May 2026
Lise Abrams, Peter W. Stanley Chair of Linguistics and Cognitive Science, published the research article “The grammatical class of first-syllable neighbours constrains resolution of tip-of-the-tongue states” in the journal Language, Cognition, and Neuroscience, co-authored with collaborator Katherine White (Rhodes College).
In collaboration with colleagues at the University of Colorado Colorado Springs, Army University and Rhodes College, Abrams co-authored a talk (“These F**king Words! Humor Attenuates the Taboo Stroop Effect”) and poster presentation (“Funny but Forgettable? Predicting the Plausibility, Humor, and Memorability of Taboo Compounds”) at the Association for Psychological Science 2026 annual convention, which was held May 28–30 in Barcelona, Spain. Three Pomona students (Alexa Tapia-Plazola ’26, Kalyani Nair ’27 and Elisabeth Lootus ’25) were also co-authors on the poster. Abrams also co-authored a lightning talk, “Is the Pen Truly Mightier than the Laptop? Slaying Educational Zombie Claims Using AI,” with David Therriault (University of Florida) at the (Re)Imagining Liberal Arts and STEM Education in the Age of Generative AI conference held May 21–22 in Claremont.
Malachai Komanoff Bandy, assistant professor of music, played solo viola da gamba with Bach Collegium San Diego (dir. Ruben Valenzuela) in two performances of a program pairing funerary works by G. P. Telemann and J. S. Bach with a selection of African American spirituals, curated and sung by countertenor Reginald Mobley, on May 2 and 3 in San Diego and at the Conrad Prebys Performing Arts Center in La Jolla, California.
On May 4 at the Athenaeum Music and Arts Library in La Jolla, California, Bandy delivered a pre-concert lecture, programmed and supplied program notes, and played viola da gamba as artistic director of Artifex Consort in a performance of 17th-century works by Benjamin Hely, Johann Michael Nicolai, Johannes Schenck, Christopher Simpson, Dieterich Buxtehude and Francesco Corbetta. After teaching a day-long workshop for Cascadia Viols in Portland, Oregon, on May 16 on the topic of the compositional technique fauxbourdon in 15th- and 16th-century works by Guillaume Dufay, Francesco Layolle and others, Bandy played G violone with Tesserae Baroque in their 2025–2026 season finale featuring Francesco Cavalli’s 1675 Venetian Vespro della Beata Vergine and assorted instrumental works, held at All Saints’ Episcopal Church in Beverly Hills, California, on May 31.
Allan Barr, professor emeritus of Chinese, had his translation of Yu Hua’s story “Victory,” originally published in The New Yorker, adapted into a short film of the same name by Indian director Prateek Damodaren.
Barr gave an online keynote speech titled “Translating Xu Xiake’s Travel Diaries for Western Readers” at the Symposium on Civilizational Exchange and Cultural Communication, Shaanxi Normal University, May 16–17.
Mietek Boduszynski, associate professor of politics, delivered the Heinz Ethics lecture at Polytechnic School in Pasadena, California, titled “Why Values Matter in Foreign Policy.”
With his sister Monica Chellam ’04, Boduszynski co-organized and led a democratic resilience-focused study tour in Poland for senior American political and civic leaders in Poland, funded by a large grant from The States Forum. He co-authored a piece on lessons learned during the study tour in Just Security.
Boduszynski was a visiting professor at Jagiellonian University, teaching courses in its CISAD and IRAS programs.
Paul Cahill, associate professor of Spanish, presented a paper, “‘Un punto ciego en el mapa conocido como la tierra de Nonú’: Imagining Asturias in the Poetry of Laura Ramos,” at the IV SAnTINA Conference (Sociedad para el Análisis de Temas Culturales e Identidades Lingüísticas N’Asturies), held online and at the Universidade de Vigo from May 6–7. He also published an article, “‘Una sólida trayectoria’: (In)visible Hierarchy in the Circulation of Twenty-first-century Spanish Poetry,” in the Bulletin of Contemporary Hispanic Studies as part of “Claves de la contemporaneidad en la poesía española reciente,” a special issue he co-edited with José Ángel Baños Saldaña (Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha) and Manus O’Dwyer (University of Oxford).
