General Education

Charles Bashaw

Biography

Charles “Chuck” Bashaw received a BA in Comparative Literature from Hampshire College in Amherst, MA, an MA in History from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and a Joint PhD in History and History of Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His scholarly interests all center on questions about how we know things and how much confidence we can have in what we think we know.

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Ciaran Buckley

Biography

Originally from Ireland Prof. Buckley lived in Germany for 30 years before coming to Champlain College. He studied Law at Bonn University and was admitted to the German Bar in Düsseldorf. He completed a post graduate degree in Real Estate Economics Immobilienoekoenom ebs at the European Business School. He taught previously at Hampden Sydney College in Virginia.

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Veruska Cantelli

Biography

Veruska Cantelli received her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. Before joining the Core Division at Champlain College, she was an Assistant Professor at the Center for Global Communication Strategies at the University of Tokyo. Veruska is a writer, a translator, and a scholar with a focus on Transnational Feminist Studies and Postcolonial and Decolonial Studies. Among her works are the two volumes Mediterranean: Migrant Crossings (UpSet Press, 2018) and Insurgent Feminisms: Writing War (Zubaan Books in 2023). As a Senior Editor for Warscapes Magazine she curated several retrospectives with particular attention to decoloniality, migration, and food and activism. She studied modern and contemporary dance at the Mary Anthony Dance Studio and the Trisha Brown Dance Studio in New York and has performed with the Human Kinetics Movement Arts. She is serious about Lazio, the soccer team that brought football to the city of Rome in 1900.

Publications & Abstracts

BOOKS AND BOOK CHAPTERS
2023 (Forthcoming) Insurgent Feminisms: Writing War. Zubaan Books (Co-editor)

2021 – Lettere Rivoluzionarie. Diane di Prima, Le Lettere, Translator and Editor

2020 – “Resistant Recipes: Food, Gender and Translation in Migrant and Refugee, Narratives” in The Routledge Handbook of Translation and Activism. Eds. Rebecca Ruth Gould and Kayvan Tahmasebian, Routledge, (Co-writer)

2018 – Mediterranean, Warscapes and UpSet Press, (Co-editor)

2011 – In Danger, San Francisco: City Lights Books. Ed. Jack Hirschman Translator of literary essays by Pier Paolo Pasolini

ARTICLES
2020 – “The Dance of Bones: Tomioka Taeko’s Stage of Reprobates”Otherness: Essays and Studies, Centre for Studies in Otherness, Aarhus University

2017 – “The Maternal Lineage: Orality and Language in Natalia Ginzburg’s Family Sayings” Journal of International Women’s Studies, Volume 18, Issue 1

2016 – “Student-Centered Teaching: Writing Through Passion” Komaba Journal of English Education, Volume 7, University of Tokyo, co-author

2015 – “The New Paladins of the Humanities: A Warning” Warscapes, June 28th

2015 – “The Bundle on my Back” in Warscapes an in-depth conversation with writer Cristina Ali Farah. January 2015

2013 – Editor and Translator of “Narrating Absences, Narrating History” on the photographs of desaparecidos by Argentinian artist Gustavo Germano, Warscapes, August 2013

2013 – Curator of the Retrospective Food on hierarchy of taste and consumption of “otherness,” Warscapes, June 2013

2013 – Curator of the Retrospective Visas on migration, surveillance and militarization of space, Warscapes, March 2013

2013 – “Eye on Honduras” a conversation with historian Dana Frank on the human rights crisis after the coup, Warscapes, January 2013

2012 – Curator of the Retrospective Uncertain Borders on the work of Gloria Anzaldùa, Warscapes, October 2012.

