College of Humanities and Social Sciences

George Mason PhD is living the dream in NYC with Met fellowship

Katarina Benson — Wed, 19 Feb 2025 17:57:26 +0000

George Mason PhD is living the dream in NYC with Met fellowship Katarina Benson Wed, 02/19/2025 - 12:57

��AV history PhD candidate Jayme Kurland is living her dream this academic year as the Jane and Morgan Whitney Fellow at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

George Mason PhD candidate Jayme Kurland at the Met. Photo provided

Kurland started her college career as a viola performance major at the University of Oregon before earning her BA in music history. She then got a master’s in music history at Arizona State. As a Met fellow, Kurland is working in the musical instruments department and conducting research for her dissertation. “I’m back in my happy place,” she says, “just working with objects and thinking about the stories they can tell us.”

It’s Good to Be Back: Kurland fell in love with museum work as an undergrad when she landed a job at the Musical Instrument Museum in her hometown of Phoenix. “I never planned to move back home, but working as a curatorial assistant blended my music background with my love of museums.” She also worked as a curatorial research fellow in musical instruments at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston from 2013 to 2017.

Finding Your People: Working at the Met has allowed Kurland the opportunity to connect with scholars in the musical instruments department, as well as throughout the institution. And, of course, the resources the Met offers are unparalleled. “Returning to the museum world at an institution like the Met has been tremendously rewarding. I have been able to complete hands-on work with the museum's guitar collection and really dig into my own research.”

Guitar Heroes: Kurland’s research focuses on a group of Mexican American women who wired amplifiers, wound pickups, and assembled first guitars and amps for guitar manufacturer Fender between 1946 and 1965. In addition to examining instruments in the Met’s collection and conducting oral histories, Kurland is also working with experts at Brooklyn Lutherie, a women-owned guitar and violin repair shop, where they are building a piece of equipment called a pickup winder. “[Winding pickups] is one of the skills of the women I'm studying that was completed by hand. I think that understanding the physical skills [required of the women] is a way to better understand their experience.”

Putting Yourself Out There: In addition to working on her dissertation, Kurland gets to present her research to the public in various ways, including presenting to docents, in public programs, and in a symposium called Research Out Loud, where Met fellows discuss their work. Kurland also started a writing group for fellows that meets twice a week and “holds each other accountable for what we're working on.”

Out on the Town: When not working, Kurland explores the Big Apple. “I am living in NYC full time and really trying to take advantage of the city's music scene. I try to see as much live music as possible!”

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College of Humanities and Social Sciences

Psychology researcher focuses on why theatre education matters

Colleen Rich — Wed, 19 Feb 2025 15:27:35 +0000

Psychology researcher focuses on why theatre education matters Colleen Rich Wed, 02/19/2025 - 10:27

��AV psychology professor Thalia R. Goldstein’s work focuses on children's developing social and emotional skills, and how such skills intersect with imaginative activities. In her latest book, Why Theatre Education Matters: Understanding its Cognitive, Social, and Emotional Benefits (Teachers College Press, 2024), she pulls together the research she’s conducted on social and emotional learning and cognitive development.

George Mason psychology professor Thalia Goldstein. Photo by Office of University Branding

What inspired you to write this book?

I have been doing work on the benefits of theater education and the arts for about 15 years, and I realized that what was missing from the scientific literature was a foundational study of the actual activities that were happening in theater classrooms. The book came from this desire to go back to acting classrooms and look at what was happening and then tie that into all the different things I had learned in my research on social and emotional learning, and cognitive development.

How do you anticipate people using this book?

My hope is that the book will be used by acting teachers, theater teachers, and other educators interested in integrating theater techniques, such as role-playing, into their classrooms. There's research that shows that using these kinds of dramatic and playful techniques can help students be more motivated in different subjects and can help them learn more deeply and retain the information for longer. My hope too is that the book is useful for policy makers and people who are writing curriculum, as well as school administrators who are looking for ways to foster creativity and social emotional skills.

The book has been assigned as a textbook in a class called Acting for Non-Actors so that the students can see they are not learning how to perform Romeo on stage. That's not a thing they may ever do, but they are learning how to release their inhibitions, collaborate with others, and reflect on their behavior. All those things are skills that are useful no matter what your job is.

Was there anything that surprised you while working on the book?

One thing that surprised me was how much emphasis there was in these theatre classes on embodiment and physicality. Obviously, actors use their bodies as the instrument. In theater, there's this dualism where you have to use your body as yourself and as your character. But what surprised me was how much classroom time was spent doing things like pushups and sit-ups, jogging around, and meditation, in order to help students have a sense of their own physical limits and their kinesthetic understanding of where they are in space.

Science is showing more and more evidence that embodiment and understanding your body is the key to a lot of well-being and mental health. Emotion regulation—the ability to understand what you're feeling and then figuring out how to alter it—is a physical process. Emotions are in the body. Knowing what an emotion is is about reading the signals your body is sending you and figuring out what they mean. It makes sense to me that some of the best scientific evidence we have about the benefits of theater are about its benefits for emotional control and emotional understanding because it's an embodied practice, it's a physical practice.

What are you working on now?

Photo by Getty Images

We are collecting data from an elementary school where we're working with students taking their very first theater classes and talking to them about their feelings. We are also looking at how they understand these embodied class processes and then connecting what the students tell us to parent and teacher reports and academic grades. We are looking at the classroom activities and how they're connected to academic, interpersonal, and social outcomes.

Another thing we're doing is we're studying grownup play—like when adults go to cosplay conventions or Renaissance fairs or dress up for Halloween. All the ways in which we do pretend play as an adult. We always talk about how we don't do pretend play anymore when we're done being a kid, but the truth is huge numbers of people engage in these other kinds of pretend play activities. And we're trying to figure out why.

How did you get interested in studying theater?

I was a drama kid growing up. I did theater all through school and double majored in psychology and theater in college. I find that it’s a pretty common double major because both majors are asking the same question, which is ‘why do people do what they do?’ It's all about what are humans and why do they do what they do.

When I graduated from college, I moved to New York City and worked as a professional actor and dancer for a few years. I did some national tours and some small movies. I did some big movies as an extra in the background. Nothing super successful or I'd still be doing it. In the end, I decided that wasn't quite for me.

Because I had majored in psychology, I had done research in college. I find you can do psychological research on basically any question you have. If it has to do with humans, there's psychology behind it. I wanted to figure out the psychology of imagination, creativity, and play. When I applied to graduate schools, that’s the pathway I took.

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Research

College of Humanities and Social Sciences

arts education

Podcast — EP 65: James Baldwin’s insights on American life and identity

Sarah Holland — Mon, 17 Feb 2025 18:24:32 +0000

Podcast — EP 65: James Baldwin’s insights on American life and identity Sarah Holland Mon, 02/17/2025 - 13:24

On this episode of Access to Excellence, Distinguished University Professor Keith Clark, joins President Gregory Washington to discuss the literary journey of James Baldwin and his reflections on his life of courage and wisdom as he studied the human experience.

"James Baldwin in one of his early essays, talked about America having, you know, too many Americans being guilty of the crime of nostalgia. And so he understood that while it was important to look back, and we must look back, but we also must use the looking back as a way to propel us forward...Looking at that history as a way to move into a future that is more about connectivity and connection and mutual progress, right? And so I think these writers would have us understand that we have to look at the past, but we can't be stuck in that past, and that past has to be used as a vehicle for moving us forward." — Keith Clark

Read the Transcript

Intro (00:04):

Trailblazers in research, innovators in technology, and those who simply have a good story: all make up the fabric that is ��AV. We're taking on the grand challenges that face our students, graduates, and higher education is our mission and our passion. Hosted by Mason President Gregory Washington: this is the Access to Excellence podcast.

President Gregory Washington (00:26):

In his essay, "As Much Truth as One Can Bear," James Baldwin writes, "not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced." It's a timeless quote, one that feels as relevant now in 2025 as it did in 1962. In fact, it's something that I've used in my signature line for a number of years and it's a great introduction to James Baldwin, who my guest today has studied and written extensively about. Distinguished University Professor Keith Clark is a professor of English and African and African American studies in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. A specialist in African American literature, Keith's scholarship centers on topics such as Black literary masculinity and African American LGBT studies. Keith, welcome to the show.

Keith Clark (01:23):

Thank you Dr. Washington. It's a pleasure to be here.

President Gregory Washington (01:26):

Alright, it's great to have you here. So let's start with the beginning of your academic journey. When did you know you wanted to be a professor in, of all things English, ?

