Rhyme & Reason

Saúl Sosnowski, professor of Latin American literature and culture, reflects on his global academic journey and decades at the University of Maryland, emphasizing the importance of language, history and cultural understanding to his work. He highlights the humanities’ role in strengthening democracy, fostering empathy and creating informed citizens, while warning against complacency in moments of political and cultural instability.

Environmental historian Jayson Porter shares his path to become an assistant professor of history at the University of Maryland. In conversation with Dean Stephanie Shonekan, he talks about his interdisciplinary research connecting environmental history, race and capitalism through commodities such as oilseeds. Drawing on archival work and his personal history, he emphasizes critical inquiry, humility and curiosity, arguing that environmental racism shapes access to resources and knowledge while urging students to question everyday objects and ways of being.

Public relations expert Ganga Dhanesh (associate professor of communication) discusses her global academic journey and research on corporate social responsibility, emphasizing authenticity, reflection and stakeholder alignment. She argues companies should act based on core values rather than trends, and highlights empathy as essential for teaching, leadership and navigating cultural differences among students worldwide.

Dean Stephanie Shonekan sits down with Dr. Janelle Wong, professor of American Studies and Government and Politics at the University of Maryland, and director of the Asian American Studies program. Dr. Wong reflects on her personal journey into political science, shaped by the 1992 Los Angeles uprisings after Rodney King was beaten by police, and her research on how immigrants are mobilized—or excluded—from U.S. politics.

In this episode, Dean Stephanie Shonekan sits down with Dr. Cécile Accilien, professor of French and Francophone studies at the University of Maryland, to explore Haiti’s rich cultural, political and intellectual legacy. Dr. Accilien shares her personal journey from pre-med student to leading scholar of Haitian and Francophone African literatures, and discusses why understanding Haiti requires reckoning with colonialism, U.S. and French intervention and the nation’s enduring fight for independence.

In this episode, Dean Stephanie Shonekan talks with Dr. Quincy Mills, historian and director of the Frederick Douglass Center for Leadership Through the Humanities. Dr. Mills shares insights from his research on African American business history, barber shops as cultural institutions and the ways Black communities have shaped economic and social life in the United States.

In Episode 6, ARHU Dean Stephanie Shonekan is joined by Nana Kwame Osei Fordjour, assistant professor in ARHU’s Department of Communication who is a scholar of international political communication. They discuss his path from Ghana to the University of Maryland, the role social media plays in contemporary politics and the political landscape in Africa, including how political leaders construct their public image during governance, elections and crises.

In Episode 5, ARHU Dean Stephanie Shonekan is joined by Peter Wien, a Professor in ARHU’s Department of History. They discuss Wien’s scholarship, beginning at the University of Bonn Germany, on the history of the Modern Middle East and Arab Nationalism and what context this knowledge provides for the current rise in Islamophobia and the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.

In Episode 4, ARHU Dean Stephanie Shonekan is joined by Jeffrey Herf, Distinguished University Professor Emeritus from ARHU’s Department of History. They discuss Herf’s path to becoming a leading scholar on modern Germany, the history of antisemitism in pre-modern and modern history and the creation of Israel as a Jewish state forged in the shadow of World War II and the Holocaust, and what people should understand about that history to have a context for the current rise in antisemitism and the ongoing conflict in the Middle East.

ARHU Dean Stephanie Shonekan is joined by Nancy Mirabal, associate professor of American studies, who directs the Latino/a Studies program. Their conversation centers on the Chicano and Latinx communities in the United States and Mirabal’s role as the director of the Community Fellows Program for the Urban Equity Collaborative, a project funded by the UMD Grand Challenges initiative that engages community organizers as partners to respond to and develop solutions to urban displacement and dispossession.

ARHU Dean Stephanie Shonekan is joined by Madeline Hsu, Center for Global Migration Studies Director and professor of history, in a conversation about the historical and contemporary causes of migration, challenges facing immigrants to the U.S. today and a new project focused on the rich culinary histories of the ethnic and immigrant communities in the D.C. metro region. Before joining the faculty at UMD, Hsu was at UT Austin where she led the development of the Teach Immigration History website, a curriculum guide for teaching about immigration laws and their implications for different groups throughout history.

ARHU Dean Stephanie Shonekan is joined by Shelbi Nahwilet Meissner, a proud first-generation descendant of the La Jolla Band of Luiseño Indians, who is of both Luiseño (Payómkawichum) and Cupeño (Kupangaxwichem) descent. Shelbi is an assistant professor in the Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at University of Maryland, College Park. The discussion centers on indigenous identity and language, as well as Shelbi’s vision for the Indigenous Futures Lab that she established to serve as a hub of indigenous feminist research and evaluation.