2012 – “Gloria Anzaldúa’s Poetics of Borders” Warscapes, October 2012 issue

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Weiling Deng

Biography

Dr. Weiling Deng is Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Champlain College. She currently serves as the Core Division’s Third Year Faculty Lead and helps developing the new curriculum of Digital Humanities. Weiling received her Ph.D. in Social Sciences and Comparative Education from UCLA. Her research and teaching interests span a wide spectrum of interdisciplinary fields, which include Global Asias, Urban Humanities, comparative and international education, human geography, gender and feminist studies, technology and race, postcolonial theory, and postsocialist studies. Weiling emphasizes place- and project-based experiential learning and promotes transnational thinking of Vermont primarily through immigration, diaspora, border, and urban space.

Weiling is currently working on two book projects. The first book, co-authored with Dr. Jonathan Banfill of Champlain College, Los Angeles-based artists Sara Velas and Ruby Carlson, focuses on panorama museum as a critical form of public humanities and art. It challenges the Euro-American convention of panorama production by way of incorporating 20th-century Soviet and Chinese techniques of visual historiography and grounding museum-making in feral DIY Los Angeles art scenes and landscaping. This book releases the study of panorama from its traditional field of art and media history to embrace critical, grassroots, and community-oriented creation of alternative art space in a postcolonial Californian metropolis.

Weiling’s second book develops from her dissertation to examine the creation, transportation, and readjustment of feminist and gender empirical knowledge, with a special focus on transpacific and digitally mediated Chinese feminist and queer activism. It questions the eclipse of race in contemporary Chinese feminist and queer narratives by the binary state-activist approach and maps these narratives between postcolonial and postsocialist feminist works. This book maps the place-based tension instigated by the trans-lingual, transnational, and transmedial practice of the concept of “gender” onto the post-Cold War geopolitics of liberal academic knowledge production.

Weiling’s work has been published on South Asian Review, Verge: Studies in Global Asias, Panoramic and Immersive Media Studies, Los Angeles Review of Books, and academic anthologies including Postcolonial and Postsocialist Dialogues: Intersections, Opacities, Challenges in Feminist Theorizing and Practice.

Publications & Abstracts

• “Death and Life in the Bordersand: On the Queer Remembrance of Partition through Geetanjali Shree’s Tomb of Sand,”?South Asian Review?45, no. 1-2 (August 29, 2023): 66–76.
• “Grappling with the ‘China Crisis’: Positionality, Impasse, and Potential Breakthrough of Chinese Feminist Diaspora in Post-Cold War North America.” In?Postcolonial and Postsocialist Dialogues:?Intersections, Opacities, Challenges in Feminist Theorizing and Practice, edited by Redi Koobak, Madina Tlostanova, Suruchi Thapar-Bj?rkert (Routledge, 2021).
• “The Chinese Restaurant on Main Street, USA: On Zai Liang’s?From Chinatown to Every Town,”?Los Angeles Review of Books?(September 23, 2023).

Recommended Reading, Listening & Viewing

• Lisa Lowe, The Intimacies of Four Continents, Durham: Duke University Press, 2015
• Daniel Immerwahr, How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States, London: Picador, 2020
• Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power, New York: PublicAffairs Books, 2019

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Jeffrey Haig

Biography

Jeff Haig was born in the United States, but grew up in England. He attended Manchester University and Yale. He worked in radio, advertising, television and movie production before becoming a teacher. He specializes in courses on semiotics, art and censorship.

Curriculum Vitae

READ MY CV

Favorite Quote

“Americans no longer talk to each other, they entertain each other. They do not exchange ideas, they exchange images. They do not argue with propositions; they argue with good looks, celebrities and commercials.”

—Neil Postman

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Michael Lange

Biography

Michael Lange is an anthropologist and folklorist, specializing in narrative, food, and identity. He has done ethnographic fieldwork in Scotland, Morocco, Norway, the US, and Canada. His books include Norwegian Scots and Many Meanings of Maple.