Keith Clark (01:35):

Well, it's funny, my students, I guess, assume that I'm a thousand years old, that I've been doing this forever, and that I knew that I wanted to be doing this forever. And I have to tell them that at one point, I too was an 18-year-old freshman sort of fledgling and not knowing exactly what I wanted to do, . And so I did not begin as an English major in 1981. My freshman year in college, I had a dream of being a business major and I thought, well, that would be open-ended enough. I could perhaps go to law school, I could get a job at industry and that would be it. And so at my undergraduate institution, I went to William and Mary, and before you could declare business as a major, you first had to take accounting. So I guess it was what they would call a, a weed out course. And it worked.

President Gregory Washington (02:26):

Exactly.

Keith Clark (02:26):

It worked.

President Gregory Washington (02:27):

It weeded you right on out.

Keith Clark (02:27):

Right weeded me right out to confusion. And the dean of minority students at the time, Dr. Carroll Hardy rest her soul. She was one of my first and most important mentors and, and Dean Hardy was from the south. So she would talk to me real southern style, "baby. You've got, A's in all of your English classes, have you ever thought about majoring in that?" And you know, the response when someone says, you know, English or anything in the humanities, the first response is, well, all I can do is teach. And you know, I'm 18 or 19. And so of course I was thinking, well, you know, I wanted to go into business, I wanted to work for a company, I wanted to make money. And, you know, teaching, I knew was not necessarily a lucrative profession, but Dean Hardy understood, and she knew even better than I, or before I did, that I was really passionate about literature.

Keith Clark (03:23):

I didn't realize that could be a springboard into a career. I didn't know that at the time, but she knew it and she directed me to the English department. And so I had another wonderful mentor in the English department, Dr. Joanne Braxton. And she too demonstrated to me that, you know, you could be an English teacher, you could teach high school English, or you could actually continue your education and get a doctorate. And so it was those two mentors along with others. I mean, I had great mentors as an undergraduate, and they really demonstrated for me that the professorate could be a career and it could be one that I both loved and was successful in and, you know, and could make a good living. It wasn't a straight path, I guess, is ultimately what I'd say. It was a very circuitous route and one that I didn't think I wanted to to, to walk at first, but I got to where I needed to go.

President Gregory Washington (04:19):

It rarely is a straight path. You know, in a recent interview you cite one of your British literature professors as throwing you a literary lifeline by suggesting you read Baldwin. So talk to us a little bit about that.

Keith Clark (04:34):

Well, it was so funny, you know, those first couple of years as an undergraduate and taking American literature courses, very rarely, if ever had they included African American writers. And so I was enrolled in, I can't remember the professor's name now, but I remember being enrolled in that class, I believe I was a sophomore. And the professor was, you know, trying to give me some titles and some authors that he thought, you know, would be of specific interest to me. And he said, I don't know of James Baldwin's career and work, but I do recall the title of his first novel. And he said that title was Go Tell it to the Mountain. And so at the time, I had never heard of James Baldwin and I thought, "go tell it to the mountain." So let me, you know, this is long before computers. So I thought, well, let me go to the encyclopedia and look up James Baldwin.

Keith Clark (05:26):

I saw that the title of the book actually was Go Tell It On the Mountain. So my professor on the one hand had sort of, you know, mangled the title, but in giving me that name and giving me that title, he really gave me a, a literary and professional lifeline. And when I looked up James Baldwin in the World Book Encyclopedia, I saw this picture of this little, it was a terrible picture. It was just, it's a little more than the dark spot, frankly. It was just an awful picture. And it wasn't a lengthy description of James Baldwin, but I remember it saying that his essays and his fiction dealt with race and dealt with sexuality. And, you know, for 19-year-old me, these things were now starting to really come into view in terms of importance, in terms of my own personal identity. You know, aside from this, the professional literary part, my personal identity. So once I began reading, you know, I I high tailed it to the library, I checked out and read or, you know, probably devoured might be a better word, you know, as much James Baldwin as I could. And that was the beginning of this journey.

President Gregory Washington (06:33):

You know, this is really interesting. So was there something in him that sparked an interest in you in terms of pursuing a career in literature in African American literature, L-B-G-T-Q literature as well? What was it that gave you that spark?

Keith Clark (06:52):

I think it was the fact that James Baldwin led, I guess what we probably would in contemporary parlance called a life that was not by the book, respectable. In other words, he was more someone who really followed his own path and marked his own path. So his most anthologized short story is a story called Sonny's Blues that he published in 1957, and actually wrote a lot of it while he was living here in DC with a famous writer named Owen Dodson, who used to teach at Howard University. He was a playwright and a writer himself. And so he wrote Sonny's Blues. And Sonny's Blues is about the conflict between two brothers and one brother has followed a more traditional path. He's, you know, what we might call assimilated. You know, he's gone to school, he's a teacher, he's got a a job, he's got a family, and his younger brother, the titular character, Sonny, wants to be a jazz musician, and he's not inclined to follow his brother's very conventional by-the-book path.

Keith Clark (07:53):

And so the young brother, he, he's a teenager, Sonny's a teenager, and his, his older brother says, well, you know, you can't always do what you want to do. You know, you want to be a jazz musician, but you can't always do what you want to do. And Sonny says, well, I don't see why anybody cannot do what they want to do. And I think that was how James Baldwin saw his life. You know, his father, you know, he had a very difficult relationship with his stepfather. And his stepfather was someone who really did not appreciate Baldwin, he didn't appreciate his intellect, he didn't appreciate his gender identity and comportment, he didn't appreciate a lot of things about him. And so James Baldwin learned very early on that either he was going to live by his own sort of standard and way of thinking and way of being, or he was not gonna live at all.

Keith Clark (08:41):

And so just his model of someone who decided, "I'm going to chart my own path, and I'm not going to be concerned with who likes that, who appreciates that, who approves that. I have to be true and genuine to myself and to my passion and to what I want to be in this world." And I think, you know, for somebody who was, again, young, impressionable, nerdy, you know, just seeing someone who basically just sort of did what he felt like he needed to do and be who he felt like he needed to be without, you know, input from anybody else. And I think that that gave me a sort of model for, okay, you can do what you want to do and you can be who you want to be, and you don't have to, you know, necessarily conform or be conventional. Yeah. So I'll leave it there. .

President Gregory Washington (09:34):

No, this is really, really good stuff. We are now at the point of really celebrating the legacy and engaging in the legacy of James Baldwin recently at the Alan Cheuse Center for International Writers is wrapping up Baldwin100: A year-long celebration of James Baldwin in honor of his 100th birthday.

Keith Clark (09:56):

Yes.

President Gregory Washington (09:56):

You're a member of that host committee, right?

Keith Clark (09:59):

Yes.

President Gregory Washington (09:59):

So talk to me about that legacy and what is the importance of honoring and celebrating, especially today, right, with what we are dealing with in the country today. What is the importance of celebrating the legacy of James Baldwin?

Keith Clark (10:15):

The center is named after Alan Cheuse, who was a marvelous fiction writer and who was on the staff of George Mason for decades. A lot of people probably know Alan from, he used to review books on National Public Radio. He was a wonderful writer and just a wonderful creative presence at George Mason and had such an impact. And so the Cheuse Center for International Writers was the brainchild of Bill Miller, who was, you know, a colleague of mine and who really was just a wonderful friend and mentor as well. And so the current director, professor Leeya Mehta, she approached me and she said that the Cheuse Center wanted to honor James Baldwin, the centennial of his birth. He was born in 1924 in Harlem. And she approached me, and as someone who, you know, is a Baldwin scholar, and she thought I really needed to be a part of this.

Keith Clark (11:03):

And so I jumped at the opportunity and I was so delighted that George Mason was taking this role in celebrating, you know, not just a national treasure, but a, an international treasure. An artist whose life went far beyond the borders of the United States. You know, he was an international citizen, really. He lived in France, he lived in Turkey. And so Baldwin always saw himself as a disturber of the peace. In one interview, someone asked him, what do you think of your role? And he said, "well, I guess I'm probably some kind of witness." And so if you think about that word witness, it has multiple connotations, right? It has a religious connotation, it has a specific Black church connotation, right? The Black preacher saying, can I get a witness? It has a connotation in terms of a judicial connotation or a witness, but it's all about somebody watching and viewing and voicing and reporting.

Keith Clark (11:57):

And so, Baldwin, you know, he grew up in the church. His father was a preacher, Reverend David Baldwin was a preacher of a storefront church. And Baldwin grew up in the church, and he was a preacher himself at the age of 14. So Baldwin had a keen insight on America, on religion, on race, on various types of identities, you know, sexual, artistic. And so Baldwin's legacy was that we all need to be witnesses, and we all need to witness for morality and truth. And if we are not going to witness for morality and truth, then what is our purpose? And Baldwin was an uncompromising visionary. And so in The Fire Next Time in 1963, Baldwin, basically, it's a sermon to Black and white America: it's very simple, really. The thesis is very simple. It's a very complex book, but the thesis is very simple, that we in America cannot remain divided that ultimately, and he was very much a disciple of Dr. King, ultimately, we have to reach a place of not just mutual respect and tolerance, but a place of love.

