All News

Professor of Anthropology Charlotte Beck was quoted in the journal Science, in LiveScience, in The Oregonian and in U.S. News & World Report about a study, published in the journal Science on March 4, that raised questions about how prehistoric peoples, upon their arrival from Asia, journeyed south to the Americas. Beck and Professor of Anthropology Tom Jones published a paper in 2010 that concluded that the initial colonization of the intermountain region of the Great Basin was probably by populations from the Pacific coastal area and not, as conventional wisdom holds, from the Great Plains.

Six prizes were awarded across three categories in the annual Public Speaking Competition on Saturday, March 5, in the Chapel. The 17 finalists were chosen after an open preliminary round held in February. Speakers' presentations were either persuasive or informative in nature, and in one category, speakers were asked to address an assigned topic.

The Doris M. and Ralph E. Hansmann Lecture by Anthony Kronman scheduled for Monday, March 7, has been cancelled because the College is closed for the day. Organizers hope to reschedule for the fall.

Associate Professor of English Steven Yao delivered a lecture titled "Global Literary Studies and the Rising Tide of the Transpacific," as part of the Faculty Research Colloquium Series at UMass, Amherst, on March 1. While there, he also taught a graduate seminar on Global Modernisms.

A previously owned ion trap mass spectrometer (LC/MS) was recently donated to the Chemistry Department by SAIC – Frederick, Inc. Dr. Jack Simpson, a senior scientist at SAIC, made the donation possible. A similar, new LC/MS would cost about $175,000.

George Baker ’74 returned to Hamilton on March 3 and spoke with students about starting their career search in Washington. The discussion, titled “So You Want to Work in Washington, D.C.: A User’s Guide to Finding a Job in the Nation's Capital,” introduced students to the nature of the Washington job market and provided a framework for beginning the search. Baker is a partner at Williams & Jensen PLLC in D.C., a litigation lobbying firm where he started working in 1980.

The Hamilton College Orchestra presents the annual Brainstorm! concert on Sunday, March 6, at 3 p.m., in Wellin Hall. The concert will feature Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony with remarks by conductor Heather Buchman exploring the significance of the conductor’s work to Russian musical culture.

A packed Red Pit on Thursday March 3, was privileged to hear a “local boy done good,” as Professor Steve Orvis described him. Les Roberts, a native of the Syracuse area and now a human rights epidemiologist, visited Hamilton to talk about three of his conflict surveys.  Roberts led a transfixed crowd through a brief history of violence in war and then on to examples he saw firsthand: Zimbabwe, the Central African Republic, and what is now Congo.  

Assistant Professor of Psychology Jeremy Skipper has been awarded a $907,350 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for his research project "Neurobiology of Speech Perception in Real-World Contexts." The long-term objective of this research “is to understand the neural mechanisms of language comprehension in real-world settings, in which the brain can use context to aid in communication.”

Al Gore, the 45th vice president of the U.S., Nobel Laureate and author of An Inconvenient Truth, will deliver the Commencement address at Hamilton College on Sunday, May 22, at 10:30 a.m., in the Margaret Bundy Scott Field House. The ceremony will be webcast live beginning at 10:15 a.m.