Congratulations to Arelis Moore de Peralta, assistant professor of Spanish and Health and the winner of the 2018 Phil and Mary Bradley Award for Mentoring in Creative Inquiry. This award is given to a faculty member in recognition of their outstanding work with undergraduate students. Students participating in Creative Inquiry projects are the nominators for this award.

One of Moore de Peralta’s nominators wrote: “She has taught our CI that anything is possible with the support of each other, and through her support to us, has encouraged and helped her students to present research all across the nation… Dr. Moore has made a significant impact on my personal life. She has taught me how to go into third world countries, and to use community health tools to create a healthier, sustainable, and long-lasting community. She taught me the value of partnership, and that only by creating strong partnerships can a community become long-lasting and flourish. She truly cares about each of her students in a unique and loving way. She provides leadership opportunities for every single one of her students, by making each student in charge of a smaller project, fostering communication and organizational skills in each person. She encourages outreach and the building of partnerships with different organizations on campus, and promotes countless public speaking opportunities by allowing each student to present at conferences locally and nationally. She takes no
credit for her work, but allows each student to shine in their own way.”

Moore de Peralta will be honored at a ceremony on May 8 and receive a monetary award. Read more about her Creative Inquiry project here.

Jae Takeuchi, assistant professor of Japanese, who has been awarded the Hamako Ito Chaplin Memorial Award for excellence in Japanese language teaching at the college level. The national award, administered through the Association for Asian Studies, is given to only one or two instructors of Japanese each year.

Stephen Fitzmaurice, assistant professor of ASL, published “Best Practices for Educational Interpreters in South Carolina,” a technical assistance resource for the South Carolina Department of Education Office of Special Education Services. He was also featured in the Member Spotlight of the national Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf.

Alma García-Rodríguez, lecturer of Spanish, received her Ph.D. in Spanish literature from the University of Florida. Her dissertation focused on the representation of the city in six novels from the Hispanic Caribbean: Santo Domingo, La Habana and San Juan. She took a Neo-Baroque perspective to study these cities as elements that stand against an established order and authority in order to create a new identity that governs itself. She plans to continue researching Caribbean literature.

Daniel Holcombe, lecturer of Spanish, published the essay “Salvador Dali’s Everyman: Renaissance and Baroque Classicism in ‘Don Quixote and the Windmills (1946)’” in Cervantes: Bulletin of the Cervantes Society of America. Here he traced Dali’s classical trajectory through art historical analyses of the third watercolor illustration from the artist’s first illustrated edition of “Don Quixote.” He also published “Salvador Dalí’s “Don Quixote: High Art or Kitsch?” in Laberinto Journal. He was recently named an editor of this online peer-reviewed journal published by the Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies. His article in Laberinto defines Dalí’s role as an illustrator of the 1946 text. It also reveals how Dalí achieved what critics have deemed impossible: the rendering of both fantasy and reality in the same pictorial composition. Holcombe presented related research at the South Atlantic Modern Language Association conference in Atlanta in November 2017. He also published a book chapter, “Marco Berger: Homoaffective Edging and Cinematic Queered Continuums,” in Intimate Relationships in Cinema, Literature, and Visual Culture, edited by Gilad Padva and Nurit Buchweitz for Palgrave Macmillan. In the chapter, Holcombe combines queer theory with Jacques Lacan’s psychoanalytical theory l’objet petit a to analyze the spectator gaze and cinematic techniques in two films by Argentinian director Marco Berger.

Jason Hurdich, lecturer of ASL, was named the Marie Griffin Interpreter of the Year. The award, given by the Southeast Regional Institute on Deafness, recognizes his outstanding service to the deaf, hard of hearing and deaf-blind communities of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, Tennessee and the Carolinas. Read more about his award here.