Keith Clark (13:11):

And at the end of that book, he says, you know, he uses the parable of, of Noah and the flood. And so he says, you know, God sent Noah the rainbow sign. No more water, fire next time. So if we don't reach this place where we connect, where we accept, where we love, where we don't create barriers, where we don't create division, we are going to perish and we are gonna perish collectively. And so what was so striking in 1963 when he wrote this is that, well, fortunately we have made advances, certainly we've come together in important ways, but we remain so divided, and the culmination of that, or the outcome of that will be our demise. And so what Baldwin was trying to preach, you know, he's often compared to the prophet Jeremiah, what Baldwin's always out there preaching, you know, out in the whirlwind preaching when nobody wanted to hear it, that we still don't want to hear it.

Keith Clark (14:08):

And it's very frustrating, frankly, Dr. Washington, that the things that he wrote in the late fifties, in the sixties, are so resonant at a time when people want to wound and people want to divide, and people want to disempower. People want to divide and separate and move away from each other. And Baldwin always was clear in that this is not how we're going to survive. This is not how we're going to thrive. And so Baldwin's legacy is, you know, one that is important that it remains, but it's also sad that it is still so germane in 2025 that we are grappling with so many of the issues that divided us. But I think Baldwin's message would also be this, we've gotta keep witnessing, we've gotta keep testifying and we can't tire in doing that work.

President Gregory Washington (15:00):

Hmm. Even when you are tired, right?

Keith Clark (15:02):

Even when you're tired, you know, Fannie Lou Hamer used to talk about, you know, I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired--

President Gregory Washington (15:07):

Of being sick and tired, absolutely.

Keith Clark (15:09):

Absolutely. And I, I I wanna say this, African American women played key roles in Baldwin's life, beginning with his mother, you know, whereas his father did not appreciate his artistic bent. He didn't appreciate Baldwin's genius, his mother did, and she encouraged him, right? And so Baldwin, you know, understood the legacy, not just of people like Martin Luther King, but also people like Fannie Lou Hamer, and people like, you know, Nina Simone, whom he was friends with, and Lorraine Hansberry, the playwright, who he was friends with, he understood that not only did we need to sort of stir the waters in terms of our racial way of thinking, but also in things like gender and things like sexuality and sexual orientation.

Keith Clark (15:49):

So Baldwin was really a trailblazer. He was really ahead of his time. And for that, he paid a tremendous price, frankly. For example, the FBI had a voluminous file on him as a troublemaker, right? The FBI persecuted this man. And so, as someone who was writing about things in the 1960s that people dare not write about, people dare not write about sexuality, people dare not write about homosexuality. People dare not write about bisexuality, especially a Black writer, right? If you are a Black writer, you're supposed to write about the race problem, and that's it. And James Baldwin's was like, no, I'm not going to be forced into a cubbyhole. I'm not gonna be pigeonholed. I'll write about whatever the hell I want to write about. And again, he paid a tremendous personal and professional price for that, but he persisted.

President Gregory Washington (16:39):

Understood. Well, in addition to your decades of teaching and writing about James Baldwin's works, you were also one of the premier scholars of Earnest J. Gaines, somewhat lesser known, but people do identify with his work, right? With such important novels as The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, still one of my favorite movies growing up. Yes. And A Lesson before Dying. So what makes these two men important figures and what makes them similar?

Keith Clark (17:11):

It's so funny, Dr. Washington, you mentioned the movie, The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. Oh, yeah. And now I'm gonna date myself, so I Well, you,

President Gregory Washington (17:17):

Well, I've already, I already dated myself, but,

Keith Clark (17:20):

Well, I, I, I think I got a few years on you though. Um, so I remember growing up in Norfolk, Virginia, and in 1974, you know, there were, what, three or four television stations in the seventies? That's right. And I remember CBS was premiering this, uh, movie, The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman. And, you know, people didn't really know, you know, what it was based on, but they just knew it was a, a movie with Black folks. And it was a movie with Cicely Tyson, who, you know, at that time, was the Black movie star at the time.

President Gregory Washington (17:49):

That's right.

Keith Clark (17:49):

You know, I think she had been nominated for an Oscar and a movie sounder a couple years before. So this was really, this was must-see TV, you know, and the representations of, you know, we could do a whole conversation on representations of Black people, right? Often as, you know, buffoons and clowns. But here was a movie that was going to portray, you know, a serious side of Black life and Black experience, an American experience.

Keith Clark (18:12):

And so I remember as a 11, 10, 11-year-old watching that movie and thinking, oh boy, this is so powerful. And I remember, you know, afterwards seeing it won all kind of awards and it really catapulted, you know, Cicely Tyson to even greater stardom. But it also put Ernest J. Gaines on the map. And so, Ernest J. Gaines, if you think of Baldwin as a northern, urban, you know, born in Harlem writer, well, think of Ernest Gaines as sort of the opposite in terms of his upbringing. He's from rural Louisiana, a little place called Oscar, Louisiana, about 45 minutes from Baton Rouge. And, you know, he grew up basically on a plantation in dire poverty.

Keith Clark (18:53):

I mean, he lived, for the first 14, 15 years of his life, he lived in what was called the Quarters, which were former slave quarters on the plantation. His aunt raised him, and also about seven or eight of his siblings. And all of these people were in basically a two room shack. So that was Ernest Gaines's upbringing. But like Baldwin, he discovered early the power of art, the power of writing as a way to voice yourself, but also to be a voice for people who didn't have voice. And so, Ernest Gaines, in his interviews, he talked about the aunt who raised him. And on this plantation, the people, you know, there were sharecroppers and people who worked the fields. And these were people who didn't have formal education. This was Louisiana in the 1930s. And so Ernest Gaines remembers as a 10-year-old boy, he had more education than just about all of the adults on the plantation.

Keith Clark (19:48):

And so his aunt would make him write letters for the adults. And so they would tell him what to say in the letter, and, you know, they might give him a line or two, and then he'd have to sort of write the rest of it. So doing that sort of sparked his creative imagination. And so Ernest Gaines, when he got to be older as a, you know, teen, early adult, he talked about going to the library. And Baldwin also was a voluminous reader as a kid and a young man. So he talked about reading all the books in the Harlem and New York public libraries. And so Ernest Gaines, by his teen years, early adulthood, he had moved to California with his mother and stepfather, and he recalls going to the library there. And in Louisiana, at that time, there was no library, you know, Black people could not go to the library.

Keith Clark (20:32):

It was segregated. And there was no Black library, so he couldn't even go to the library. So when he moved to California in San Francisco area in the forties, he discovered in the library that all of the books about Southern Black, either there were books, not about southern Black people, you know, by Faulkner, and they had southern Black people, but it was a very limited portrayal. And he said he didn't see any of the people that he grew up with in any of those books. And so he decided, well, if I wanna see those people on those plantations, those rural people, what were called the peasants, right? If I wanna see those people, I'm gonna have to write those books myself. And so Ernest Gaines made it his mission to portray southern Blacks, rural southern Blacks, and all of their complexity and all of their humanity, be it good, be it bad, be it indifferent, being trying, being heroic, being struggling, being, you know, less than humane. But Ernest Gaines was committed to presenting Black southern people in all of their complexity. And so, whereas James Baldwin's work was more focused on his experiences in the north and in, later, his international experiences in Europe, Ernest Gaines basically, as Faulkner said, never left his little postage stamp. He always wrote about rural Black people and white people in Louisiana. So these two artists were really complimentary in a kind of way in giving us urban experiences and rural southern experiences. So they're very ostensibly different, but very complimentary.

President Gregory Washington (22:06):

That's interesting. You talked about how one was this, you know, had this broad view of the world, right? And you talk about the other one as if he was very, very narrowed and focused. You write that the word masculine is often reductively equated with whatever historical atrocities and social scourges one dares to dredge up. Can you talk a little bit about that assertion?

Keith Clark (22:34):

Boy, I think that's going back to my to an early, my first book. I think I wrote that in 2002. So that takes me back. So I guess just to sort of update that idea, nowadays we hear the phrase toxic masculinity thrown around. And so I think both Baldwin's and Gaines' artistic and aesthetic mission and intervention. And they took very different approaches, I'll say. But I think what both of them wanted to do was dislodge or trouble this idea that masculinity was one thing, that it was monolithic, that it was univocal, that it just consisted of one thing. It just consisted of these parochial ideas about strength, about aggression, about not being emotional, about stoicism, you know, domination. You know, some of these things that are, some of them quite pejorative, frankly. And so what I think James Baldwin and Ernest Gaines tried to do was to give us a more complex, a more nuance, a more capacious notion of masculinity.

