UND Women Studies Blog

Women Studies Essay Contest – Entries Due February 1

undwomenstudies — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 14:43:39 +0000

The UND Women Studies Program sponsors a contest for the best essays that wholly or in significant part address issues of particular concern to women, women studies or gender studies.

Three prizes may be awarded, one for undergraduate research paper, one for creative project, and one for graduate research paper; each prize is $100. Essays and projects may be of any length and may come from any discipline. They may be submitted by faculty or directly by the student. Essays or projects should have been created in 2009 (spring or fall semesters).

Mark entries with class title and instructor and include the author’s phone number and address. Please send essays by February 1 to Kathleen Dixon – Women Studies, intercampus mailbox 7113. Winners will be announced during Spring semester 2010. If you have any questions please call Kathy at 777-4115.

Tagged: 2010 news, essay contest

Hormones and Long Life: Lessons from Dwarf Mice

undwomenstudies — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 14:35:22 +0000

Dr. Holly Brown-Borg will be presenting at the University Faculty Lecture on Thursday, January 21. The lecture is at the North Dakota Museum of Art. The reception begins at 4:00 pm, and the lecture at 4:30 pm.

Press Release: Dr. Holly Brown-Borg is associate professor in the University of North Dakota School of Medicine and Health Sciences Department of Pharmacology, Physiology, and Therapeutics. Brown-Borg has built a distinguished and internationally recognized career as a biomedical researcher and teacher with a number of highly regarded and regularly referenced publications, including books and book chapters. Brown-Borg is especially well known for her work on aging. Early in her career, she gained international notice for discovering that a certain strain of experimental dwarf mice lived longer than all other kinds of mice used in research.

Brown-Borg’s primary research interest focuses on aging, stress resistance, longevity, and growth hormones. She earned her undergraduate degree in agriculture at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1984. She received her Master’s of Science in Animal Science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1986 and her PhD in Physiology at North Carolina State University in 1990. She served as a research associate in endocrinology at the U.S. Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service Meat Animal Research Center and in physiology at Southern Illinois University. She joined the faculty at the UND medical school in 1995.

Brown-Borg is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, among them an unprecedented $60,000 award from the Glenn Foundation (unsolicited) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) National Research Service Award.

Brown-Borg’s lab first made waves in the aging research community in 1996 with a paper in the international science journal Nature about Ames dwarf mice living longer than normal mice. Her current research focuses on identifying mechanisms of stress resistance associated with health and longevity, using one of only six Ames dwarf mice colonies in the United States. She compares stress factors caused by metabolic oxidation in the dwarf mice compared to those in normal mice.

She also has been awarded the status of Fellow in the Gerontological Society of America. The GSA Fellows represent the highest class of membership and are recognized by their peers for outstanding contributions to the field of gerontology, the branch of science that deals with aging and the special problems of aged persons.

Brown-Borg, who has been conducting studies on aging since 1995, has received funding from the NIH and the American Federation of Aging Research over the last 10 years. Her current funding includes an NIH RO1 in the amount of $1,387,000 and a Senior Scholar Award from the Ellison Medical Foundation for $803,525. Internationally recognized in her field, Brown-Borg co-chaired the Gordon Research Conference on the Biology of Aging in 2007 in Switzerland; she is President-Elect of the American Aging Association and Chair-elect of the Biological Sciences section of the Gerontological Society of America; and she organizes the International Symposium on the Neurobiology and Neuroendocrinology of Aging held in Austria every other year.

Tagged: 2010 news, UND events

2009 Publications by Women Studies Affiliates

undwomenstudies — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 18:38:14 +0000

The Global Village Revisited: Art, Politics, and Television Talk Shows

By Kathleen Dixon

“In The Global Village Re-visited, Kathleen Dixon deftly interrogates taken-for-granted ideas around the public sphere and the global village. Most importantly, the implicit assumption that cultural transfer only flows from the United States outward is challenged here with intriguing examples from Belgium and Bulgaria. As such, the book reminds us that media and discourses circulate in ways that require vigilant attention to production, distribution, and consumption.”—Kimberly Springer, King’s College London

Cultural studies scholarship on the television talk show, especially the “audience discussion” genre, was guardedly hopeful about its democratic or feminist potential. In this exciting new volume, Kathleen Dixon investigates the relationship between the talk genre and democracy, but through a new emphasis on art, broadly defined. The Global Village Revisited: Art, Politics, and Television Talk Shows explores three case studies from Belgium, Bulgaria, and the United States, and reveals how these cases interanimate to produces a new view of the talk show as a global phenomenon, and as a negotiation among the forces of late capitalism, the unnamed but still palpable audience, and the individual rhetors, artists, and technicians who make the shows. Dixon treats the globalization of media and culture as a dynamic process that yields different results according to time and place. While the way in which television talk shows serve democracy may be hard to define precisely, The Global Village Revisited demonstrates the importance and necessity of this question in cultural studies.

Published 2009, Lexington Books
ISBN 978-0739123409

The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Robert Browning to Isa Blagden 1850-1861

Edited by Philip Kelley and Sandra Donaldson
Associate Editors: Scott Lewis, Edward Hagan, and Rita S. Patteson.

The Indian-born novelist Isa Blagden (1816?–73) held a unique place in the Brownings’ circle by virtue of her intimacy with both poets. No other friend saw as much of them during their married life in Florence, and, according to one contemporary, no other friend was “admitted into the mysteries of their inner thoughts.” Florentine Friends presents the 232 letters the Brownings wrote to Isa over a twelve-year period. EBB’s letters, which constitute the greater share of this correspondence, reveal her intellectual and emotional commitment to the Risorgimento, Italy’s struggle to become an independent nation. Of particular interest are her thoughts on Napoleon III and his role in Italy’s fate. Also discussed are some of the Brownings’ most significant works: RB’s Men and Women and EBB’s Casa Guidi Windows, Aurora Leigh, and Poems Before Congress. Both poets comment freely on Isa’s first novel, Agnes Tremorne. RB’s letters to Isa, though few in this volume, display a warmth and spontaneity, that, in his correspondence, he reserved for her alone. The editors have provided: an introduction; a provenance of the letters; a chronology; comprehensive annotations; a family tree of Isa and her relatives the Brackens; and a bibliography of Isa’s works, manuscripts, and letters.

Published 2009, Wedgestone Press
ISBN 978-0-911459-33-3

Companion to British Poetry before 1600
By Michelle M. Sauer

Winner, Editor’s Choice, Reference Text 2008 (Booklist)

Covers the period from 500-1600, canonical and non-canonical works, and includes Irish, Welsh, and Scottish works as well

From the review by Merle Jacob: “[The] Companion to British Poetry before 1600 is an outstanding reference work that should be in high-school, academic, and public libraries where students study British literature.”

Published 2008, Facts on File
ISBN: 978-0816063604

How to Write about Geoffrey Chaucer
By Michelle M. Sauer

Part of Harold Bloom’s “How to Write about Literature” series

Designed to assist students in developing paper topics about Chaucer

Covers The Canterbury Tales and other works

Published 2009, Chelsea House
ISBN: 978-1604133301

Companion to British Poetry before 1600
By Michelle M. Sauer

· Winner, Editor’s Choice, Reference Text 2008 (Booklist)

· Covers the period from 500-1600, canonical and non-canonical works, and includes Irish, Welsh, and Scottish works as well

· From the review by Merle Jacob: ”[The] Companion to British Poetry before 1600 is an outstanding reference work that should be in high-school, academic, and public libraries where students study British literature.”

Published 2008, Facts on File
ISBN: 978-0816063604

Tagged: 2009 news, book publications, women studies affiliates