Salvador Oropesa, professor of Spanish and Department Chair, published the article “‘El Quijote’ en la trilogía de la frontera de Cormac McCarthy: Neobarroco del Southwest” in the Colombia-based journal Lingüística y Literatura 72 (2017): pp. 135-55. In his abstract, Oropesa said: “We read Cormac McCarthy as a novelist of the Baroque of the Southwest paying special attention to syntax, vocabulary, and intertextuality. The bulk of the critical attention on McCarthy is anglocentric. We cover the influence of Spanish literature, mainly Cervantes, in the Border Trilogy.” He also presented the paper “La Trilogía del Baztán de Dolores Redondo como guía de liderazgo en el contexto de la novela policiaca contemporánea española” at the XXVII annual congress of the International Association of Female Hispanic Literature and Culture November 8 in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

Kelly Peebles, associate professor of French, published the article “The Head, the Heart, and Hysteria in Jeanne Flore’s ‘Tales and Trials of Love’ (c. 1542)” in the Journal of Medical Humanities. She presented the paper “Mothering in the Shadow of the Crown: Royal cousins, religious refugees, and the nurturing influence of Renée de France” at the Royal Studies Network’s Kings & Queens 6 conference, which was held in Madrid, Spain, September 12-15.

Graciela Tissera, associate professor of Spanish, presented her research on armed conflicts and historical memory in film, “Paco Cabezas y Gilles Paquet-Brenner: intersecciones de la memoria histórica en el cine,” at the IX Congreso de Análisis Textual Trama y Fondo (University of Valladolid, Spain) in October. Tissera also attended the II Congreso Internacional Figuraciones de lo Insólito en las Literaturas Española e Hispanoamericana organized by the University of León, Spain in October to present her research paper “Jorge Luis Borges y David Roas: percepciones de múltiples universos y seres soñados.” The research focused on the perception of time, space, and personal identity related to supernatural dreams and idealist philosophy in the fiction of Borges and Roas.

Eric Touya, associate professor of French, gave the lecture “Make Civil Rights and the Humanities Happen at Your Library” on October 12 at the 2017 South Carolina Library Association Conference in Columbia. He also read the paper “Humanizing Economics: Pedagogical Approaches to Transforming the Homo Economicus” at the 32nd Annual Interdisciplinary Conference in the Humanities held October 27 at the University of West Georgia in Carrollton.

Rosa M. Pillcurima, originally from Quito, Ecuador, joined the faculty in January 2018 as a new Lecturer of Spanish. She earned her B.A. in Spanish from the State University of New York at Geneseo and her M.A. in Foreign Languages and Literatures with a concentration in Spanish from Iona College. Prior to coming to Clemson, she taught Spanish at SUNY Geneseo and at the University of Florida. In her free time, Rosa enjoys traveling, cooking, reading and visiting museums.

Senior Lecturer of Spanish Scott Harris retired in December 2017. His retirement marks the end of a 30-year career in the Department of Languages, where he began teaching in January 1988.

Harris earned his B.A. in Spanish and his M.A.T. in Secondary Education in Spanish from the University of South Carolina. Although he was trained to teach high school, he enjoyed teaching college much more. After graduating, he taught at Furman University for two years before coming to Clemson.

At Clemson, Harris taught elementary and intermediate levels of Spanish and served on various committees, including the President’s Council for Community and Diversity and the Declamation Committee. He also served as the Scheduler and Registration Coordinator for the department for many years.

Of his most memorable activities at Clemson, Harris said, “Over the years I enjoyed the Southern Circuit Film showings and have greatly missed that program since its recent departure. I was also proud to be involved in the founding of the Lambda Society, the first gay-straight alliance organization, back in the early 90s here at Clemson.”

Harris will be greatly missed by his colleagues in the department, who feted him at a retirement party in December. Department Chair Salvador Oropesa described Harris as the “electricity” of the department, while CAAH Dean Richard Goodstein called him the “glue.” Other attendees reminisced about their time working with Harris.

Congratulations, Scott!