Keith Clark (23:43):

So in Ernest Gaines's works, often the heroic figure of his works is the young African American man who is not necessarily aggressive in terms of violence or dominating, you know, his family or women, but is the man who is committed to education, the man who's committed to uplifting the community. So you mentioned The Autobiography of Jane Pittman. So a couple of the key figures in that novel are young African American men. One is a community organizer, and the other starts a school for African Americans, kids who live on plantations and don't have schools. So it's this whole idea that masculinity, generally, but African American masculinity in particular, doesn't have to be just one thing. That it can be about community, it can be about family, it can be about men who are heterosexual, but it can also be about men who express sexuality and whose sexual identities are manifold or more complex, or go beyond a sort of heteronormative box. Both of these writers do know in different ways. I mean, I don't want to equate them, right, they were doing some very different kind of work, but they both felt that the sort of monolithic notion of masculinity and this prescribed, accepted orthodox notion of masculinity was just too truncated. It was just too narrow, too parochial. So they really wanted to break Black men out of that box. And, and they both were very successful in different ways.

President Gregory Washington (25:16):

That is real interesting. So how has this sentiment evolved since the book was published?

Keith Clark (25:23):

Well, you know, the fortunate thing is that nowadays we see, you know, and I see in my classes, I see young people really disrupting these sort of binaristic ways of thinking about gender, for example. And so you see a masculinity now that's really much more expansive, it's much more capacious, it's much more open to various forms of gender expression, of sexual identity. And so, you know, I have students in my classes now who identify as queer, who identify as non-binary, who identify as male, who identify as female. And so they really have disrupted, you know, these sort of, again, monolithic and truncating and really limiting notions of identity. And I'm really happy, you know, and they've educated me, frankly, Dr. Washington, you know, I grew up at a time when things like gender and sexual expression and gender expression were very, you know, binaristic, right? Either/or.

Keith Clark (26:24):

And so, you know, what my students have modeled for me, and what I've learned from them is that, you know, all of these things, just varying degrees, are really boxes, and they're ways to divide, and they're compartments. And so we need to sort of create a new language to think about, you know, race and gender and femininity and masculinity, you know, these terms that have these very fixed notions and very truncated and limiting circumscribing ways. And so my students have modeled for me how, you know, we can break free of these things. And I'm glad for that education, frankly.

President Gregory Washington (27:00):

So there's a lot to learn from our youth, huh?

Keith Clark (27:03):

Yes. And I was someone who frankly, was a bit resistant to it, but now I appreciate, and I, you know, relish the opportunity to learn from my students. And they don't hesitate to pull me up short when my thinking and my limited vocabulary, and they don't hesitate to educate me. And I appreciate that education.

President Gregory Washington (27:23):

Okay. Sound like you have gotten an education in pronouns.

Keith Clark (27:27):

Mm-hmm yes, I have.

President Gregory Washington (27:28):

It's effective use of, right?

Keith Clark (27:29):

Yes, I have.

President Gregory Washington (27:30):

I, I, I, I understand as we, as we all have. I'm going to kind of go off script a little bit okay. Here, right? Because obviously these two individuals had profound insight into our culture and our way of life, and what that meant at the time in which they were living. I want you to, in your, your knowledge of them extrapolate that to today, we're very different now. But also somewhat the same.

Keith Clark (28:09):

Yes.

President Gregory Washington (28:10):

So talk about how these individuals, uh, how their works should be viewed today, should be received today, and how should we respond based on those works today?

Keith Clark (28:25):

I think both of these literary luminaries, I think they would say that how we should interpret their literature today is this, that literature and all art, but their expression, their particular expression or mode was literature writing that all art should be about the illumination of who we are as a society, micro and macro. And it should be about shedding a light. It should be about witnessing, it should be about looking at where we were, right? And so there's always going to be an element of looking back. So that means looking at our history, looking at it candidly, looking at it, honestly, looking at it, not romanticizing it, not editing out our history, not giving us an expurgated version of that history, but looking at it honestly, to say that here's where we were and here's how we've progressed.

Keith Clark (29:34):

So, you know, James Baldwin in one of his early essays, talked about America having, you know, too many Americans being guilty of the crime of nostalgia. And so he understood that while it was important to look back, and we must look back, but we also must use the looking back as a way to propel us forward. And so I think both Gaines and Baldwin, they were very much invested in history, but they also made it clear that history should not be for nostalgic purposes, and it should not be used as a way to sort of try to take us back to some type of mythological golden age, right. Some mythological utopia that really never existed. Right? And so they would be about of the importance of---

President Gregory Washington (30:18):

Well, well, that didn't exist for us.

Keith Clark (30:21):

Right? Exactly. Exactly. So they would be very clear that we have to not romanticize, right? We don't want a, you know, gone with the wind type history, right? And so we have to look back, but we have to use that looking back as a catalyst to move forward. And I would think that both of these writers would believe we have moved forward, right? We certainly have moved forward in important ways, but I think they also would say, look at our work as a way to get us to go further, right? To get us to think, to dig deeper, not just in looking at our history, but looking at that history as a way to move into a future that is more about connectivity and connection and mutual progress, right? And so I think these writers would have us understand that we have to look at the past, but we can't be stuck in that past, and that past has to be used as a vehicle for moving us forward.

President Gregory Washington (31:29):

Now, that's real good insight. That is real good insight. In the conclusion of the book, you, you describe Black men's writing as becoming quilt-like in contemporary times. How have you seen this tapestry expand over the years since the writing of this book? How has it changed?

Keith Clark (31:49):

Well, one of the ways I've seen the expansion of African American men's literature is that it really has become expressive of so many types to be. And so there's this sort of ontological dimension, right? This whole business about there are different ways to be. And you know, whereas earlier writers, let's say a writer like Richard Wright, who grew up in the hellscape of the American South in the 1910s and 1920s. And so the focus for Richard Wright was basically on sort of individual survival of a type of neo-slavery, right? And so in the later parts of the 20th century, so, you know, I would say beginning with Baldwin, and I also write about Gaines, and I write about the playwright August Wilson. And so these writers look at African American men in terms of race, but in terms of other dimensions of their being. So for example, Baldwin is very much concerned with men who are artists.

Keith Clark (32:54):

So in many of his works, the primary character will be a musician or an actor. I don't, I don't think ever a writer, ironically enough, but a musician, an actor, a creative person, right? And so he was much more interested in these other ways that men could be in the world. And so I would offer another writer who inspired James Baldwin, a writer named Randall Kenan, who probably a lot of people have not heard of. He was another southern writer, although ironically he was born in New York, but he moved to North Carolina when I think he was a six, seven month year old, and he was taken to North Carolina. But Randall Kenan was a writer, very much a southern writer who was inspired by James Baldwin, right, as another Black gay writer. And so Randall Kenan opened up a space for African American male writers to deal candidly with the church, but also sexuality.

Keith Clark (33:52):

And so in Randall Kenan's work, you have young males, and in one of his books, the teenage protagonist and in other works, older male protagonists, but who grapple with their rural southern communities and their very sort of limited way of thinking about race and sexuality and how those things really can be complicated. And if we're not careful, those things can be asphyxiating, right? And so Randall Kenan charts a path for, and I'll use the word queer, and it's a word that I take issue with often, but I'll use it here. I think it fits. Randall Kenan opened a space for an assertion of a type of queer masculinity that, you know, James Baldwin was getting at. And Randall Kenan sort of start propelled it and pushed Baldwin's portrayals forward, right?

Keith Clark (34:44):

And so when I say quilt-like right, if you think of a quilt, a quilt is multiple pieces, right? It's multiple fragments brought together in a hole. And so what Randall Kenan, along with, you know, Baldwin before him, wanted to give a more comprehensive portrait of not just Black men, but just of masculinity generally. And so I think this quilt means that there are multiple different expressions, and these expressions, while they're individual, can also be part of the whole, right? And so, and I take that quilt metaphor, I was actually thinking about the writer, Alice Walker, right? And one of her famous short stories, she's featured quilting in her short stories and in the novel The Color Purple and quilting is always both an individual act, but it's also a collective act that's done in community. And so what these more contemporary writers are doing is trying to look at more expansive notions of masculinity that include community, that include forms of different gender expression that include one's feminine self, right? And so, you know, this is where these writers are moving forward. And so you have writers now who identify themselves as transgender, non-binary. Last semester I taught in one class a memoir of a transgender, uh, writer. And so these are people who are really, again, moving us forward, right? And so they're picking up the mantle at, you know, Baldwin and Randall Kenan, and now they're picking up that mantle to move us forward and thinking about these sort of very truncated notions of race and gender and identity and sexuality.

