Christopher Atzinger, Professor of Music
My sabbatical project focuses on three solo piano pieces based on the 24th Caprice by the
violinist composer, Niccolò Paganini. First is the famous Brahms variations set, Op. 35. This technically demanding work serves as a noteworthy example of prominent string literature crossing into the romantic piano genre. Next is Ignaz Friedman’s 1914 variation set, Op. 47b. Friedman’s harmonic language, while still romantic, reveals further development and experimentation. The program closes with Mark Hambourg’s Variations on a Theme of Paganini, written in 1902. Like Friedman, Hambourg, follows many of the structural outlines established by Brahms, while expanding registration, harmonization, and textural choices in addition to offering fresh melodic ideas. In total, the three pieces showcase virtuosity and compositional creativity while embracing boundaries of thematic continuity. The project also serves to showcase both historically significant and lesser known piano works, all unified by Paganini’s 24th Caprice.
Laura Boehm Vock, Associate Professor of Mathematics, Statistics, and Computer Science
Within the field of Statistics, my primary area of methodological expertise is in analysis and
modeling of data collected over space (i.e. data which can be visualized on maps). During my
sabbatical, I hope to focus on an ongoing collaboration to study glacier loss and statistical
methods for quantifying uncertainty in glacier mass balance estimates. I will also develop and
disseminate materials for my Spatial Data Analysis course, a topic not often taught at the
undergraduate level. Lastly, I am excited to work with my colleague Paul Roback on the second
edition of the textbook Beyond Multiple Linear Regression.
Brian Borovsky, Professor of Physics
I will perform experiments in my research lab at St. Olaf designed to follow up on recent results
obtained during a collaborative project with Prof. Seong Kim’s group at Pennsylvania State
University. Our project aims to understand how a class of carbon-based lubricant films
dramatically lowers friction between two objects in sliding contact, at least under certain special
conditions. These films are called “diamond-like carbon” coatings, or DLC. If friction and wear
can be nearly eliminated, then there is enormous potential for energy savings and improved
durability in a wide range of everyday devices within the transportation, energy, medical device,
and other sectors. Our work was initiated with NSF funding in 2019, and to date we have made
progress in understanding the chemical reactions and physical requirements for achieving
ultralow friction with DLC. Dedicated research time will allow me to follow up on the newest
results obtained by my students and I and plan the next phase of collaboration with Seong Kim
and/or other university-based partners.
Maggie Broner, Professor of Romance Languages
This project continues the work started in 2020 exploring a relatively new area of study in linguistics known as ecolinguistics to explore how it intersects with teaching Spanish in a post-communicative context. One of the goals of connecting environmental literacy with linguistics comes is, in part, to address changing student demographics who have, for some time, asked for more course offerings bridging STEM and Spanish and a way of exploring avenues that link Humanities and STEM.
The second part of this sabbatical project is to continue on-going work with Emeritus Prof. Barnes-Karol that looks at specific questions related to the acquisition of Spanish language in post-communicative language classes—classes that require development of communicative competence alongside critical thinking skills, language complexity, and advanced literacy—and situates language teaching within the larger goals of a liberal arts education.
Sian Christie, Entrepreneur in Residence
Reflective practices are crucial for learning and they are especially important in the experiential learning environment (Perry, 2012) such as internships and study abroad. Previous CURI research (2017-18 & 2019-2020) found that entrepreneurial thinking complements reflective thinking. That is, entrepreneurial thinking is the next step to reflection on off-campus study programs. Through working with a host institution as a Fulbright specialist I will identify entrepreneurial skills and/or mindsets that promote collaborative problem solving. I also intend to look at the systems that support creativity and innovation in the country where I am hosted such as: Universities, Innovation Councils, Government agencies, Incubators, Venture Capitalists and local entrepreneurs. It will be enlightening to compare these resources with the support systems in other countries.
Jenna Coughlin, Associate Professor of Norwegian
This research project investigates how representations of hydroelectric power can enhance understanding of the social and cultural impacts of energy transitions. Over nine months, I will analyze examples of Norwegian, Swedish, and Icelandic literature, film, digital storytelling, and museum and dam sites to identify the historical and cultural understandings of water that motivate conflicting attitudes toward hydropower. In order to better understand how energy discourse is produced and contested, I will examine how specific phrases associated with hydropower are employed in both literary texts and newspapers. This research will contribute to globalizing the humanistic study of water and energy by drawing on examples from the Nordic countries, which are considered world leaders in hydropower production. The resulting academic book will help scholarly and non-scholarly audiences become informed participants in contemporary debates over renewable energy.