On October 21, 2017, the Department of Languages hosted the 45th Annual Declamation Contest. This poetry recitation contest brings together middle- and high-school students from the region, who come to the Clemson campus for the day to show off their language skills. This year, 490 students from 31 middle and high schools in South Carolina, Georgia, and North Carolina registered to compete in ASL, Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Latin, Russian and Spanish. Clemson students also volunteered to help with registration and supervise contest rooms in Daniel Hall.

Competitors recited two poems, a mandatory selection and a second selection. They were evaluated by 67 judges, who included Clemson faculty and members of the community. After the judging was complete, students and their families attended an awards ceremony in Tillman Hall. The event also gave participants a chance to explore the campus, eat in a dining hall, and learn more about the school. Past Declamation participants have attended or are now attending Clemson to study foreign languages.

The contest’s continued success is due to the hard work of the Department’s faculty and staff, especially the Declamation Committee of Su-I Chen, Scott Harris, Melva Persico, Cathy Robison, Anne Carole Salces y Nedeo, Amy Sawyer, and Julia Schmidt.

The 45th Declamation Contest was dedicated in loving memory of Roger K. Simpson, Senior Lecturer of Spanish, who passed away on February 4, 2017. Roger served for 17 years on the Declamation Committee, and his unwavering dedication and commitment to the contest, to his colleagues and to his students will always be appreciated and remembered.

Congratulations to Jason Hurdich, lecturer of ASL, the recipient of the Marie Griffin Interpreter of the Year Award. The award was presented on October 10 at the Southeast Regional Institute On Deafness (SERID) conference. SERID covers the entire area of Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. The award is presented to an individual who has demonstrated outstanding community leadership, personal achievement, or contributions to individuals who are Deaf or Hard of Hearing.

“I am extremely honored to accept this award on the behalf of the wonderful Deaf and interpreting communities here in South Carolina,” Hurdich said. “I am very proud to be involved in serving this great state.”

Yanming An, professor of Chinese and philosophy, received the College of Architecture, Arts and Humanities (CAAH) John B. and Thelma A. Gentry Award for Teaching Excellence in the Humanities. Established by Frank and Sarah Gentry to honor Mr. Gentry’s parents, John and Thelma Gentry, this peer-reviewed award recognizes an outstanding humanities faculty member and provides an annual competitive fund to support projects, materials and activities that will improve and enrich teaching in the humanities.

Raquel Anido, assistant professor of Spanish, received the CAAH Dean’s Award for Excellence in Teaching. The annual dean’s awards are peer-reviewed by the college faculty awards committee. Each award comes with a plaque of recognition, placement on the list of awardees in the dean’s office and a cash award. Her nominators write glowingly of her excellence in the classroom.  One wrote, “[she] imparted a wealth of knowledge on her other students and me about Spanish language and culture, but she also imparted the necessity for passion in whatever one is doing. She encourages her students to pursue their passions, to never settle and to challenge beliefs.” Another said, “Anything less than the best is not enough for [her].  I truly admire this desire in her. She challenges all of her students to be the very best they can be. In return, she brings her best, every day, to the classroom. Her standards are high but not impossible, and I truly appreciate that she cares enough about her students to educate them to the best of her ability, push them beyond their comfort zone and help them to discover their strengths and passions in the process.” And, from her own teaching statement, Professor Anido reminds us all of this very important message: “Teaching is a passion for communicating knowledge, for sharing and giving back what you have learned from the most inspiring readings, travels, life experiences and teachers you have had.”

The Summer issue 94.1 of the journal of Italian studies Italica contains an article by Luca Barattoni, associate professor of Italian, on the representation of work in post-WWII Italian Cinema. The article is entitled “Diritto negato, pratica alienante, collisione corpo/macchina: l’identità ferita nella rappresentazione cinematografica del lavoro” and looks at film as the privileged medium for a symbolic negotiation of work in Italian society.

Adrienne Fama, lecturer of Spanish, received a scholarship from the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL) to study in Salamanca, Spain. She spent two weeks in July at Colegio Delibes taking a methodology course for instructors of Spanish as a foreign language.