President Gregory Washington (36:17):

Let me switch gears a little bit more.

Keith Clark (36:20):

Sure.

President Gregory Washington (36:20):

So along with your books on Baldwin, Gaines, and Wilson, who, who you've mentioned, You also published a study entitled The Radical Fiction of Ann Petry. And that was in 2013, and that was on the works of a writer who is not nearly as well known as these prominent male authors. Can you talk a little bit about her, her writing and why she deserves a wider readership?

Keith Clark (36:45):

Sure. Thank you for that question. So probably 99% of of the people, even in literary studies, unfortunately have not heard of Ann Petry. She's dutifully included in African American literary anthologies, but I rarely have seen her. I don't think I've ever actually seen her included in anthologies of American writers. And so, Ann Petry is a writer near and dear to my heart. She was born in Connecticut in the same year as Richard Wright, I believe, 1908. And so Ann Petry's life was very different from the writers that I had written about. Very different from James Baldwin, very different from Ernest Gaines, very different from August Wilson. Ann Petry grew up in sort of the Connecticut suburbs, if you will, in a place called Old Saybrook, Connecticut, which was an all-white town, and her father was a druggist. So he ran the pharmacy and this all-white town, old Saybrook, Connecticut. And, Ann Petry grew up, you know, relatively, you know, probably higher than middle class, probably, you know, not elite, but . She grew up at a very, her financial situation was not that James Baldwin.

President Gregory Washington (37:55):

She was well-to-do.

Keith Clark (37:55):

She was well-to-do. Her financial situation, she wasn't scrambling and scuffling like Baldwin and, and Ernest Gaines, her family had some means, you know, they weren't rich. But, so while her father ran the pharmacy, her mother was a business woman as well. She, you know, made and sold hair care products. She did all kinds of things. And then Ann Petry had an aunt who became the first woman in Connecticut to earn a doctorate in pharmacy. So she came from a very, you know, affluent, might be too strong a word, but she came from a very accomplished background. And so here was this young girl growing up in rural Connecticut, born in 1910s, 1920s, and she was a voracious reader. You know, she loved reading, she read Frederick Douglas, she read Edgar Allen Poe. She was like, you know, Baldwin and Gaines and that she devoured books.

Keith Clark (38:40):

So Ann Petry thought, well, you know, I don't want be a pharmacist. You know, her father, her aunt, you know, that was the family business. But, uh, I think in one interview, she, you know, said, you know, I don't want to be a pill counter or a pill distributor. I , I wanna do something else. So interestingly, like Baldwin, she too charted a different path. And so she left Old Saybrook and went to Harlem and became a journalist. And she worked on African American newspapers, but she also studied creative writing. And so she started taking these creative writing classes at Columbia. And lo and behold, she wrote a few chapters for novels, just a couple of chapters, and submitted them to a publisher. And she won a fellowship, which meant money. And so that gave her the time to write, you know, pursue her creative writing full-time.

Keith Clark (39:29):

And she produces a book in 1945 called The Street, which was the first novel by an African American woman to sell a million copies. Yeah. And so it was a phenomenal accomplishment. And so it was set in Harlem in the 19, you know, 40s, contemporary book. And instead of following a male protagonist, as you know, writers before her protagonist was an African American woman, a single mother growing up in hardscrabble Harlem in the forties, trying to raise her son. And now Harlem really was sort of voracious in terms of exploiting her economically, sexually, psychologically, and Harlem for Lutie Johnson, that was the character's name, was really a hellscape. And so what Ann Petry gave voice to was not simply, you know, the, the plight of African-American men, but the plight of an African-American woman. And so, in an interesting way, she was sort of following in Zora Neale Hurston, who was a southern writer, but following in Zora Neale Hurston's footsteps, and sort of providing a feminist counter voice to these sort of dominant portraits of these, you know, male protagonists.

Keith Clark (40:39):

And, you know, and there was an audience for it. Like I said, it was the first book by a Black woman, novel by Black woman to sell a million copies. And it really sort of catapulted her to, to literary stardom. You know, she was on the cover of, of Ebony Magazine, which back in the day, that was the, you know, the magazine of Black America. And so she really became sort of a literary star, unlike James Baldwin, who loved celebrity, Ann Petry did not like celebrity. Ann Petry really wanted first and and foremost just to be a writer. So she left New York and moved back to Old Saybrook with her husband. She had gotten married by this time, and so she continued to write, but she really was one who'd really eschewed the spotlight. But she was also a prolific writer. She wrote two other novels.

Keith Clark (41:20):

She wrote children's and young adult books. So she was a prolific writer, but you know, someone who was unheralded. And so, when I was in graduate school, I had a very good friend, uh, Hillary Holiday, who's a journalist and a writer and an academic. And Hillary wrote her dissertation on Anne Petri. And one of my mentors at University of North Carolina Chapel Hill was Trudier Harris and Professor Harris's class, she taught Ann Petry. And it really opened up another world for me. And it, she taught not only the street, which I had, you know, I knew of, but she taught another Ann Petrynovel. And I thought, wow, these works are great. How come people aren't writing about them? And so my friend did her dissertation on Ann Petry and published the first book on her. But after that, you know, there was nothing. And so I thought, well, maybe I need to write a book on Ann Petry. That became the impetus for my second scholarly project. And I would say, I'm really proud of my Ann Petry book, and I'm proud of being able to play a role in introducing her to a wider audience. So yes, Ann Petry is somebody that we really need to know.

President Gregory Washington (42:22):

So, so as we wrap up here, you write in an essay, Are We Family: Pedagogy and the Race of Queerness, which is included in Black Queer Studies: A Critical Anthology. And so in that essay, you write about teaching the unspeakable, teaching the unspeakable. So let's talk about that for a little bit. How would you define that which is unspeakable

Keith Clark (42:55):

That essay? Actually, the beginnings of that was the first, what was called Black Queer Studies Conference in the year 2000 at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. And the two organizers were two very important literary scholars, Mae Henderson and E .Patrick Johnson. And they organized this conference, and from that conference, they published several of the papers that we turned into essays. And so that book, I believe, came out in 2005. And it's wonderful. I've been invited to participate in the 25th, a commemoration of that. So they're gonna have 25 year anniversary, so they're gonna have another Black Queer Studies conference in Chapel Hill just in a few months. And I'll be participating in that. But my presentation at that conference in 2000 was about teaching, you know, what were still sort of these taboo issues and these taboo issues or unspeakable issues were often L-G-B-T-Q sexuality.

Keith Clark (43:55):

And so, in my presentation I talked about, and also in my title I was inspired by Toni Morrison. She has an essay called Unspeakable Things Unspoken. And where she was talking about, you know, history and the sort of gaps and the way we understand American history and how slavery is this sort of big exclusion in American history, and how it was something that was, you know, unspeakable and not spoken. And so I was thinking that in teaching, often, especially in African American literature at the time, that people still were a little skittish about talking about L-G-B-T-Q issues. So in my presentation, I talked about, you know, whenever I teach Ellison's classic work, Invisible Man, I pay very careful attention to the sort of underground or sort of the invisible ways that same sex desire emerges in that novel. And it'd be very easy to miss if you weren't looking for it, right?

Keith Clark (44:54):

And so I remember early in my teaching career at George Mason when I was talking about these issues in Invisible Man and these homoerotic dimensions that again, you really had to be looking for. And there were some students who were really resistant to that. And so for them it was like, well, this is a novel about a, the plight of a, a young straight Black man, you know, where why are you raising these issues about his, about sexuality, not his, necessarily, but about sexuality and what they would think of as, you know, non-normative or deviant or unspeakable, right? Unspeakable. And so, I was always aware that it was one of my important missions as an instructor was to go into places that might, as Baldwin would say, disturb the peace and disturb the waters, and make my students uncomfortable, but make them think, you know, if I'm not making them think, if I'm not pushing them, if I'm not making them uncomfortable then I'm not doing my job.

Keith Clark (45:53):

And so in teaching, you know, Invisible Man and these, you know, classic works like Native Son, we've gotta look at both what's on the surface and what we can see. But we also have to look at the things that are unseen, right? So there's one critic used to talk about the sexual silences and the slave narratives, right? And so when you read a Frederick Douglass or Harriet Jacobs, these narratives by enslaved people, you have to look at the things that they say, but also, what are the things that are implied? What are the things that are underlying, what are the things that you need to unearth? And so what my mission has always been is to look at those things that need to be unearthed, right? And so when teaching a book, like Nella Larsen was a writer from the Harlem Renaissance, and she wrote this very well known novel called Passing.