Kevin Crisp, Professor of Biology
Epilepsy and seizures affect about 1 in 10 people living in the US, and are associated with a high rate
of premature mortality. A seizure occurs when neuronal firing rates become erratic and abnormal,
due to changes in neuronal excitability and an imbalance of excitatory and inhibitory neurochemical
signaling. The mechanisms underlying the control of neuronal firing are highly preserved across
hundreds of millions of years of evolution. For example, it has been shown that spontaneous
neuronal activity patterns, and their responses to drugs that cause or suppress seizures in humans,
are similar between leeches and rodents. The neural circuitry of the leech is simpler and better
understood than in many nervous systems. Using the high degree of experimental accessibility and
the vast knowledge about neuronal connections in the leech, I intend to build a computational
model to replicate the observed spontaneous and pharmacologically-perturbed firing activities of
the well-studied leech ganglion. Once verified as a valid model of the physiological system, this
computational model will be used by students in my lab to generate testable hypotheses about the
effects of channel blockers and pharmacological manipulations on firing patterns (especially
seizure-like activity) which they can then verify using electrophysiology.
Tracey Engleman, Professor of Music
I will spend my sabbatical learning the repertoire of a group of female French composers whose works have rarely, if ever been available in print before. These composers include Hedwige Chretien, Marguerite Olagnier, Hortense Bonaparte, Marcelle Soulage, Victorine Louise Farrenc, Marie Emmanuelle Bayon, and others. By the end of my sabbatical, I plan to have curated a full recital program of these works to present in public concerts, conferences, and at other colleges and universities with the intention of recording and releasing these songs. I will also be doing intense French language and culture study at Alliance Francaise in Minneapolis and conducting research of some of the unpublished manuscripts housed in the University of Michigan’s Women Composers Collection.
Karen Marsalek, Professor of English
The central task of my sabbatical will be submitting the final version of my full book manuscript for publication. In this monograph, titled The Remains in Their Plays: Bodies and Revenancy in the King’s Men’s Repertory, 1603- 1619, I trace stagings of whole and fragmented bodies in sixteen plays performed by Shakespeare’s theater company. Connecting the work of Shakespeare, Thomas Middleton, William Rowley, Ben Jonson, John Webster and John Fletcher, I argue that the practical techniques and material elements used in these stagings are often themselves revenants: sometimes technology and effects recycled from earlier performance practices, and sometimes props repurposed across the company’s repertory. I anticipate being under contract by June 2025. Binging the book project to a close will be the single most important task of the sabbatical.
In addition to completing this longstanding project, I plan to submit an assignment and reflective essay to Prompt: A Journal of Academic Writing Assignments, and to launch the next chapter of my scholarship and teaching with research and course development on recipes and food studies.
Jason Marsh, Associate Professor of Philosophy
The decision to create and raise children is something that will be on many students’ minds in the
near future. What’s less often on their minds is just how riddled with risks and complexities
family-making can be. Does the decision to create children in a world of suffering require a
moral justification? What should we think about the ethics of abortion? Designer babies?
Screening for disability? Gamete donation? Adoption? And if questions about creating life aren’t
already enough to think about, parenting a child presents a whole new set of morally and socially
risky choices. Should you be able to send your child to fancy private schools while your
neighbors live in poverty? What about removing them from school at the age of fourteen or
withholding life-saving care for religious reasons? My sabbatical plan involves putting the final
touches on the above co-written textbook on family-making ethics, and also finishing two other
projects. The first is an invited chapter on agnosticism and the problem of evil, and the second is
a paper on the ethics of inheritance. If these three projects are fully completed before next year, I
would start a new paper on academic freedom. In short, St. Olaf College rightly challenges
students to “examine faith and values.” My sabbatical opportunity will permit me to do
something similar.
Joseph Mbele, Professor of English
For over twenty years, I have been studying Ernest Hemingway, especially after discovering the importance of Africa in his life and writings, an aspect of Hemingway that is not well known. To fill the gap, I began thinking about writing a book manuscript on Hemingway and Africa. During my last sabbatical leave, I wrote copious notes using Hemingway’s well-known Africa writings, such as Green Hills of Africa, True at First Light, “The Short Happy life of Francis Macomber, and “Snows of Kilimanjaro.” I soon realized, however, that in order to write adequately about Hemingway and Africa, I needed to read all his writings, because Africa features even in writings not set in or directly about Africa. My sabbatical project is, therefore, to read Hemingway’s works that I have not yet read and to continue writing my manuscript.
Gary Muir, Professor of Psychology
The goals for my proposed full academic year sabbatical are:
1) complete data analyses and submit two manuscripts for publication; 2) capitalize on recent
methodological advancements in the lab by continuing work on planning and implementing an
enhanced research program over the next five years (i.e., until my next potential sabbatical) to
further examine firing properties of Head Direction cells; 3) actively explore opportunities for
collaborations to increase the impact and scope of my research program; and 4) continue my
work on designing a J-Term study abroad course in psychology and/or neuroscience.
Catherine Ramirez, Artist in Residence in Music
I have a long and highly-regarded track record as an active professional flutist. During the
upcoming leave, I plan to continue performing, and more specifically, to practice and take
lessons on repertoire and excerpts in preparation for upcoming high-profile orchestral auditions.
Preparing for an audition of this caliber takes years of preparation, and I want to be ready.
