September 2024
Malachai Komanoff Bandy, assistant professor of music, played viola da gamba and violone basso continuo in a rare complete performance of Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber’s cycle of 15 Rosary Sonatas (ca.1680), with violinist Andrew McIntosh, baroque harpist Maxine Eilander and keyboardist Ian Pritchard. The performance, which included 15 scordatura violin tunings on four violins (one tuning for each Mystery of the Rosary), was presented September 14 at Shigemi Matsumoto Recital Hall at Cal State University Northridge on the series ChamberMusic@CSUN, sponsored by the Colburn Foundation and the CSUN Foundation.
On September 27 in Lyman Hall, Bandy performed as a viola da gamba soloist with Cornucopia Baroque on the Friday Noon Concert Series.
Allan Barr, professor emeritus of Chinese, gave invited talks on literary translation at several Chinese universities: Shanghai Normal University on September 3; Zhejiang University, Hangzhou Normal University and Zhejiang International Studies University on September 10, 11 and 12; and Sichuan International Studies University on September 26.
Graydon Beeks, emeritus professor of music, collaborated with his Cornucopia Baroque Ensemble colleagues September 27 as harpsichordist in a program of music by Johann Krieger, George Frideric Handel and Georg Philipp Telemann on the Friday Noon Concert Series. Other faculty performers were Alfred Cramer, violin, Malachai Komanoff Bandy, viola da gamba, and Jason Yoshida, theorbo, who were joined by Aki Nishiguchi, oboe and recorder, Eva Lymenstull, viola da gamba, and Roger Lebow, cello.
Shannon Burns, assistant professor of psychological science and neuroscience, published a paper in Nature Communications about the neural dynamics underlying social interaction titled “Hyperscanning shows friends explore and strangers converge in conversation.”
Paul Cahill, associate professor of Spanish, published a journal article, “‘A modo de huella’: desaparición y desafío en la poesía de Antonio Méndez Rubio,” in Perífrasis: Revista de Literatura, Teoría y Crítica and a book chapter, “Viral Variation(s): Juan Eduardo Cirlot and the Poetics of Permutation,” in Art and Biotechnology: Viral Culture from CRISPR to COVID, Bloomsbury, edited by Claire Correo Nettleton and Louise Mackenzie.
Karla Cordova, Chau Mellon postdoctoral fellow in economics, was awarded the 2024 Professional Development Grant for Emerging Scholars Studying Poverty and Economic Mobility among Latino Populations from the National Research Center on Hispanic Children & Families.
Alfred Cramer, associate professor of music, joined in a celebration of Arnold Schoenberg’s 150th birthday September 13 with a presentation, “Klangfarbenmelodie: Phantasy for Violin & Piano, op. 47.” He argued that Schoenberg’s concept of Klangfarbenmelodie (melody of tone-color) provides an important structural and interpretive framework for his music. The presentation included a demonstration on two different violins, one strung in early-20th-century fashion. The celebration was held at the Westside Conservatory of Music in Los Angeles, near the Brentwood neighborhood where Schoenberg lived for the last 16 years of his life.
Malte Dold, assistant professor of economics, published the article “Taking psychology seriously: a self-determination theory perspective on Robert Sugden’s opportunity criterion” in Journal of Economic Methodology on September 28. The article was co-authored with Elias van Emmerick ’21.
Robert Gaines, Edwin F. and Martha Hahn Professor of Geology, with colleagues from Harvard, described a new species of fossil sponge, which is named for the artist James Turrell ’65. The paper “A new sponge from the Marjum Formation of Utah documents the Cambrian origin of the hexactinellid body plan” was published in the journal Royal Society Open Science on September 18.
Stephan Ramon Garcia, W.M. Keck Distinguished Service Professor and chair of the Department of Mathematics and Statistics, published an editorial, “A Word From…,” in the September 2024 issue of Notices of the American Mathematical Society.
Dean Gerstein, director of sponsored research, presented a paper (virtually), “Assessing Research Culture: The Grants Development Ecosystem Inventory,” at the plenary session of Building a Sustainable Research Culture, the 2024 Annual Meeting of the NORDP MSI Consultants program, at Florida Memorial University, Miami Gardens.
Esther Hernández-Medina, assistant professor of Latin American studies and gender and women’s studies, guest co-edited and wrote the introduction for the book Embodiment and Representations of Beauty along with Sharina Maíllo-Pozo. The book is volume 35 of the series Advances in Gender Research (editors Vicky Demos and Marcia Segal) and was published by Emerald on September 6.