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Robert Mayer

Biography

Robert Mayer holds a BA and a Ph.D. in History from the University of Georgia, and a MA in Foreign Affairs from the University of Virginia. Robert has worked in the defense intelligence industry, in the USA and abroad, as well as in journalism as both a writer and an editor in the computer entertainment sector. He worked on the Papers of James K. Polk at the University of Tennessee, and has done freelance work supporting the design, promotion, and marketing of video games as well. His research interests include antebellum America, race and slavery, military and security issues, computer games, pop culture, cars, and Standard Poodles. Robert has been teaching at Champlain College since 2000, serving in numerous roles supporting the development and delivery of courses across the Champlain curriculum. He lives in Jericho, VT with his wife and three dogs.

Distinctions & Awards

Finney Chair 2020-23

Recommended Reading, Listening & Viewing

Go read Moby Dick. Go listen to anything that makes you happy.

Favorite Quote

“There Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch”

—Heinlein, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress

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Flavio Rizzo

Biography

Flavio Rizzo has a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York and an Italian Laurea in Cinema Studies from Roma Tre University. Before joining Champlain College, Flavio was an Assistant Professor in the Center for Global Communication Strategies at the University of Tokyo where he was part of its faculty in the Japan in East Asia Program. He also taught Comparative Literature and Film Studies at the City University of New York.

Flavio is also a writer and filmmaker. Among other works, he has a documentary on Pier Paolo Pasolini (recognized with the Cinema Avvenire Award during the 53rd Venice Film Festival) and a documentary on the Coca Wars in Bolivia.

His research is currently focusing on cinematic and literary representations of seclusion; it concentrates on exploring contemporary forms of seclusion by putting the radical act of retreating from the world into the larger context of contemporary hyper-connectivity, networked and narcissistic digital narratives, and both commercially motivated and sincere forms of neo-spiritualisms. As part of this study, he has been tackling the Hikikomori phenomenon in Japan; he focuses on the juxtaposition of what he sees as postmodern hermits and the hyper-connected container in which they live. He is interested in analyzing the very specific iconographic space that emerges from this encounter-collision.

His areas of concentration rotate around interdisciplinary approaches and include:

He is a staunch supporter of Lazio, the team that in 1900 brought football to the city of Rome.

Publications & Abstracts

2021 “Re-inventing isolation, Imagining the other in seclusion” Essays in Otherness – Aarhus University, co-author

2019 “Unlocking Hikikomori: an Interdisciplinary Approach” Journal of Youth Studies, Volume 22, No 06, Taylor & Francis, co-author

2018 “Migrant Crisis: One Day We Will Have a Language for This” Africa is a Country, May 2nd

2016 “Hikikomori: the Postmodern Hermits of Japan”? Warscapes, June 14th

2016 “Student-Centered Teaching: Writing Through Passion” Komaba Journal of English Education, Volume 7, University of Tokyo, co-author

2015 “The New Paladins of the Humanities: A Warning”? Warscapes, June 28th

2013 “Toward a Loss of Language”? Huffington Post, Oct 2nd

2013 “Thoughts in Exile: Beyond Berlusconi’s Sex Trial”? Huffington Post, August 6th

2013 “Minister Kyenge and “Good’ Colonialism”? Warscapes, July 31st

2013 “Navigating Italian Shame”? Huffington Post, July 21st

2013 “The Story of Wikileaks?”? Warscapes, June 30th

2013 “Shipwrecked in Whole Foods”? Warscapes, June 1st

2012 “On Ignorance and Prankumentary: Adrift in the Central African Republic”? Warscapes, October 15th

2012 “Filming the Green Wave: a Delicate Space of Brutality”? Warscapes, October 3rd

2012 “Compromising Iranian Cinema”? Warscapes, May 29th

2011 In Danger, San Francisco: City Lights Books Translator of literary essays by Pier Paolo Pasolini

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David Rous

Biography

David Rous has taught history and interdisciplinary studies at Champlain since 2006, specializing in first-year courses such as Concepts of the Self, Concepts of Community, and the First Year Inquiry: Reading, Writing, and Gender in Pop Culture. He attended Colorado College and the University of Vermont. His research includes popular culture, post-war American history, the Civil Rights Movement, the Cold War, and European Colonialism. His interests include reading, hiking, soccer, modern languages, and arguing.