Keith Clark (46:39):

And it's all about, you know, racial passing and this Black woman who passes, you know, light enough to pass for white. But also there's an important dimension of that novel about sexual passing, right? And so, again, we have to sort of speak that, you know, what would've been unspeakable during the Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s? People said things, they just said them in ways that were not necessarily sort of obvious or clear or on the surface, and you really had to sort of dig deeper, right? And so in teaching these unspeakable things, it's all about excavating. It's all about digging up. It's all about seeing these sexual silences. What could people say and what prevented them, you know, what types of protocols were in place that prevented them from saying things more explicitly. We have to, as readers always be sensitive and always be reading actively, not passively, but actively looking at what's said. But also to quote Baldwin's last book, looking at the evidence of things unseen, like looking at those things that are unseen, but are there, and sometimes they're there hidden in plain sight, right? .

President Gregory Washington (47:44):

So last question here. So Black manhood was bought to the forefront of our cultural conversations in, in the 2010s, right? As the country confronted institutional and structural racism, which precipitated the Black Lives Matter movement. How did that moment change how you view your scholarship?

Keith Clark (48:07):

If it had any effect on my scholarship, and I guess I'm still sort of working through whether it did, but I can say at least it had an effect on me in the classroom. And it made me even more sensitive to the lives of my students specifically, but also students generally, and young people specifically and generally. And so one of the sort of pitfalls of being in academia and being in the ivory tower is that it can be a very insular place, and it can be a very insular place, and it can be a place where you exist in this sort of heady space that is not always in touch with material realities. And so what that moment sort of meant for me is that I also had to look in the books, but I also had to look beyond the books. And so I had to think about, you know, what types of things were students and young people dealing with that would impact their ability to read a James Baldwin or Ann Petry and a Toni Morrison, what was going on in the real world that might disturb their ability to learn or to focus on these texts or to extrapolate from these texts what they needed.

Keith Clark (49:28):

So what this moment did for me was it sort of, it made me more sensitive and more aware of not just my place as a professor, but also my place in terms of, as a citizen, as a model, as someone who needed to really be attentive to my own students' complexity. Not just, you know, what they learned in my class in the textbooks, but also, you know, what types of things were they experiencing during these very troubling times, right? During these moments. How are they dealing with this, and how are they coping with this? And how do these realities? And often these realities are very unpleasant. Often these realities are very uncomfortable, right? When you see, you know, one of the things about technology is that it produces, and it gives us the ability to reproduce and to reproduce and to reproduce. And so what is the effect on your emotion, on your psyche when you see violence, right?

Keith Clark (50:30):

Just to take that example, you talked about institutional, you know, to see, you know, institutional and juridical and judicial violence reproduce in this way. What effect does that have on one? And so it really made me aware that, okay, what my students learn in the books is important, but how are those lessons, how do they comport with the lessons that they're also learning and viewing these images and, and experiencing this reality of people, you know, being brutalized in real time, not just in a book, but in real time. And so it really made me keenly aware that I needed to be sensitive to my students' complexity and their experiences beyond the classroom.

President Gregory Washington (51:11):

No, I understand that. And that is, you, you, you are to be commended for doing that. And I know, uh, I I, I remember that time vividly and what young people at universities were going through. I know the university I was at at the time, there was a real change that students were going through just experiencing the level of violence that they were seeing happening around them, happening to people who looked like them.

Keith Clark (51:38):

Yes.

President Gregory Washington (51:39):

And so that, and so I, I, I, I actually appreciate that you have had a brilliant career, and I want to thank you for taking some time to engage with us.

Keith Clark (51:50):

Well, thank you, Dr. Washington, for this opportunity. And thank you for your leadership and your sensitivity to these matters at a time when things are a difficult, you know, at this time, this is, you know, the fire next time, 1963, the fire this time, 2025. And so, you know, it's important for us to continue to work and to, and continue to, to struggle.

President Gregory Washington (52:12):

Understood. And I agree. So Keith, thank you for bringing your insights to our listeners.

Keith Clark (52:18):

Thank you.

President Gregory Washington (52:20):

And so we're gonna have to leave it there. I am George Mason, president Gregory Washington. Thanks for listening. And tune in next time for more conversations that show why we are All Together Different.

Outro (52:38):

If you like what you heard on this podcast, go to podcast.gmu.edu for more of Gregory Washington's conversations with the thought leaders, experts, and educators who take on the grand challenges facing our students, graduates, and higher education. That's podcast.gmu.edu.

Learn more about the Access to Excellence Podcast

Listen to more episodes

Podcast — EP 65: James Baldwin’s insights on American life and identity
February 17, 2025
Podcast — EP 64: Navigating AI’s risks and rewards
January 21, 2025
Podcast — EP 63: The economic perceptions driving U.S. politics
December 11, 2024
Podcast — EP 62: What are the chances of intelligent life beyond Earth?
November 18, 2024
Podcast - EP 61: Can dirty coffee grounds be the key to clean water?
October 21, 2024

In This Story

Keith Clark

Gregory Washington

George Mason PhD student looks at deception and human-robot interactions

Colleen Rich — Thu, 13 Feb 2025 14:20:46 +0000

George Mason PhD student looks at deception and human-robot interactions Colleen Rich Thu, 02/13/2025 - 09:20

How likely are humans to trust a robot, especially if that robot has the capacity to lie? This is the question ��AV psychology doctoral candidate Andres Rosero is exploring in his research on human-robot interaction.

George Mason PhD candidate Andres Rosero, pictured here with "Pepper," is exploring deception and human-robot interactions. Photo by Ron Aira/Office of University Branding

“As robots become more integrated in human society, their roles will transition into those of a collaborative nature rather than as tools used by people,” said Rosero, who works in Applied Psychology and Autonomous Systems (ALPHAS) Lab in the Human Factors and Applied Cognition Program. “In response, these robots must be programmed with enough social awareness to navigate complex interpersonal interactions to build relationships and maintain a positive interaction with the humans they share their environment with.”

Almost 500 participants took part in Rosero's study “Human perceptions of social robot deception behaviors: an exploratory analysis,” which he conducted with George Mason graduate teaching assistant Harris Kelly and psychology professor Elizabeth Phillips. This study gauges how likely participants are to accept a lie told by a robot in various situational contexts and is one of the three manuscripts that comprise Rosero's dissertation.

Participants ranked specific scenarios involving robot deception and evaluated how deceptive the lie was, whether they approved of the robot’s actions, and if the robot’s behavior could be justified. The study placed these scenarios into three different environments: medical, domestic, and retail.

“The goal is to examine human perceptions of AI and robot collaborations across different complex social interactions,” explains Rosero, who received an MA in psychology from George Mason in 2022. “This study is one of two that examine moral norms in robots and how in breaking these moral norms, humans accept and justify the robot's behaviors.”

Each environment presented a unique quandary for the participant. For example, in the medical environment, the robot lied to a patient with Alzheimer’s, telling the patient that her deceased husband was coming home. In the other environments, the robot was evasive rather than uttering false statements.

In the domestic environment, the robot did not reveal to the individual that they were being secretly filmed. And in the retail environment, the robot did not disclose that it was capable of completing an assigned task and didn’t require human assistance. Overall, participants widely believed the robot’s lie in the first scenario, but once the robot’s capacity for deception and manipulation was revealed, they became less trusting. They also were more likely to say that the robot’s behavior in the medical environment was justified than in the other two scenarios.

“Any technology that is designed with the intention of being utilized by people is an intersection of that technology and the humanities,” said Rosero. “Our challenge as psychologists is to design experiments that properly explore this interaction to provide direction to the development of these technologies in the real world.”

Technology’s ability to potentially conceal its true capabilities remains a concern of Rosero, as a focus on human-robot dynamics continues to fuel his research. "I am planning on defending my dissertation in the summer, and I am hoping to continue doing human factors research,” says Rosero. “My goal is to conduct impactful research that can assist people in their interactions with cutting-edge technology.”

When offering advice to students in an age of artificial intelligence and its advancements, Rosero recommends understanding “the practical applications of your work.”

“As an applied psychologist, one of the most important questions I ask myself is how my research can be applied in the real world,” he said. “It is important to understand how your work helps to build upon the current knowledge of the field and how it could impact the development of the larger technology in society.”