Jade Star Lackey, professor of geology, presented “Chlorine concentrations in metamorphic wallrocks in the Sierra Nevada: implications for arc halogen budgets” and “How to read the oxygen isotope system in Cordilleran arcs: lessons from 190 million years of Sierran magmatism” at the Annual Meeting of the Geological Society of America on September 22–25. Lackey was also a co-author on three other presentations with two current and two former Pomona students, and he served as a session convener.
Genevieve Lee, Everett S. Olive Professor of Music, was a guest performer at Oakland University (Michigan) where she performed solo, four-hand and two-piano works in concert.
Piano Spheres posted Lee’s entire March solo concert on YouTube. The San Francisco Classical Voice gave her a glowing review for this recital.
Jonathan Lethem, Roy E. Disney ’51 Professor of Creative Writing, had a two-volume omnibus edition of two of his novels, Motherless Brooklyn and The Fortress of Solitude, included in The Everyman’s Library.
Joyce Lu, associate professor of theatre and Asian American studies, read the part of Anne in a staged reading of American Hunger by Nikhil Mahapatra in the Jean-Claude Carrière New Works Festival, produced by EnActe Arts at the Hammer Theatre in San Jose, California.
Lu appeared in a public service announcement for Alzheimer’s Los Angeles.
Alessia Lupo Cecchet, visiting assistant professor in media studies, received recognition for her experimental film balaena (2023), which won second place at the juried exhibition organized in Aosta, Italy, by ArteAlta Foundation and third place at the 32nd Annual Emerald Coast National Juried Art Exhibition, organized by the Mattie Kelly Arts Center Galleries (Niceville, Florida). Watch the trailer for balaena.
Cecchet will have a two-person show with artist Jasmine Baetz at the Sprague Gallery at Harvey Mudd College in October, where her sculptural work will be displayed along with her video work.
Denise Machin, assistant director of the Smith Campus Center and director of the ballroom dance program, successfully defended her title as the number one woman/woman Latin couple from the North American Same Sex Partner Dance Association (NASSPDA) alongside her partner Viola Ni CMC ’25 on September 21. Machin also excelled in various woman/woman salsa categories with Amy Rubinstein, art studio technician at Pitzer College.
Sara Masland, associate professor of psychological science, presented a talk, “Using Ecological Momentary Assessment to Test GPM Theory and Enrich Clinical Care,” at the European Society for the Study of Personality Disorders (ESSPD) conference in Antwerp, Belgium.
Richard Mawhorter, professor of physics and astronomy, recently received word of acceptance by Physical Review A of a manuscript with four Pomona student co-authors titled “Rotational and near-infrared spectra of PbF: Characterization of the coupled X1 2Π1/2 and X2 2Π3/2 states.” Sean Jackson ’23 is lead author. Also, a poster with three Pomona student co-authors titled “SrF Rotational and Hyperfine Global Fit (and YbO)” was presented at the American Physical Society DAMOP meeting in Fort Worth, Texas.
Preston McBride, assistant professor of history, delivered a keynote research webinar for the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition on September 25 titled “Hidden Epidemics within Indian Boarding Schools.”
Richard McKirahan, Edwin Clarence Norton Professor of Classics and professor of philosophy, published the book The Sophists. The book is part of Routledge’s Ancient Philosophies series in which the fifth-century BCE Sophists are presented in a radically different and more positive way than the traditional view of them as subversive foreigners who took money for teaching young men how to gain political power and win lawsuits through dishonest means and misleading rhetoric.
Susan McWilliams Barndt, professor of politics, participated in three panels at the American Political Science Association’s annual meeting in Philadelphia during the week of September 5: as the chair of a panel on African-American political thought; as the chair of a panel titled “The Idea of Fraternity in America at 50 and Its New Generations of Readers” and as a presenter on a panel on “Liberalism, Republicanism, and Communal Freedom in American Political Thought.”
On September 10, McWilliams delivered the Constitution Day Lecture at Skidmore College, titled “A Tale of Two Liberalisms: Desegregating American Political Thought.”
McWilliams published an op-ed in The Los Angeles Times on September 9, titled “Do You Remember Politics Before Trump? My Students Don’t.” On September 16, she published an article in Ms. Magazine titled “The U.S. Political Reality (Taylor’s Version).”
On September 25, McWilliams appeared on LiveNOW From FOX to discuss the upcoming American presidential election as part of the network’s You Decide 2024 series.