Gary Champi, assistant professor of dance, performed as a guest artist with Malashock Dance at The Joan and Irwin Jacobs Performing Arts Center on May 2–3 in a new duet with Khamla Somphanh choreographed by Christopher Kaui Morgan.
Karla Cordova, visiting assistant professor of economics, presented a paper titled “Immigration Enforcement and Child Maltreatment” at the Liberal Arts Colleges Public and Labor Economics (LACPaL) conference hosted by Oberlin College on May 8.
Jordan Daniels, assistant professor of environmental analysis, published “Weird Sisters and Other Relatives: Witch Hunts, the Commons, and Uncommon Natures in Ecological Feminism” in The Witch: A Reader in Feminist Political Theory, edited by Katie Howard and Shannon Mariotti and published by Palgrave Macmillan.
Donna M. Di Grazia, David J. Baldwin Professor of Music, and the 34-member Pomona College Glee Club gave an abbreviated concert at the Getty Center in Los Angeles on May 7, the fourth time the ensemble has performed at the Getty since 2022. Di Grazia and the ensemble performed two full-length concerts on Alumni Weekend (April 30 and May 1) and took part in Memorial Convocation on May 2. They also gave a full-length performance May 16 as part of the College’s Evening of Music and Art on Commencement Weekend and made their traditional appearance at Commencement itself (May 18). Following Commencement weekend, Di Grazia and the ensemble left for its annual spring concert tour, giving four full-length performances in Colorado Springs, Colorado; Denver; Albuquerque, New Mexico; and Santa Fe, New Mexico. This was the Glee Club’s first visit to the Rocky Mountain and Southwest regions in more than 30 years.
David Divita, professor of Romance languages and literatures, gave an invited lecture titled “Antropología: Salidas profesionales” at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid on May 13.
Virginie A. Duzer, professor and chair of Romance languages and literatures, and Andrew Wilson, director, research computing and digital scholarship and lecturer in computer science and French, participated in the Harvey Mudd conference “(Re)Imagining Liberal Arts and STEM Education in the Age of Generative AI” on May 21 by co-presenting a lightning talk dedicated to French 184 (On Proust and AI), a class supported by a Hahn Grant that they co-taught in spring 2026.
Roberto A. Garza-López, professor of chemistry, served as the keynote speaker for the Chicano Latino Student Affairs (CLSA) graduation ceremony, honoring Latinx graduating seniors and advanced degree recipients earning their bachelor’s, master’s and Ph.D. degrees.
Garza-López undergraduate students secured several prestigious abstract acceptances for upcoming scientific conferences. Benjamin Roh ’29 had an abstract titled “In Silico Discovery of Potential Therapeutic Compounds for Coccidioidomycosis (San Joaquin Valley Fever)” accepted for the 8th International Coccidioidomycosis Study Group (CSG) Symposium. The lab achieved dual abstract acceptances for the ACS National Meeting in Chicago. This includes a submission co-authored by Noah Baoerjin ’29, Yonten Gyatso ’29 and Roh, “Computational mapping of GSNO-mediated transnitrosylation and S-nitrosylation mechanisms in HDA19 and NPR1,” as well as a submission by Jonathan Cong ’28 and Roh, “Multi-bank virtual screening and comparative molecular dynamics of steroid mimetics targeting the GVR protein for Duchenne muscular dystrophy.”
Dean Gerstein, director of sponsored research, was elected to the board of directors of the 1,500-member National Organization of Research Development Professionals.
On May 5, Gerstein presented “What is Research Development in the Context of Research Administration? Survey Results,” funded by a National Science Foundation grant, at a meeting of the Society for Research Administrators International in Atlanta.
Nicole Desjardins Gowdy, senior director of international and domestic programs, presented “In Defense of Language Learning in Education Abroad” at the Association of International Educators (NAFSA) Annual Conference with Mark Lenhart (president, CET Academic Programs), Hang Du (professor and chair of the Chinese department, Middlebury College) and Marilena De Chiara (program director, CET Barcelona). The topic and fellow presenters were also recently featured in NAFSA’s International Educator magazine.