Together with Kim Misener Dunn, lecturer of American Sign Language, Stephen Fitzmaurice, assistant professor of American Sign Language, presented “An Eye on ASL Standards” on January 28 as hosts of the first annual Clemson American Sign Language Pedagogy Conference in Greenville. This conference welcomed ASL educators from the Southeastern United States and will become an annual event. Steve presented a ten-hour workshop in February for working educational interpreters related to “Knowledge Competencies for Educational Interpreters.” This workshop was the inaugural professional development session for interpreters working in public schools across the state as part of the South Carolina Educational Interpreting Center grant awarded to Clemson from the South Carolina Department of Education. From March 31-April 2, he served as an invited moderator for two sessions at the second international Symposium on Signed Language Interpretation and Translation Research held at Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C. The symposium promoted the exchange of scholarship on signed language interpretation and translation as well as provided a platform for interdisciplinary research across various disciplines including linguistics, communication, sociology, psychology, anthropology, and education. He also published an article “Unregulated autonomy: Uncredentialed educational interpreters in rural schools” in the American Annals of the Deaf. This research employed ethnographic methodologies to explore how interpreters without national certification were enacting their role in a rural high school. He also provided a workshop for the South Carolina Department of Education: Research to Practice Institute focusing on educational interpreters and how to convey key vocabulary in their interpreting work.

In August William Daniel Holcombe, lecturer of Spanish, published a peer-reviewed article in Mexican Studies / Estudios Mexicanos, a journal co-published by the University of California at Santa Barbara and the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. In the article, Holcombe examines how Mexican chronicler Carlos Monsiváis (Mexico City 1938-2010) utilized the concept of slumming and the term “queer” in his later works that focused on sexuality studies. Holcombe, William Daniel. “Lo queer de Carlos Monsiváis: slumming en el ambiente.” Mexican Studies/Estudios mexicanos 33.2 (Summer 2017): 272-95.

Joseph Mai, associate professor of French, published Robert Guédiguian in Manchester University Press in May. Intervening at the crossroads of philosophy, politics, and cinema, this book argues that the career of Robert Guédiguian, director of Marius et Jeannette (1997) and other popular auteurist films, can be read as an original and coherent project: to make a committed, historically-conscious cinema with friends, in a local space, and over a long period of time. Illustrated with comprehensive readings of all of Guédiguian’s films. He also gave a paper titled “Democratic practices and the Human Affair” at the Bophana Center in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, where he was conducting research on the work of filmmaker Rithy Panh. The Bophana center, named to preserve the memory of just one of the Khmer Rouge’s many victims, was founded by Rithy Panh to provide audio-visual resources and production training and support to young generations of Cambodians.

Tiffany Creegan Miller, assistant professor of Spanish, received the CAAH Lightsey Fellow award for her work on (Re)negotiating the Politics of Orality and Ethnography in Performances of Kaqchikel Children’s Songs and Poetry. Established by Dr. and Mrs. Harry M. Lightsey with an original pledge of $100,000, the endowment provides support for junior faculty members in the humanities for summer research projects that will advance their scholarship. A peer review committee of faculty has judged these proposals. Tiffany was also invited to Elon University in North Carolina on April 6 to give a talk on Kaqchikel Maya children’s songs in relation to contemporary Pan-Maya activism in Guatemala and participate in a panel discussion of the film, “Ixcanul” (2015). Both of these events were part of a series focusing on indigenous rights in Guatemala in the 21^st century. Miller also was invited to be a guest lecturer for a medical Spanish class at Brown University on March 13 to discuss health care initiatives focusing on diabetes and child malnutrition in Guatemalan Maya communities. She also organized a panel session on Central American cultural and literary production at the Latin American Studies Association Congress in Lima, Perú. As a presenter in the panel, Miller discussed her recent work with Kaqchikel Maya children’s songs as a form of socio-political activism in terms of language revitalization efforts for this Guatemalan indigenous language. In early June, Miller also attended the DHSI (Digital Humanities Summer Institute) at University of Victoria.