Topics

Artificial Intelligence

College of Humanities and Social Sciences

Alumni

Temple Grandin discusses her advocacy work with George Mason students

Katarina Benson — Mon, 10 Feb 2025 17:09:56 +0000

Temple Grandin discusses her advocacy work with George Mason students Katarina Benson Mon, 02/10/2025 - 12:09

In January, renowned author, animal scientist, and autism advocate Temple Grandin came to ��AV’s Fairfax Campus for a series of talks and Q&A sessions. With support from the Department of Psychology, she was hosted by the student organization Students in Neuroscience as part of their speaker series.

Temple Grandin speaking to the Mason community. Photo provided.

Grandin champions the humane treatment of animal livestock. Diagnosed with autism at an early age, she stands as an autism self-advocate and has previously noted how her autism advances her ability to understand and empathize with animals.

George Mason students, faculty, alumni, and community members gathered in Merten Hall on the Fairfax Campus to witness Grandin’s work as she presented talks and responded to audience questions throughout the day. She answered questions about her research, personal aspirations, and career journey, and gave advice for autistic individuals, especially children and adults facing challenges in school and higher education.

In addition to her two presentations, Grandin spent multiple hours speaking to individuals and small groups of people. Neuroscience major Ashir Bhatti, a member of Students in Neuroscience, is currently conducting research focused on the ethical use of ejiao (donkey collagen) in Chinese skin care products. He said he appreciated the opportunity to discuss his research with Grandin.

“We [asked] Dr. Grandin to come and speak because we recognize the benefits of her interdisciplinary knowledge and how it could benefit those studying neuroscience, psychology and beyond,” he said.

“It was a great day," said Tim Curby, chair of the Department of Psychology in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences. "Hearing Dr. Grandin speak in-person about her research on both animal behavior and autism, while also taking the time to our questions, served as an encouragement personally and professionally for all of us who were there.”

Topics

College of Humanities and Social Sciences

College of Science

Students

Art history students’ museum exhibit unearths four centuries of Indian history

Katarina Benson — Wed, 29 Jan 2025 20:31:06 +0000

Art history students’ museum exhibit unearths four centuries of Indian history Katarina Benson Wed, 01/29/2025 - 15:31

During the fall 2024 semester, ��AV students had the opportunity to apply their classroom curriculum to a real-world museum environment. The students, led by art history professor Robert DeCaroli, worked directly with objects in the holdings of the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Asian Art as part of the ARTH 495/595 Curating an Exhibit course.

George Mason students work with pieces of the National Museum of Asian Art collection. Photo by Robert DeCaroli

Through a partnership with the National Museum of Asian Art and the generosity of Debra Diamond, the curator for South and Southeast Asian art, DeCaroli’s students studied painted miniatures and manuscript pages dated 1500-1800 from India’s Rajput and Pahari Courts. Students curated their own online exhibit and designed all of the museum-related materials necessary for their display, including labels, wall texts, catalog entries, educational programming, gallery talks and more.

Senior Charmaine Mapp explained that museum curation begins with the intention of education. “You need to know what this culture is and what story you're trying to tell,” Mapp said.

From there, the students proposed what they wanted to do based on the 14 paintings they had selected.

“We considered the stories presented in these paintings,” said Mapp, who is a business major. “What did we want to say with our exhibition? What did we want our theme to be, and how would everything connect?”  

DeCaroli’s class ultimately settled on the theme of “Loving Krishna: Four Centuries of Indian Painting,” a title which has a double meaning, referring to the Hindu deity as both a loving god and the object of his followers’ love. The exhibit is currently on view at Fenwick Library until February 15.

"Loving Krishna" runs through February 15 at Fenwick Library. Photo by Charmaine Mapp

For DeCaroli, the course is just as rewarding for him as it is for his students. “It has been a joy watching the students feel connected to their paintings,” he said. “That enthusiasm provides motivation for excellent research into the history and meaning of the artwork.”

With George Mason’s proximity to Washington, D.C., dedicated faculty members and generous community partners, there is so much for students to explore both within and outside of the classroom.

Mapp has been interested in curation for as long as she can remember. “When you walk into a museum or a gallery, you just see the end result. But you often don’t realize that that's created from nothing. So, this was a really good experience, especially being able to go into the archives, work with the actual paintings, and meet people who worked at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Asian Art,” she said.

“If you’re interested in art, history, or any other field, look at the classes available,” said Mapp. “I didn't know that Curating an Exhibition was a class until I looked in the course catalog. Courses like this really allow you to get more hands-on experience, develop relationships with professors, and make connections that lead to special opportunities.” 

“I have been impressed with the class's professionalism and collaborative spirit,” said DeCaroli. “Exhibitions are group efforts and good communication skills are vital to a successful project. This class has been exemplary in that regard.”

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Commencement student speaker Caroline Little found her family while at George Mason

Shayla Brown — Tue, 10 Dec 2024 21:25:40 +0000

Commencement student speaker Caroline Little found her family while at George Mason Shayla Brown Tue, 12/10/2024 - 16:25

Graduating psychology student Caroline Little said she grew up at ��AV.

“I have grown from a child to an adult at George Mason in ways I could have never thought possible. I came here a teenager, and left here a married mother of two,” said Little.

Little, who will travel from Alabama to address her fellow graduates as the 2024 Winter Commencement Student Speaker, will welcome her second child, Isabella, this winter.

Graduation student speaker Caroline Little and her son, Saint. Photo provided.

George Mason’s rigorous education and location being so close Washington, D.C., made her decision to attend pretty easy, said Little. “George Mason really helped foster rapid maturation in the best way possible,” she said.

Originally an in-state student, Little transferred from Germanna Community College in Fredericksburg, Virginia. Since then, she has lived in Rhode Island, New Orleans, and currently resides in Alabama. 

“I chose psychology as my major because I have always had a special interest in the study of how the human brain works and how humans behave. I definitely plan to take my psychology education further,” said Little, who was part of George Mason’s psych club during her first two years.

Little’s passion for psychology was fueled by College of Humanities and Social Sciences professor Michael Hurley, the undergraduate academic advisor in the Department of Psychology who helped her get a job in applied behavioral analysis.

“I worked with older autistic individuals, mostly individuals who are about to graduate from high school,” said Little. “I taught them how to be self-sufficient in their homes and they learned to do their own laundry, cook basic meals, clean up after themselves, and things like that.”

Little also met her husband, former George Mason basketball player and star forward Joshua Oduro, BS Business ’23, during an on-campus voting event.

Little has had many great experiences during her time as a student at George Mason, but some of her favorite memories, she said, come from the Homecoming basketball games and getting married to Oduro.

Little and her husband, Joshua Oduro, celebrate on Wilkins Plaza. Photo provided.

“We came back to campus and popped a bottle of champagne in front of the George Mason statue to celebrate meeting each other on campus,” said Little.

Throughout that summer, while Oduro was away at pre-draft, Little was a full-time mother and simultaneously took seven accelerated courses. It was a big challenge, said Little, because both she and her son, Saint, were struggling with sleep deprivation.

“My son and I would go to campus every day to meet with my tutor at The Globe [dining hall],” said Little. “We would be on campus all day, from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. I breastfed him, walked him around the halls, and brought him a big blanket for tummy time, just trying to keep him occupied while I studied.”

Little’s biggest piece of advice for incoming students is pursue yourself first. “So much happens in your four years of college, don’t ever forget why you’re here in the first place,” she said. “Never give up on your dreams, no matter how hard it may seem! No one will do it for you. You are in charge of your own destiny.”

Following graduation, Little plans to pursue her master’s degree in marriage and family counseling.

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In her new 'memoir in animals,' Creative Writing professor examines her writing life

Colleen Rich — Tue, 03 Dec 2024 17:46:28 +0000

In her new 'memoir in animals,' Creative Writing professor examines her writing life Colleen Rich Tue, 12/03/2024 - 12:46

George Mason English professor Kyoko Mori writes both fiction and nonfiction. Her latest book, Cat and Bird (Belt Publishing, March 2024), has been called a “memoir in animals” and focuses on the six house cats who defined the major eras of her life as a writer.

Kyoko Mori with her cats. Photo provided

What inspired you to write this book?

I’ve lived my entire adult life with cats and yet my previous books—both fiction and nonfiction—only featured cats in the periphery of the story, as colorful minor characters at best. In truth, getting my first cat at 22 was a life-altering event: that cat saw me through graduate school, my first full-time teaching job, marriage and divorce, and the publication of my first two books. I wouldn’t be the same person I am now if I hadn’t been with him for 18 years. So my first impetus was to finally do justice to him and to his successors.

I wanted to push against the misconception that cats and dogs are opposites—the cliché that cats are selfish and independent while dogs are loving and loyal. For those of us who are devoted to our animal companions, cats and dogs, equally, can be our alter ego or avatar—the core of who we are.