Distinctions & Awards

Francine Page Excellence in Teaching Award 2016

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Gary Scudder

Biography

During his 20+ years at Champlain Professor Scudder has taught classes on topics such as history, literature, art, evil, film, and a variety of classes dealing with the Islamic world. He initiated and ran Champlain’s award-winning Global Modules program. In addition, he has created, taught, and led student classes with trips to Jordan, India, Zanzibar, Sri Lanka, Spain, and Portugal.

Distinctions & Awards

Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching Vermont Professor of the Year, 2010.

Community Contribution Award, National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education (NITLE), 2010.

Andrew Heiskell Award for Innovation in International Education for Internationalizing the Curriculum, 2008-2009.

Edward Phelps Lyman Professorship, Champlain College, 2007-2008.

Teaching About Islam and Middle Eastern Culture Seminar, CIC Grant, Amman Jordan, January 2005.

Georgia Board of Regents Distinguished Professor for Teaching and Learning, 1999-2000.

Outstanding Award for Teaching, Georgia Perimeter College, 1997-1998.

Most Appreciated Faculty Member Award, Georgia Perimeter College, 1993-1994.

Recommended Reading, Listening & Viewing

• Charles Dickens, Bleak House
• Fernando Pessoa, The Book of Disquiet
• Marcel Proust, Remembrance of Things Past

Favorite Quote

“It was in vain that I lingered before the hawthorns.”

—Marcel Proust, Remembrance of Things Past

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Stephen Wehmeyer

Biography

Steve Wehmeyer has been teaching in the Core Division at Champlain since 2008. He holds an M.A. and Ph.D. from UCLA in Folklore and Mythology, and a B.A. in English Literature from the University of Notre Dame. Dr. Wehmeyer’s research and teaching interests are diverse and wide ranging – with particular specialization in the ethnographic study of vernacular religion, the material and ritual arts of Africa and the African Diaspora, Western Esotericism, and Indigenous American narrative traditions. His academic work has been published in several anthologies and museum catalogs, as well as a number of academic journals including “Western Folklore”, “New York Folklore”, “Southern Quarterly”, “Magic, Ritual, and Witchcraft” and “Gnosis: The Journal of Gnostic Studies”. Outside of his academic work, Wehmeyer is a professional Celtic musician and songwriter, with credits that include motion picture and television soundtracks, and 13 albums to date (11 of which have reached the top 10 on Billboard’s charts for World Music). With a passion for globally engaged, experiential learning, Dr. Wehmeyer teaches or co-teaches a variety of courses across the Core Curriculum, including several involving travel to and service learning in places like Zanzibar and India.

Publications & Abstracts

PUBLICATIONS & ABSTRACTS

Professional & Scholastic Affiliations

American Academy of Religion

Curriculum Vitae

READ MY CV

Favorite Quote

“In the beginning was noise. And noise begat rhythm. And rhythm begat everything else. This is the kind of cosmology a drummer can live with.”

—Mickey Hart

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Kristin Wolf

Biography

Kristin Wolf is an associate professor at Champlain College where she teaches courses about environmental ethics, science and society, and landscape field methods. She is the director of the campus apiary which facilitates experiential learning opportunities for the Champlain and wider 365体育官网 communities, fosters environmentally-responsible entrepreneurship with its student-run honey business, and organizes outreach and knowledge sharing with beekeeping communities in Peru and Colombia.

She holds a BS in Biology with a minor in International Studies from Penn State, an MS in Environmental Science and Management from Duquesne University, and a PhD in Environmental Science and Public Policy from George Mason University.

Publications & Abstracts

See CV

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