a negative impact on low-income families, Scott Adams (Economics) told Fox 6 News.
Using Native symbols in western art is a way for Native artists to incorporate their heritage and appeal to multiple audiences, Bernard Perley (Anthropology) said in a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article.
New research by John Heywood (Economics) revealed that female actors in Hollywood typically earn about $1.1 million less per movie than their male counterparts, Bustle reported.
https://bit.ly/2kqxLit
The Jewish Chronicle reported on how UWM became the first public university in the country to offer a Jewish studies major fully online. https://bit.ly/2lI0XS7 Thomas Haigh (History) commented on the qualities of Nicholas Negroponte, the founder and former director of the MIT Media Lab, in a Newscaf article. https://bit.ly/2m7s8Gi
Voters typically rely on political party, rather than a candidate’s sex, to determine their vote, Kathy Dolan (Political Science) said in an article about Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren on FiveThirtyEight.com. (https://53eig.ht/2kb4ckL) She reiterated that message in an article by BBC. (https://bbc.in/2ksvKCl)
The WUWM Radio Station celebrated its 55th birthday in September with a “look-back” interview with former morning host Bob Bach. https://bit.ly/2kDdmXd
Upcoming Events, con’t. October 25
Divining the Past: Dream Encyclopedic Knowledge in China. Noon. Garland 104. Brigid E. Vance, Lawrence University. RSVP to quinna@uwm.edu. Geography Colloquium: After Your Degree – Lifelong Learning for Geospatial Careers. 3 p.m. AGS Library. Adena Schutzberg, Education Team at ESRI.
https://bit.ly/2m4FVNE
https://bit.ly/2kOYK7m
Graduate student John Harry (History) spoke about his research at an event highlighting African American entrepreneurship John Heywood in Wisconsin’s Fox Valley during the Civil Rights Era. Harry’s research examines Peoples’ Brewing, an Oshkosh brewery owned by black investor Ted Mack. https://bit.ly/2lRwz7X
John Berges and Erica Young (Biological Sciences) appeared on Sea Grant’s podcast to discuss the discovery of the role of silica in algal blooms on Lake Michigan. https://bit.ly/2m5Hc7a Kay Wells (Art History) traveled to Stanford University in October to discuss the process of publishing a dissertation, using her work, Weaving Modernism: Postwar Tapestry Between Paris and New York as a basis. https://stanford.io/2krmmik
Zoos may be places of education and conservation these days, but they have a sordid past, Nigel Rothfels (History) penned in an essay published on Aeon. https://bit.ly/2lYg3mE
Radio Milwaukee talked with UWM Planetarium director Jean Creighton about the venue’s upcoming events and how this “hidden gem” works to incorporate interdisciplinary learning. https://bit.ly/2n4P7SA Amanda Seligman (History) urged everyone to honor the people working to reclaim their neighborhoods from gang and gun violence, sometimes at the cost of their own lives, in a piece she penned for the Washington Post. https://wapo.st/2mS5i5J
How does hormonal birth control affect the way women think, feel, and act? Sarah Hill (’00, BA Anthropology), a professor of psychology at Texas Christian University, posited that question on NBC’s Today show. https://on.today.com/2lqRhM2 College of Letters & Science • UW–Milwaukee • 17
The results are in ... and we couldn’t have done it without you! In September 2019, UWM concluded a multi-year, university-wide fundraising effort called Made in Milwaukee, Shaping the World: The Campaign for UWM. The university surpassed its $200 million goal by more than 25% — a powerful achievement. More than 21,000 donors contributed to the campaign, and more than half were first-time donors. UWM raised $133 million for students success, $89 million for research excellence and $29 million for community engagement. To learn more, visit https://uwm.edu/give. By Kyle Bursaw, University Relations
Campus-wide Campaign Results: • $251,466,444 raised • 21,236 total donors • 10,340 first-time donors • $79M added to the UWM Foundation Endowment with outright and deferred gifts
Results for the College of Letters & Science, Honors College, and Center for International Education: •
$32,551,836 raised
• 3,509 total donors • 2,222 alumni donors
L&S Breakdown by campaign priority: • $20,355,428 for Student Success (scholarships, fellowships, study abroad, internships, and research) • $11,437,351 for Research Excellence (endowed professorships and chairs, research institutes and academic centers, lab equipment, and faculty retention) • $759,057 for Community Engagement (Dean’s Lecture series, research symposia, film festivals, Science Bag, and other community educational events)
Join us for the Dean’s Distinguished Lecture in the Natural Sciences! In the summer of 1987 on Oneida Lake, a group of students and faculty (led by Ken Nealson and Lynn Margulis) discovered a geochemical enigma: metal oxides were disappearing (dissolving) in the sediments of the lake. Their observation led to the discovery of a group of bacteria that were doing something that, according to the paradigms of the day, “they shouldn’t be capable of doing”: donating electrons to solid metal oxides. This discovery, and the studies that followed, led to a new view of microbial metabolism. Scientists learned that bacteria could not only donate electrons to metal electrodes to convert chemical energy directly into electricity, but bacteria could also grow using electricity as their only energy source. Join us to hear Dr. Ken Nealson talk about these fascinating discoveries and the potential impact of these microbes – impacts that would never have been believed before that day at the lake in 1987. Dr. Ken Nealson is the Wrigley Chair in Environmental Studies and Professor of Earth Sciences and Biological Sciences at the University of Southern California.
Date: Thursday, Oct. 24 Time: 4:30 - 6 p.m. Location: UWM Union Wisconsin Room Cost: Free!