Kim Misener Dunn, lecturer of American Sign Language, and her collaborators from Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C. and Lamar University in Midland, Texas had the opportunity recently to discuss the challenges they encountered in educational research. Typically, Deaf individuals are seen through the lens of the dominant hearing society’s perception. Unearned vs. earned privilege in higher education were analyzed, and the benefits determined. Dunn and her colleagues used the grounded theory to generate components necessary for  successful Deaf and hearing research partnerships. As a result of this collaboration, “Deaf and Hearing Research Partnerships” has been published in the winter issue of the educational research journal American Annals of the Deaf.

Arelis Moore de Peralta, assistant professor of Spanish and health, presented “Perceptions and Determinants of Partnership Trust among Hispanic Participants in a Culturally Relevant Health Promotion Organization (PASOs) in South Carolina” at the 2017 Clemson University Research Symposium in May. This community-based participatory study allowed her to identify perceptions and determinants of trust among stakeholders of the PASOs organization, at two different stages of organizational development. The role of culture as a determinant of trust in partnerships was identified, in addition to organizational and socio-economic determinants. Data gathered were used to identify types of trust based on a selected typology (Lucero, 2013) used in the context of CBPR partnerships.

Johannes Schmidt, associate professor of German, had a book chapter, “Herder’s Religious Anthropology in His Later Writings,” published in Herder: Philosophy and Anthropology in the United Kingdom by Oxford University Press in March and in North America and elsewhere in May. From the publisher’s description: “J.G. Herder is enjoying a renaissance in philosophy and related disciplines and yet there are, as yet, few books on him. This unprecedented collection fills a large gap in the secondary literature, highlighting the genuinely innovative and distinctive nature of Herder’s philosophy.  […] The second part then examines further aspects of this understanding of human nature and what emerges from it: the human-animal distinction; how human life evolves over space and time on the basis of a natural order; the fundamentally hermeneutic dimension to human existence; and the interrelatedness of language, history, religion and culture.” The “Herder Yearbook XIII” (2016) is the second yearbook that Johannes co-edited (with Reiner Godel, Halle, Germany). This trilingual academic journal — published every two years on behalf of the International Herder Society — advances scholarly inquiries into the German thinker Johann Gottfried Herder, his reception and influence. The journal presents contributions from multiple and interdisciplinary fields, such as, but not limited to German studies, philosophy, history, linguistics, cultural and colonial studies, as well the humanities in general. At last year’s conference, Schmidt presented on “Herder and the Opera: Plurality of the Senses.” He also moderated a panel on Herder and the arts. In June Schmidt visited the OTH Regensburg in Germany, a new partner university, and gave two workshops: “German Culture and Economy in the US” (in German) and “Holocaust Education in the US” (in English). In addition, he promoted Clemson as a study-abroad destination for Regensburg students. He also took the opportunity to visit the first three Clemson students studying at Regensburg and got a tour of the large semiconductor manufacturer Infineon where one of the students is currently interning. Read more about his trip to Regensburg here.

On February 11, Daniel J. Smith, associate professor of Spanish, presented “Spanish L1 (1st language) and L2 (2nd language) ‘Errors’ due to Interference or the Natural Order of Acquisition” at the 20th Annual Conference on the Americas. The conference was sponsored by the Americas Council of the University System of Georgia at Armstrong State University in Savannah, Georgia. Smith presented an analysis of ‘non-target’ Spanish L2 utterances by English L1 speakers and Spanish utterances made by Spanish L1 speakers who are exposed to large amounts of English as their L2, differentiating between ‘errors’ in ‘non-target’ utterances which are due to interference from either L1 or L2 and ‘errors’ due to the natural order of acquisition. The analysis also made implications for the role of interference errors in language shift and for instruction strategies in second language classes.

Gabriela Stoicea, assistant professor of German, participated in the Annual Meeting of the American Comparative Literature Association in Utrecht, the Netherlands in July. There she organized a three-day seminar entitled “Liberalism in Crisis: A Perspective from the Humanities.”