During my 2-course Leave, I will continue more intensively with lessons, with the aim of learning
a new concerto, honing my knowledge and performance of the major orchestral excerpts, and
discovering improved audition strategies for such an audition. Deepening my knowledge of and
experience with orchestra excerpts, audition preparation techniques and updated strategies, will
improve my overall competence in teaching and demonstrating these works to students
Hannah Ryan, Associate Professor of Art and Art History
During the full academic year of 2025-2026 I plan to complete the final revisions of the
monograph baked on my dissertation, Liquid Gold: Lactation as Labor and Human Milk as
Commodity in Transatlantic Visual Culture, with plans in place to publish the book with Yale
University Press by the end of 2025. Additionally, I will begin my next research project on blue
spaces as sites of liberation; meaning, the sites where marginalized groups have fought for,
sought refuge in, and maintained bodies of water in which they can swim. I plan to identify
spaces, ideas, and visuals wherein swimming is an act of not just leisure and well being but also
of resistance and activist labor. During this sabbatical I will also seek out grant funding to
financially support research and travel as this project evolves.
Marci Sortor, Professor of History
My sabbatical project is to work on a book about the lives and work of people living in the medieval city of Saint-Omer. 1424: A Year in the Life of a City (working title) will be framed by the events and issues arising in a single year. 1424 will invite readers to explore a time and place inhabited by people whose challenges, motivations and sensibilities are sometimes recognizable and often very different from our own. A second purpose is to share the remarkable story of a city that in many ways was not so different from other medieval cities in western Europe. Saint-Omer was located on the nexus of trade routes and political boundaries in flux in the first decades of the fifteenth century. This study will seek to provide nuanced understanding of late medieval cities generally, while discovering those elements that made this particular city and its people distinctive. The third purpose is to explore how chronology itself—the beginning and ending dates of a study—shapes how a history can be told. Building from the events of a single year allows Saint-Omer to tell its history in light of the things that mattered to its people at that time.
Emery Stephens, Associate Professor of Music
I propose to research, curate, and record retrospective solo and vocal chamber works
throughout my professional career, featuring H. Leslie Adams, Leonard Bernstein,
Kurt Weill, Margaret Bonds, Harry Burleigh, William Grant Still, and Florence Price,
along with new works. As a large part of my professional life in academia has focused
on underrepresented Black composers in the canon, this recording opportunity will
serve as my first project with PARMA Recordings, a well-respected company, adding
credibility to my professional portfolio, while lending substantial experience in the
recording industry. Additionally, I will sharpen my vocal pedagogy skills through visits
with leading voice teachers, scholars, researchers, and practitioners while I gather
information and explore an interdisciplinary minor on African American Music at a
similar liberal arts college, to propose an interdisciplinary music concentration or First
Year Seminar on African American music and culture.
Charles Umbanhowar, Professor of Biology and Environmental Studies
This project is focused on examining long-term linkages between climate, vegetation, fire and grazing
over the past 10,000 years in the northern Great Plains (NGP). The NGP is a large region in central
North America dominated by grassland. Fire and grazing are important management tools in the NGP
and other grasslands today. Burning is increasingly used to influence grazer distribution while intensive
grazing may reduce the likelihood of fire. Both grazing and fire are positively correlated with the annual
production of grasses which is in turn strongly controlled by precipitation. A primary goal of this project
is to better understand grazer and fire responses to long term changes in precipitation. To go backwards
in time sediment is taken from lakes, dated and then analyzed for charcoal (fire), fungal spores (grazers)
and dust (climate).
Mary Walczak, Professor of Chemistry
I propose to spend my sabbatical exploring the menu of alternative grading options and adapting my courses accordingly. Alternative grading approaches, such as mastery grading or specifications grading, are generally focused on guiding students to respond to feedback in revising their work. At their core, these alternative grading strategies are intended to reward students for learning, not penalize them for early, failed attempts at learning. When implemented well, these grading approaches motivate students to learn because they have the opportunity to reattempt their assessments without penalty. In this way, students who take longer to learn content are not penalized for needing more time to reach mastery. I plan to implement these equity-focused elements in my courses upon my return to the classroom and to collect data for dissemination.
David Walmsley, Associate Professor of Mathematics, Statistics, and Computer Science
During sabbatical, I intend to complete one research project and launch two others in my
mathematical subfield of operator theory, specifically hypercyclicity. Sufficient conditions
for hypercyclicity to occur are called Hypercyclicity Criteria, and in previous work I have
been able to generalize some of these criteria from the setting of linear spaces to the
setting of semigroups; I plan to submit a manuscript in preparation during my sabbatical
which continues this trend. Such generalizations are valuable because they allow
mathematicians to consider a broader range of problems and applications. Since that
manuscript was conceived, new Hypercyclicity Criteria have been published, and I intend
to launch a new research project with the goal of generalizing these new criteria to the
semigroup setting. Lastly, some recent work I have done with undergraduates left
several unanswered questions, and I will pursue those questions by forming new
collaborations with researchers outside the college.