The real contrast is between cats and dogs on one hand and songbirds and other wildlife on the other. Even with birds who come to our window feeder or end up in our care (I worked as a songbird rehabilitator), we can only admire them from a distance or nurse them back to health in order to return them to the wild. We love companion animals by holding on; we love wildlife by letting go. I wanted to explore this contrast.

What surprised you about the process of writing this book?

I knew from the beginning that the book was going to be about the way the two kinds of devotion—to cats and to birds—have sustained my work as a writer and helped me to make a home as a single childless woman who is happy in her solitude and yet fulfilled by her involvement in the community. Having a husband and children is not the only way to engage meaningfully with the world and make a positive impact.

The balance between solitude and community and the joy of making a home alone (with cats) did remain important ideas in the book. But I also realized that a book about living with animal companions and witnessing the dangers that threaten birds, other wildlife, and the whole planet will have to dig deep into grief. The desire to hold on and let go at the same time—as when a beloved animal companion dies or when we watch from the ground as migratory birds navigate the sky full of danger—became the essential aspect of the book’s narrative and investigation.

What are you working on now?

My last nonfiction book before Cat and Bird was a knitting memoir titled Yarn: Remembering the Way Home. Since finishing Cat and Bird, I’ve picked up where Yarn finished and published four personal essays about women and clothes: shopping with my close friends, how we express ourselves with our clothes, etc. At the same time, I continue to be interested in backyard wildlife—birds that were not included in Cat and Bird and squirrels—especially after a squirrel made a nest in the flowerpot on my window ledge, had two babies, and stayed for two weeks before moving her nest to a maple tree in the backyard.

Sei Shōnagon, the 11th-century Japanese writer who appears in Cat and Bird as the embodiment of the book’s spirit, was equally interested in the beauty of nature and of human-made objects. I don’t think clothes and backyard wildlife can fit into the same book for me as they did for her, but for now I’m following the inspiration of her astute observations about both and seeing where my work goes.

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Public history students highlight local Indigenous communities

Shayla Brown — Tue, 19 Nov 2024 21:19:53 +0000

Public history students highlight local Indigenous communities Shayla Brown Tue, 11/19/2024 - 16:19

��AV associate professor Gabrielle Tayac’s course, HIST 397 Public History in Action, looks at how indigenous communities interact with our student population through community-based engagement and projects.

“Like anywhere in the Americas, George Mason is indigenous land, but we’re trying to get a sense of the interplay between past and present,” said Tayac, who is a member of the Piscataway Indian Nation. “My goal is to get students ready for museum work, give them accessible history, and guide them to work really deeply with communities.”

Gabrielle Tayac and her students. Photo by James Wells.

Tayac and research partner the Center for Humanities Research (CHR) applied for and received an Access to Research and Inclusive Excellence (ARIE) grant for their project, “IndigenoUs Northern Virginia.”

This project, completed by students in the Spring 2024 course, is in the form of an exhibit titled “Offerings for Tauxenent: Acknowledging Indigenous Place” at the National Trust for Historic Preservation, another project partner through George Mason alum James Wells, BA History ’22.

Wells previously took this course with Tayac and reached out to inform her of an open space at Woodlawn, which he offered as a place for current students to look at what the indigenous reality is and what needs to be remembered, explained Tayac.

“Professor Tayac’s class was one of my first real exposures to Indigenous history and cultures. It was really eye-opening,” said Wells, who came to George Mason from Northern Virginia Community College through the ADVANCE Program and was a member of George Mason’s student organization Native American and Indigenous Alliance.

“This exhibit was the most crowded I’ve seen Woodlawn in the two years that I’ve worked here. The work the students did on this project made that possible and opened the door for us to interpret Indigenous histories at our site,” said Wells, a program assistant at Woodlawn & Pope-Leighey House, one of National Trust for Historic Preservation’s locations.

Meghana Bandaru (left) and Odessa Lamborn with their presentation. Photo by James Wells.

For the project, the students were divided into three teams, focusing on different Indigenous communities: the International Mayan League, Indigenous Andean, and a combination of local tribes including the Doeg, Intertribal urban community, Piscataway, and Rappahannock tribes.

The groups had to collect research, objects, and images to produce interactive art and media that accurately represent their assigned Indigenous communities.

History graduate student Odessa Lamborn worked on this project during their last semester as an undergraduate student at George Mason.

“The mission of the project is about bringing awareness to the Indigenous and First Nations people in the Washington, D.C., area,” said Lamborn. “It was a really phenomenal experience being able to collaborate with Indigenous people in the area and uplift their voices.”

Lamborn is now working alongside Wells as a historical interpreter at Woodlawn & Pope-Leighey House.

“This project gave me great insight into the behind the scenes of creating exhibits for the public, and it also influences my current work at Woodlawn with the tours I provide,” said Lamborn. “I make sure to point out where we have a John Smith map, detailing Indigenous culture [from before] colonization.”

Some of the students in Tayac’s course contributed their original art or personal objects to the exhibit as well.

“This whole project was basically what I want to do as my professional career once I graduate,” said senior and history major Sinead Monaghan.

“I’ve gotten to take a lot of classes with Professor Tayac, and I’m so grateful for all her guidance,” said Monaghan. “What we're doing goes beyond the classroom and makes a valuable impact in the world beyond. If it just touches one person or changes the way one person thinks, then it will have done its job.”

The exhibit is being brought to George Mason’s Fairfax Campus in 2025 through Mason Exhibitions and will open on April 15 as “Offerings to the Potomac: Acknowledging Indigenous Place.”

Guests at Woodlawn & Pope-Leighey House for the exhibit. Photo by Woodlawn & Pope-Leighey House.

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George Mason researchers receive NEH funding for Connecting Threads project

Colleen Rich — Tue, 19 Nov 2024 18:49:31 +0000

George Mason researchers receive NEH funding for Connecting Threads project Colleen Rich Tue, 11/19/2024 - 13:49

Deepthi Murali and Jason Heppler of ��AV’s Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media have received a level two Digital Humanities Advancement Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), in support of their ongoing global textile history project titled Connecting Threads: Digitally Connecting Collections, Expanding Public Engagement.

Deepthi Murali. Photo provided

Connecting Threads is a collaborative digital history project by George Mason in the United States and the University of Edinburgh in the United Kingdom. Led by Murali, an assistant professor at George Mason’s Department of History and Art History, and Meha Priyadarshini, a senior lecturer at the University of Edinburgh, the project is dedicated to amplifying the contributions of Indian weavers and Afro-Caribbean consumers to global histories of dress.

"We wanted to pursue original research and scholarship while connecting collections that allow people other than us to find information about these textiles more easily, and offer our research and interpretation to a global public audience, particularly those audiences whose histories we were exploring in our work," said Murali.

The digital project includes archival and material sources from more than 12 archives and museum collections, creating a network of institutional data and scholarship on these textiles. In its first phase, the project utilized the work of an interdisciplinary team of researchers to examine the history of the Madras handkerchief, an internationally popular dress accessory made of brightly colored checked cotton.

The project's institutional partners include the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Bristol Museum and Archives in England, the University of Glasgow Archives in Scotland, the Smithsonian Cooper-Hewitt Design Museum in New York, and Louisiana State Museum in New Orleans.

Jason Heppler. Photo provided

The NEH grant will allow the project team to complete building the digital infrastructure and processing of collected data, setting up the project for Phase 2 development.

"The data is a mix of things: material compiled by the Connecting Threads team but also data that we’re computationally compiling from museum open data," said Heppler, senior developer at RRCHNM and the technical lead on the project. "Having those materials in our own database allows us to structure data in a way that serves our purposes."

Heppler said they are also building public-facing interfaces for browsing and viewing the data they’ve compiled. "We’ll be making interactive visualizations, primarily timelines and maps, to follow the movement of textile materials over time and space," he said. "To me, this really is the crux of the project—to understand how materials followed people and cultural ideas."

Murali said she is eager to see how they resolve the challenges of mapping these textiles with their fragmented histories. "This is a problem that most of us who work on non-Western art and material culture history face. The incompleteness of data makes it difficult to produce meaningful digital visualizations and networks," she said. "I am really excited by the possibility that we might be able to work out a solution and further make our process accessible to others dealing with the same issues."

In the next phase, the Connecting Threads team will further expand their research into the history of production of these textiles in southern India as well as begin research on the use of Indian cotton checked textiles in Southeast Asia.

The NEH is the nation's largest public funder of the humanities. The Digital Humanities Advancement Grants program supports innovative, experimental, and/or computationally challenging digital projects, leading to work that can scale to enhance scholarly research, teaching, and public programming in the humanities.

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