Newsmakers | College of Liberal Arts

Highlighting the professional and academic accomplishments of College of Liberal Arts students, faculty, and staff.

Newsmakers are a quick and easy way to acknowledge the professional and academic accomplishments of RIT students, faculty, and staff, such as publishing an article in a scholarly journal, presenting research at a conference, serving on a panel discussion, earning a scholarship, or winning an award. Newsmakers appear in News and Events as well as the "In the News" section on faculty/staff directory profile pages.

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April 2025

April 9, 2025

Shay Ryan Olmstead, lecturer in Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, was presented with the John D’Emilio LGBTQ History Dissertation Award by the Organization of American Historians. Olmstead's dissertation, entitled “Refuse to Run Away: Transsexual Workers Fight for Civil Rights, 1969-1992,” argues that employment discrimination claims brought by transsexual workers fundamentally shaped the legal definitions of sex and disability.
April 4, 2025

Anna Sofia Hege, a second-year experimental psychology MS student, and Logan Brownell ’24 (psychology), presented research at the International Conference on Comparative Cognition in Albuquerque, N.M. Their studies, conducted with Professor Caroline DeLong at RIT’s Comparative Cognition and Perception Lab, were carried out at Rochester’s Seneca Park Zoo.
April 4, 2025

Danielle Pafunda, associate professor of English, released her 10th poetry collection, Along the Road Everyone Must Travel, which was selected by poet Hoa Nguyen to win the Saturnalia Poetry Prize.
April 4, 2025

Evelyn Brister and Evan Selinger, both professors in the Department of Philosophy, were selected as 2025 Marc Anderson Foundation Philosophy in Media Fellows. The international fellowship supports academically-trained philosophers who produce public-facing work. They will also participate in the Trade Books and Publication Workshop this summer.
April 4, 2025

John Edlund, professor in the Department of Psychology, co-authored “Predicting the Replicability of Social and Behavioral Science Claims in COVID-19 Preprints,” published in Human Nature Behavior. He also co-authored “Can Swearing Improve Persuasion in Advertising Contexts” with experimental psychology MS student Jeremy Marshall and Paul Wiele ’16 (experimental psychology), which was published in Social Influence.
April 4, 2025

Michael E. Ruhling, professor in the School of Performing Arts, co-edited Haydn, Sacred Music, and Perspectives of the Viennese Classical Triad. Ruhling, a historical musicologist and conductor, is president of the Haydn Society of North America and editorial director of HAYDN: Online Journal of the Haydn Society of North America.
April 4, 2025

Jessica Hardin, associate professor of anthropology, and Sophia Williams ’23 (sociology/anthropology, criminal justice), co-authored the article “Diabetes care in Samoa: Prevention as not-enough-care and the knowledge gaps it produces.” The collaborative ethnography was supported by the National Science Foundation and the Wenner Gren Foundation.

March 2025

March 26, 2025

John Capps, professor of philosophy, organized a panel on pragmatism and the penal system and presented his paper “Pragmatism, Deterrence, and Collective Punishment” at the annual meeting of the Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy on March 14 in Washington, D.C.
March 24, 2025

Katrina Overby, assistant professor in the School of Communication, will deliver the keynote address titled “Gathering as Necessary Resistance: On Black Women’s Social, Communal, and Digital Belonging" at St. John Fisher University for its Women’s History Month programming. Her talk will explore the role of community and placemaking in Black women’s experiences in academia and society.
March 24, 2025

Hinda Mandell, professor in the School of Communication, was invited as a visiting professor at the University of Paris-East Creteil. She delivered lectures and workshops to graduate students on craftivism, artistic-based research, and exhibition curation.