Buzz Around IAC

Yanni Loukissas, associate professor in the School of Literature, Media, and Communication, appeared on the WREK podcast Lost in the Stacks to discuss the work students in his Data, Design, and Society class did to create data visualization videos for the Georgia Tech Library Media Bridge. Listen to the episode at https://bit.ly/41VFtQN.

Lindsey Bullinger, assistant professor in the School of Public Policy, wrote an op-ed for Undark on her research showing that expanding the child tax credit helped reduce child abuse and neglect visits to Atlanta-area hospitals. Read it at https://bit.ly/3HwW3OW.

Margaret E. Kosal, associate professor in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, recently spoke at a UN event on the cognitive neurosciences and neurotechnology.  The United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR) is sponsoring a series of talks on brain-computer interfaces, and Kosal spoke on the strategic and security implications, geopolitical competition, and trends in technology adoption.

Lawrence Rubin, associate professor in the Sam Nuinn School of International Affairs, moderated a panel discussion for the Council on Foreign Relations on geoplitics in the Middle East. About 150 people attended. You can watch a recording of the discussion at https://on.cfr.org/3oWX7oN.

Patrick McCarthy, Professor Emeritus in the School of Economics, received a Best Paper Award at the 64th Transportation Research Forum Conference. The title of the paper is “Health Indicators, Mode Choice, and Time-Cost Trade-offs: Evidence from Out-Patient Trips to Health Care Facilities."

Susana Morris, associate professor in the School of literature, media, and communication wrote an MSNBC commentary on journalist Don Lemon's firing from CNN. 

Britta Kallin, associate professor in the School of Modern Languages, presented a webinar on April 25, 2023, as part of the Klett World Languages webinar series on "Incorporating Education for Sustainable Development into the WL Classroom.” 

Jin Liu, an associate professor of Chinese in the School of Modern Languages, published a review of the Chinese film China's Last Peasant in Return to Dust in the publication China Currents, Vol. 22, No. 1. The article discusses how the film documents the disappearing rural lifestyle in China and why it was "suddenly and mysteriously taken down from all the country's theatres and streaming sites."

Jin Liu, an associate professor of Chinese in the School of Modern Languages, published a review of the Chinese film, China's Last Peasant in Return to Dust, in China Currents, Vol. 22, No. 1. The review discusses how the film documents the disappearing rural lifestyle in China and speculates on why the box office hit was "suddenly and mysteriously taken down from all the country's theatres and streaming sites."

Dina Khapaeva, professor in the School of Modern Languages, has been named a University of Strasbourg Institute for Advanced Study Fellow for the Spring 2024 term. Khapaeva will work at the French university studying the “propaganda of violence in post-Soviet politics of memory from 2000 to 2022.” For more information, see the university's announcement.

At a recent Hague Centre for Strategic Studies event, Adam N. Stulberg, Sam Nunn Professor and Chair in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, and Distinguished Professor of the Practice Philip Breedlove discussed Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the RuBase research project designed to provide insight into Russia and improve strategic analysis capabilities. Read more at https://bit.ly/3GCCynz.

Lisa Yaszek, Regents' Professor of Science Fiction Studies in the School of Literature, Media, and Communication, spoke about science fiction as a source of hopeful narratives for educational game designers as part of the OceanVisions 2023 biannual summit's closing event, "Gaming Platforms for Oceans and Climate Solutions."

Cassidy R. Sugimoto, Tom and Marie Patton Chair in the School of Public Policy, gave the Fred Jevons Lecture at the University of Manchester on March 23. Sugimoto spoke about the gender gap in science and technology and ways to address it. She discussed her recent book, Equity for Women in Science, which analyzes how the gender gap in science blocks the advancement of women in scientific research.

Dina Khapaeva, professor of Russian in the School of Modern Languages, wrote a commentary on Russian President Vladimir Putin's use of mercenaries in its fight against Ukraine. The article, "Putin's Dogs of War," is published in Project Syndicate.

Shatakshee Dhongde, associate dean for academic affairs and associate professor in the School of Economics, co-authored a paper for the IZA Institute of Labor Economics discussing the Vietnamese economy. The article is titled "Rapid Economic Growth but Rising Poverty Segregation: Will Vietnam Meet the SDGs for Equitable Development?"

Lisa Yaszek, Regents' Professor of Science Fiction Studies in the School of Literature, Media, and Communication, will be the lead guest scholar at the 2023 Tennessee Williams Institute in Provincetown, Mass. The symposium is scheduled in conjunction with the annual Tennessee Williams Theater Festival. This year, the festival and the symposium will focus on Williams' work featuring "spaceships, aliens, vampires, ghosts, and bizarre imaginary worlds," according to the festival site.

School of Public Policy Professor John Walsh recently presented at a National Bureau of Economic Research Productivity Seminar. He presented his paper, co-authored with You-Na Leek, titled “What Share of Patents is Commercialized?”

Elise Li Zheng, a Ph.D. student in the School of History and Sociology, wrote a commentary on her research on self-tracking technology for Platypus, the blog of the  Committee for the Anthropology of Science, Technology, and Computing. "It is a love and hate relationship, as we gain knowledge of ourselves by numbers, getting excited about the fun parts of self-tracking, while getting disheartened at the never-achieving goal of self-improvement," she writes.

Stéphanie Boulard, associate professor in the School of Modern Languages; Brigitte Stepanov, assistant professor in the School of Modern Languages; and David Edwards, director of the Center for Urban Research, were among the presenters at the Atlanta "Night of Ideas" held March 4. The event included activists, performers, authors, and academics discussing aspects of sustainability and equity.

Mariel Borowitz, an associate professor in the Sam Nunn School of International Affairs, was featured in the MIT Technology Review. The article discusses how Borowitz, a 2006 MIT graduate in aerospace engineering, became an expert at the nexus of space policy and international affairs.