Southwestern Magazine | Spring 2019

A stronger sense of self Southwestern also supports students and faculty members who want to research off-site. These experiences often are just as intense. Bob Bednar ’89, associate professor of communication studies, has been doing fieldwork since graduate school. At first, the work satisfied his itch to travel. “I was an outdoors person and a reluctant academic when I started. I didn’t see myself in basements and closed spaces,” he says. Much of Bednar’s work has focused on roadside car crash shrines and their connections to how individuals negotiate public spaces. He has visited these sites across the American West, as well as in India, the U.K., New Zealand, and Canada. Seeing them in person has had a profound effect on both his research and how it is perceived. “I learn things I can’t imagine on my own by encountering realities I can’t imagine on my own,” Bednar says. “It gives me a lot of credibility. I am able to bring my experience to the audience, and the reader’s experience is less mediated as well.” Professor of Anthropology Melissa Johnson P’19, P’21 also researched off-site while in graduate school. A professor asked her if she was interested in serving as a research assistant in Belize, and she jumped at the opportunity. The experience did much more than simply change her life. “I fell in love with someone there. It created my life—my husband and my kids,” Johnson says. “It transformed everything.” Johnson has taught abroad multiple times since that first fateful trip. She sympathizes with students who feel out of place when they start their programs. “The first time, I felt like a fish out of water. Roosters would make noise all night long. I couldn’t sleep; I would be in tears,” she says. “Now I don’t even hear them.” Johnson believes that, ultimately, the discomfort is a good thing. “Students understand who they are better when they’re thrown into a new cultural context. They gain confidence and a sense of self,” she says. “They also develop a more sophisticated understanding of global issues and a more nuanced ability to describe people and experiences. Studying abroad is simply an amazing opportunity.” “This is the ultimate college experience....There’s no better way to discover yourself than to take yourself out of your comfort zone and study abroad.” – — — Professor Katy Ross Southwestern Faculty Research Abroad Beloware a fewexamples of projects SU faculty have completed or are currentlyworking onduring research trips abroad: Professor of Political Science and Dean of the Faculty Alisa Gaunder published her book Japanese Politics and Government (2017), a comparative examinationof postwar political institutions, reform, and policymaking in Japan. Professor of Art andArtHistory andChair of ArtHistory Thomas Noble Howe has published numerous articles and books about recent and ongoing excavations in Italy as the coordinator general of the Restoring Ancient Stabiae Foundation. One of his latest articles is “The Social Status of the Villas of Stabiae.” Professor of Biology Romi Burks specializes in the ecology, diversity, and distribution of apple snails in Uruguay, publishing her findings in such journals as Malacologia , PLOS One , and Freshwater Science . Assistant Professor of History Jethro Hernandez Berrones recently presented “Teaching Medicine to the Working Class: Private Medical Schools in RevolutionaryMexico, 1910–1940” inGuadalajara,Mexico, and his book ARevolution inSmall Doses: Homeopathy, the Medical Profession, and the State inMexico, 1893–1942 is forthcoming. CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT: (1) A student's snapshot of the colors of India’s streets. (2) Leslie Ramey ’14 and Will Cozzens ’14 show their Pirate pride at Stonehenge. (3) Joey Kyle ’14 takes a long stroll in Playa Jacó, Costa Rica. 27 SOUTHWESTERN