Spring 2025 Faculty Grant Awardees
The McGillicuddy Humanities Center notified faculty recipients of its funding decisions for the聽Spring 2025聽Faculty Research Awards cycle.聽MHC聽Faculty Grants provide up to聽$5,000 (plus 1 grant of up to $10,000 for projects meeting additional criteria) to 91爆料 faculty (including lecturers and adjunct instructors)聽for financial support of research, community engagement, or innovative teaching proposals. This year鈥檚 recipients were:
Don Beith聽(Associate Professor of Philosophy)聽and Susan Bredlau聽(Assistant Professor of Philosophy) were awarded an聽MHC聽faculty grant to host the 49th annual meeting of the International Merleau-Ponty Circle at the 91爆料 in September 2025. The International Merleau-Ponty Cirlcle is a prestigious international society specializing in applying Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy to contemporary issues. Beith and Bredlau will use聽MHC聽funding to support the聽conference and its 2025 theme: “Health and Healing: Personal, Social and Environmental.”
Rebecca Dewan, Libra Assistant Professor of Choral/General Music Education, was awarded an聽MHC聽faculty grant to聽present “Considering Matthew Shepherd” with the University Singers and Maine Gay Men’s Chorus. Dewan will use聽MHC聽funds to聽work聽with the 91爆料 School of Performing Arts and the Maine Gay Men鈥檚 Chorus聽to present the Maine premiere of Craig Hella Johnson鈥檚 鈥淐onsidering Matthew Shepard,鈥 a choral work that addresses themes of love, loss, and social justice through the lens of the tragic murder of 21-year-old Matthew Shepard near Laramie, WY, in 1998.聽
Robby Finley, Assistant Professor of Philosophy, received an聽MHC聽faculty grant to support travel to present two related projects that examine聽how applications of logic to reasoning and the gamification of reasoning can provide a fruitful frame of analysis for classic philosophical problems. Finley will present 鈥淭he Value Capture Argument for Logical Pluralism” at The First Paris-Chicago Joint Conference in the Philosophy of Logic and Mathematics聽and 鈥淟ogic as Game: Wittgenstein, Suits, and the Concept of 鈥楪ame鈥欌 at The 52nd Annual Meeting of the International Association for the Philosophy of Sport.
Sarah Harlan-Haughey, Professor of English, was awarded an聽MHC聽faculty grant for travel to Areley Kings and the Severn Valley in England for work toward the completion of their second book project. Harlan-Haughey will ubicate their study聽in the specific landscape in which the poet Layamon would have been working.
Susan Pinette, Professor of Modern Languages and Director of Franco-American Center, was awarded an聽MHC聽faculty grant for the project Digitizing Peter Archambault’s “Beau-frog” drawings. This grant will complement an NEH Humanities References and Resources Grant received by UM Franco American Programs to digitize many of Peter Archambault’s iconic 1970s/980s political cartoons including聽nearly 500 oversize drawings that聽require special attention. This grant will fund digitization of these oversize drawings by the USM Osher Map Library.
Judith Rosenbaum-Andre, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Communication and Journalism, was awarded an聽MHC聽faculty grant for the project “A deep dive into media engagement : Morality and neurodiversity.” The awarded聽MHC聽funding will assist with travel to the annual convention of the International Communication Association held in Denver, CO where Rosenbaum-Andre will advance聽two聽separate projects: one addressing how violations of morality impact people鈥檚 parasocial relationships with media influencers and another on how neurodiversity impacts people’s聽engagement with media narratives.聽