Faculty members put their knowledge into action so students and others are able to benefit from it. Recently, faculty presented at virtual conferences and used their expertise to discuss current events and their new books on podcasts.
Associate Professor of Government Grace Huang
Associate Professor of Government Grace Huang recently discussed her new book titled “Chiang Kai-shek’s Politics of Shame: Leadership, Legacy, and National Identity," with Dong Wang, professor of history and director of the Wellington Koo Institute for Modern China in World History at Shanghai University. Their discussion was featured on the author-interview podcast, New Books Network.
Huang has been at St. Lawrence since 2005 and teaches courses like Comparative Politics, Asia: Beyond the Great Wall, Chinese Politics, Research Seminar: China’s Rise, and political leadership. Her research interests include political leadership, the political uses of shame in Chinese leadership, and rural to urban migration to China. Huang holds both a Ph.D. and master’s degree in political science from the University of Chicago and a bachelor’s degree from Brown University.
Associate Professor of History Howard Eissenstat
Associate Professor of History Howard Eissenstat recently discussed Turkish President Erdogan’s visit to New York to attend the United Nations General Assembly with Merve Tahir, Turkey program coordinator at the Project on Middle East Democracy. The conversation was featured by Conversation Six, a new platform for creating short-form podcasts from world-leading experts in their field.
Eissenstat's research focuses on nationalism and Islam in the 19th century Ottoman Empire as well as the history of the Turkish Republic. His recent work has focused increasingly on contemporary Turkish domestic and foreign policy, especially on issues of rule-of-law, minority rights, and the reshaping of political culture under the Justice and Development Party (AKP). In addition to traditional academic work, Eissenstat served for over a decade as a Turkey Country Specialist for Amnesty International-USA. He has lectured at the Foreign Service Institute of the U.S. Department of State, the U.S. military, and the Canadian Foreign Service Institute, as well as given testimony to the Canadian Senate and offered briefings to Congressional Committees.
Visiting Assistant Professor of History Carolyn Twomey
Visiting Assistant Professor of History Carolyn Twomey recently presented a paper during a panel at the virtual 27th Annual Meeting of the European Association of Archaeologists in Kiel, Germany. The paper titled, “Archaeology of Initiation: Early Baptismal Fonts of Medieval England,” focuses on the reuse of high crosses, altar, and burial stones as baptismal fonts in England, Wales, and Europe as a whole and the meanings of reuse and pastoral care for Christian communities past and present.
Twomey’s research focuses on rituals and environments of water in the early Middle Ages as well as the cultural and religious history of material culture and sacred spaces from late antiquity to the present in Europe and the Mediterranean.
St. Lawrence’s Faculty Focus is a regular roundup that features noteworthy faculty news. Submit news for an upcoming edition.
