It’s been so long since I posted an update but one is certainly in order!
Since my last update, I’ve continued my research, film work, and writing and have been teaching in various capacities at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. I’ve supported the interdisciplinary work of students, community, and colleagues through research assistantships and facilitating writing retreats and workshops for graduate students in affiliation with the Center for the Study for the Premodern World and the Race, Indigeneity, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (RIGS) Initiative at the UMN. I had the pleasure to do some service and professional development as an Advisory Board Member for The Jean-Nickolaus Tretter Collection in Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Studies (member from 2019-2020) and the Institute for Advanced Study (member from 2018-2020) at the UMN.
New Job!
In August 2020, I accepted a new position as a Research Assistant and Program Coordinator at the RIGS Initiative (whoo hoo!). In Spring 2021, this role will expand to a Postdoctoral Fellowship and I’m incredibly honored to do this work. RIGS began because of student and faculty activism and now is a hub for the Critical, Race, and Ethnic Studies Graduate Writing Group, the Critical Disability Studies Collective and our six affiliate programs:
Screenshot of the RIGS Initiative Website, September 24, 2020, featuring students in a RIGS working group discussion.
A little rewind
Summer of 2019, I interned at Morgan Stanley, Minneapolis, doing research on funds for a team focused on Sustainable Wealth Management and ESG (Environment, Society, and Governance). This experience was helpful to think through methods and approaches for a future book/film project on how ESG/Sustainability practices intersect with the production of whiteness, homo-normativity, and gender in the New North Atlantic.
In Fall 2019, I worked as a research assistant for Erin Durban and Miranda Joseph and taught an evening section of my department’s Intro to Anthropology course, “Understanding Cultures” where I focused on the economic and raced, sexed, and gendered aspects of “The Science and Politics of Storytelling”. Spring 2020, I taught 110 students and mentored three first-year graduate student teachers in the lecture/honors section of this introductory course. I moved instruction online during what was to be our Spring Break and taught a 100% asynchronous online version of my class to mostly non-traditionally aged and returning students in Summer 2020. I will miss teaching undergraduates this year but am happy to get to work with graduate writers. Trade-offs!
Be well and in care! ~Jen
Don’t forget to vote!