Jorge Moreno, associate professor of physics and astronomy, organized the 2024 GalFresca conference at the Carnegie Observatories in Pasadena, California, on September 19-20.
Moreno was interviewed on Astrobites and wrote an invited guest post titled “Astro sequoia: a blueprint for spaces of learning and discovery.”
Lina Patel, lecturer of theatre, was one of eight playwrights from across the country invited to The New Harmony Project’s inaugural PlayFest Indy new works festival to workshop her new play “Sick Girl or... Don't Hate Me Cuz I’m Pretty” about the intersection of immigration, misdiagnosis, chronic illness and disability. The play was helmed by director Daniel Talbott, with Lexy Leuzsler providing dramaturgical support. PlayFest Indy partners invited playwrights with local theaters and provided funding, travel, housing and casting support to work on and ultimately present their work to a public audience.
Sheila Pinkel, professor emerita of art and art history, will have two large bodies of work included in the Getty PST show Digital Capture at the California Museum of Photography in Riverside, California, opening October 26. The museum enlarged one of her small works and wrapped the front of the museum with it. Also, her work will be included in the exhibition Work at the Wellcome Collection in London. This large modular piece addresses prison labor in California prisons. It is also included in the show at the University of Alabama Birmingham Abroms-Engel Institute for the Visual Arts’ Outside Lines group exhibition from their collection. It is also included in the exhibition Presidential Rogues: Satirical Posters from the 1950s to the Present at the Mercado La Paloma in Los Angeles.
Hans Rindisbacher, professor of German, presented a paper titled “Proud or Sorry to be Neutral? Swiss Political Self-Representation in the Nebelspalter, 1930s and 1940s” at the German Studies Association 48th Annual Conference in Atlanta on September 26-29.
Colleen Ruth Rosenfeld, professor of English, interviewed Jonathan Kramnick (Yale University) about the art of close reading for Public Books.
Larissa Rudova, Yale B. and Lucille D. Griffith Professor in Modern Languages and professor of German and Russian, delivered a paper, “The Rise of the Detective Genre in Post-Soviet Children’s Literature: Enid Blyton and Middle-Class Values,” at the international conference “Writing a British Childhood in a Global Context? Critical Perspectives on Enid Blyton” at the University of Potsdam, Germany on September 25-27.
Patricia Smiley, professor emerita of psychological science, published a paper with colleagues at UC Irvine and the University of Wisconsin–Madison in Infant Mental Health Journal. Among other findings, undergraduate interveners from The Claremont Colleges showed higher fidelity in implementing a weekly savoring intervention than those with more education, and mothers, in turn, displayed more sensitive caregiving.
Gary Smith, Fletcher Jones Professor of Economics, published a MarketWatch opinion piece, “AI-powered stock ETFs were hyped as superior investments. Then reality hit.” on September 11.
Jessica Stern, assistant professor of psychological science, co-authored two papers on adolescents’ social development: “Emotional engagement with close friends in adolescence predicts neural correlates of empathy in adulthood,” an fMRI study published in Social Neuroscience, and “Beyond delinquency and drug use: Links of peer pressure to long-term adolescent psychosocial development,” published in Development and Psychopathology. Working with Theresa Pfister ’13, she also published an education practice brief, “Rehumanizing Education Through Relationships,” for the American Psychological Association, Division 15: Educational Psychology.
Luis Edward Tenorio, visiting assistant professor of sociology, published a paper, “Legal Care Work: Emotion and Care Work in Lawyering with Unaccompanied Minors,” in Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies.
Friederike von Schwerin-High, professor of German, published the essay “Lessings Naturbegriff laut den Schriften seines Bruders Karl Gotthelf Lessing” in September in the book Natur‘ in der Romantik, volume 15 in the series Schriften der internationalen Arnim-Gesellschaft, edited by Christof Wingertszahn.
Andrew Wilson, director of research computing, published an article titled “Visual affordances and social interactions at Early Iron Age Khirbat al-Mudayna al-ʽAliya, Jordan” in Levant, The Journal of the Council for British Research in the Levant.
Feng Xiao, associate professor of Asian languages and literatures, and Jonathan Becker ’24 led a workshop on AI-supported language learning for the Computer Assisted Language Instruction Consortium (CALICO) on September 27. Founded in 1983, CALICO is a leading international organization dedicated to advancing computer-assisted language learning (CALL).
Yanshuo Zhang, assistant professor of Asian languages and literatures, won the 2024 Luce/ACLS Collaborative Grant in China Studies, a national grant given by the American Council of Learned Societies.