Graciela Tissera, associate professor of Spanish, presented her research on literature, film and culture, “The Fiction of Borges and Cortázar in Film: Exploring the Realm of Metaphysical Imagery,” and chaired a panel on adapting philosophers to film at the Southwest Popular/American Culture Association 38th Annual Conference in Albuquerque, New Mexico (February 17). Tissera’s students, Elouise Cram and Rebecca McConnell, participated in the panel to discuss their Creative Inquiry projects related to the Hispanic world through film, literature and media. Read more about Elouise and Rebecca.

Eric Touya, associate professor of French, received the CAAH Dean’s Award for Excellence in Service. The annual dean’s awards are peer-reviewed by the college faculty awards committee. Each award comes with a plaque of recognition, placement on the list of awardees in the dean’s office and a cash award. Eric also read a paper entitled “Claudel diplomate, poète, et exégète” on the panel “(Re)-presenting Claudel Today” at the Modern Language Association Conference in Philadelphia in January. The program was arranged by the Paul Claudel Society. He presented at the 2017 Clemson University Research Symposium in May. His presentation, titled “Why should STEM students study the Humanities?”, examined the extent to which the humanities are as important as science and technology and how students in STEM can benefit from taking courses in the humanities, such as literature, art, and philosophy. Eric read a paper entitled “Remembering the Great War: Apollinaire, Proust, Claudel, Valéry” at France and the Memory of the Great War: An Interdisciplinary Conference at the University of South Alabama, Mobile, Alabama. He also read a paper entitled “Sens, Interprétations, et signifiances musicales chez Valéry, Barthes, et Bonnefoy” at “Le Sens et les sens/Sense and the Senses,” the 2017 International Colloquium on 20th and 21st French and Francophone Studies at the University of Indiana in Bloomington.

The Department of Languages welcomed the following new faculty members at the beginning of the Fall 2017 semester.

Bo Clements, Lecturer of American Sign Language

Bo is relocating from Tampa Bay, Florida after having spent 20 years teaching ASL courses at the University of South Florida. As the current President of the Florida American Sign Language Teacher’s Association (ASLTA), Bo holds ASLTA Professional Certification and recently presented several workshops at the ASLTA national conference. Bo holds an M.S. degree from Florida State University and an undergraduate degree from Gallaudet University. Bo loves Modern Art, traveling and is a proud daddy of a DODA (Dog of Deaf Adult), a golden retriever named Ryley.

Daniel Holcombe, Lecturer of Spanish

Daniel is from Asheville, North Carolina and was raised in northern Virginia, where cultural diversity and cultural competence began to play major roles in his life. He holds a B.A. in Spanish from the University of North Carolina at Asheville, an M.A. in Spanish and a Ph.D. in Spanish Literature from Arizona State University. His specialization focuses on the 400-year history of illustrated editions of Don Quixote, Salvador Dalí as the illustrator of a special 1946 edition, and how both fit into this history. Research interests include the reinterpretation of quixotic iconography in cultural production, such as in film and graphic novels; gender and masculinity studies as applied to Latin American film and literature, as well as early modern Spanish literature, especially works by Cervantes; the role of Don Quixote in the development of twentieth-century U.S. Hispanic Studies, and medical interpretation and translation. He has served as a volunteer or contract Spanish-English medical interpreter for 30 years and has written and taught medical interpretation courses in North Carolina since 2012. Daniel teaches intermediate Spanish, intermediate Spanish grammar and composition, and comprehensive writing in Spanish. He enjoys spending time with his family in Asheville, writing and publishing, and performing editorial service for academic journals and bibliographic service for the Modern Language Association.