Gizem Karaali, professor of mathematics and chair of Mathematics and Statistics, together with Feryal Alayont of Grand Valley State University, gave a presentation titled “A Framework for AI Literacy to Support Effective Teaching and Learning” during the two-day virtual workshop of the Mathematical Association of America, AI in the Classroom: What’s Working (and What’s Not), held May 20-21.
Two recent articles of Karaali’s, “Who’s Afraid of Generative AI? Ethical Considerations for Mathematics Instructors” with Kira Hamman and Lew Ludwig, and “Computo, Ergo Sum: Teaching and Learning Mathematics in the Age of ChatGPT” with Kamden Baer ’23 and Oscar Scholin ’24, were used and/or referenced in the newly adopted Ethical Uses of GenAI in the Classroom policy statement of Pitzer College faculty.
Jorge Moreno, associate professor of physics and astronomy, published an article titled “Pickles on FIRE: The 3D Shape Evolution of Simulated Milky Way-Mass Galaxies” in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society and another article titled “The quenched fraction of satellites around simulated Milky Way-mass galaxies” in the Astrophysical Journal, led by Francisco Mercado, postdoctoral research fellow.
On May 14, Moreno delivered a talk titled “Igniting (and failing to ignite) galaxy formation in the late universe” at The Universe at All Scales international conference held at Nazarbayev University in Astana, Kazakhstan. On May 29, Moreno delivered a talk titled “Igniting and failing to ignite galaxy formation” at CICO-VICO-CASSUM Spring Workshop held at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg, Sweden.
Richard Parnell, assistant director, stewardship, published a review of Benjamin Y. Fong’s monograph, Quick Fixes: Drugs in America from Prohibition to the 21st Century Binge (Verso, 2023), in The Social History of Alcohol and Drugs (The University of Chicago Press).
Mary Peterson, lecturer in neuroscience, published an article titled “Culturally responsive teaching can protect STEM identity among underrepresented students” in the journal Social Psychology of Education with colleagues from Claremont Graduate University and Texas A&M.
Carolyn Ratteray, associate professor of theatre, will perform Rose in Fences this summer season at Santa Cruz Shakespeare. She also voiced a role on American Dad this past season.
Hans Rindisbacher, professor of German, published a review of Common Scents: Poetry, Modernity, and a Revolution of the Senses by Jonas Rosenbrück (Albany: SUNY Press, 2024) in Monatshefte.
Jody Valentine, assistant professor of classics, led a workshop at the Feminism and Classics IX Conference to introduce their recently-launched website for the Deltos Project. The website provides open-access resources for teaching gender and sexuality in the Ancient Mediterranean. Valentine also co-presented a paper, “A Cursed Community? The Case of the Ostia Ornatrices,” at the same conference.
Feng Xiao, associate professor of Chinese, gave an invited online talk on AI-enhanced pedagogy at the 8th Yale Master Forum of Chinese Language Teaching for the Council on East Asian Studies at Yale University on May 6.
On May 9, Xiao presented a paper titled “Task-Adapted AI Training for L2 Pragmatics Assessment” at the 38th North American Conference on Chinese Linguistics (NACCL38) at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Additionally, he co-presented, with Aysa Vaisberg ’26, a natural language processing paper titled “News Media Sentiment Toward Chinese AI: A Comparative Analysis of Belt and Road Initiative Involvement and Public Opinion on China” and chaired the L2 Acquisition session at NACCL38.
Samuel Yamashita, Henry E. Sheffield Professor of History, delivered the address to the AdBoard Commencement dinner May 8. His talk was titled “A Personal Take on Asian American Pacific Islanders at the Claremont Colleges.”
Yanshuo Zhang, assistant professor of Asian languages and literatures, gave a public lecture on her new book, Creative Belonging: The Qiang and Multiethnic Imagination in Modern China, at the University of California San Diego, at the invitation of the 21st Century China Center, a nationally recognized center that aims to enhance U.S.-China mutual understanding by advancing scholarly collaboration, convening policy discussions, and actively communicating with policymakers and the general public in both countries.