All News

In his new book, “The Working Landscape: Founding, Preservation, and the Politics of Place” (MIT Press), Visiting Assistant Professor of Government Peter F. Cannavò focuses on the displacement and transformation of our landscape, the “crisis of place facing the United States.” He points out that “rampant development, unsustainable exploitation of resources, environmental degradation, and the commodification of places are ruining built and natural landscapes, disconnecting people from their surroundings and threatening individuals’ fundamental sense of place. Meanwhile, preservationists often respond with a counterproductive stance that rejects virtually any change in the landscape.”

In his new book, The Working Landscape: Founding, Preservation, and the Politics of Place (MIT Press, July, 2007), Visiting Assistant Professor of Government Peter F. Cannavò focuses on the displacement and transformation of our landscape, the "crisis of place facing the United States." He points out that "rampant development, unsustainable exploitation of resources, environmental degradation, and the commodification of places are ruining built and natural landscapes, disconnecting people from their surroundings and threatening individuals' fundamental sense of place. Meanwhile, preservationists often respond with a counterproductive stance that rejects virtually any change in the landscape."

The pearl crescent (Phyciodes tharos) is one of the most abundant small butterflies in eastern North America. Favoring open, sunny areas like roadsides, fields, and gardens as their habitat, pearl crescents lay their eggs on the underside of aster leaves. Asters contain a chemical known as germacrene D, a chiral product (its mirror images cannot be superimposed on one another) containing only one chiral center (an atom that is bound to four different atoms). Amy Klockowski ’09 (Rome, N.Y.) is continuing research she began last summer by attempting to synthesize optically pure (+)-germacrene D to see how the butterflies' antennae (which contain the olfactory receptor neurons) react to the chemical.

There are lots of interns in D.C. this summer but not all of them get to watch the Senate debate. Not all of them have to. As an intern with the Coalition for American Leadership Abroad (COLEAD), though, Philip Holdredge '08 (Oneonta, N.Y.) is responsible for an e-mail update concerning specific Senate debates, and he sometimes has to sit them out -- even when they go until midnight.

Hamilton lost an outstanding teacher and friend when Dwight Lindley '42, professor emeritus of English, died on July 18. He was a member of the faculty for more than three decades. Hamilton President Joan Hinde Stewart sent news of Professor Lindley's passing to the College community.

Although the Reader’s Digest’s story, “Second Chance City - A wave of refugees is bringing new life to a dying American town” paints Utica as a city that has plunged into an “economic meltdown,” Hamilton’s Associate Professor of Economics Paul Hagstrom offers some hope. His research, which is referenced in this article, focuses on the economic impact of refugee resettlement and the refugees’ effect on local labor markets on the central New York community. 

Three Hamilton students were selected as Diversity and Social Justice Project (DSJP) Service Associates for 2007. The program is designed to support students who wish to make the connections between their own disciplinary or interdisciplinary work and the mission of the DSJP. This year's research associates are Sarah (Sally) Powell '09, Maxwell Akuamoah-Boateng '09 and Lauren R. Hayden '07.

Jay Williams, the Walcott-Bartlett Professor of Religious Studies, participated in "River Summer," a program of the Environmental Consortium of Hudson Valley Colleges and Universities, of which Hamilton College is a member. He spent five days in July living on a boat and studying the ecology and history of the Hudson River from Pierpont Point to Newburg. The group took many water samples, studying the salinity, density, and temperature of the water of the Hudson as well as various lakes, marshes and brooks of the area. They also were introduced to archaeological sites, historic homes, and problems of city planning along the river.

As far as the average reader is concerned, avian flu is somewhere near West Nile virus: a danger, but a slightly dated one. After two winters of hype and no flu the fear has become a bit passé. But Allison Gaston-Enholm '09 (Atlanta, Ga.), who has a Levitt Fellowship this summer to research contingency plans for the avian flu, wants you to know two things: avian flu is potentially very dangerous, and just because it hasn’t happened yet doesn't mean it won't.

The standard study abroad program usually means 10 weeks in Paris or Madrid and some fun pictures. But Anne Bowler, a rising senior from Dallas, Texas, had a very different experience: she spent part of her study abroad program living in a Zulu village. Before leaving, Bowler had received an Emerson grant to research the South African attitude toward a medical system which relies upon both traditional healing and Western medicine. She completed part of her fieldwork in Africa, but she will spend the summer conducting further research into what she calls a "universal desire for health."