Jason Hurdich, Lecturer of American Sign Language

Jason is relocating from Charleston, South Carolina where he recently worked as a Vocational Rehabilitation counselor and was referred to as a “Rock Star” by Her Honorable and a fellow Clemson Alumnus, Governor Nikki Haley for his role as a Deaf Interpreter during Hurricane Matthew in 2016. Jason is a Certified Deaf Interpreter (CDI) by the Registry of Interpreters for the Deaf (RID) and earned his Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from Boston University and his Master’s of Education in Signed Language Interpretation from the University of North Florida. Jason has instructed college level ASL classes for twenty-three years and looks forward to joining the Clemson team. Read more about Jason here.

María Rosa Júdez, Lecturer of Spanish

María Rosa was born and raised in Mexico City. She earned her M.D. from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) along with several postgraduate fellowships and certifications. She has 30 years of clinical experience as a General Practitioner with expertise in obesity, diabetes and nutrition. In addition to her clinical experience, María Rosa has taught medical clinics and public health university courses in Mexico, developed continuing education courses for physicians and nurses, and coordinated several studies of obese and diabetic patients, among other accomplishments. She has published several articles and co-authored a book on obesity. After moving to South Carolina, she earned a certification via the Medical Assistant Program at Tri-County Technical College in Pendleton. At Clemson, she teaches a Spanish for Health Professionals course in the Language and International Health program. María Rosa has four children who live in Cancún. She loves learning, reading, exercising, and Latin dancing with her husband.

Isabel Meusen, Lecturer of German

Isabel received her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of South Carolina. Her main research interests are in the areas of Holocaust literature and film. In addition to a comparative focus on the literature of the Holocaust, Isabel’s research and teaching interests include postwar and contemporary German literature, trauma theory, women’s and gender studies, and the graphic novel. She is currently working on a book titled Unacknowledged Victims: Lesbian Women’s Experiences of Persecution during the Holocaust. Before joining the Clemson faculty, Isabel taught at the University of Memphis and Middlebury College. At Clemson, she teaches elementary German.

Stephanie Morris, Lecturer of Russian

Stephanie is from northern New Jersey and teaches beginning Russian as well as an intermediate Russian lab course. She earned a dual B.A. in Russian and International Affairs from the University of New Hampshire and her M.A. in Russian and East European Studies from the Russian and East European Institute at Indiana University. Her research interests have centered on the cultural and historical interactions between Russia, Estonia, Finland, and the Finno-Ugric peoples. In her free time, she enjoys playing the violin, painting, and writing.

Kumiko Saito, Assistant Professor of Japanese

Kumiko holds a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the Pennsylvania State University. Her research focuses on modern Japanese literature and culture, especially how Westernization impacted Japanese concepts of gender and technology. Her current book project examines the concept of romantic love through Japanese women’s literature and popular culture including novels, manga, anime, and video games. Before coming to Clemson, she taught Japanese language and popular culture at Grinnell College for two years. Prior to that, she worked as a translator in the automotive industry. At Clemson, Kumiko teaches Japanese literature courses in English and Japanese. In her free time, she enjoys playing video games.

Satomi Saito, Lecturer of Japanese

Satomi earned a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the University of Iowa. His research interests include the modern Japanese novel, the intellectual and cultural history of Japan, and Japanese popular media, such as anime and manga. Prior to joining the Clemson faculty, he taught Japanese language, culture, literature, and film courses at Colgate University. At Clemson, he teaches elementary Japanese.

Ellory Schmucker, Lecturer of Spanish

Ellory grew up in Hilton Head Island, South Carolina and earned her B.A. and M.A. in Spanish from the University of South Carolina. She taught intermediate Spanish at Clemson from 2011 to 2015 and returned to the same role this fall. In addition to her work teaching Spanish, Ellory has worked as a translator and transcriber and has interpreted on behalf of people with disabilities and Medicaid patients for the Department of Social Services. Ellory has authored a Spanish language children’s book and hosted a Spanish language radio show on WSBF, and she wrote her Master’s Thesis on the role of women in the Spanish surrealist movement. Outside of her interest in Spanish, Ellory is also a fan of tomatoes, the theremin and trap music.

The following article appeared in the Independent Mail on August 9: