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Student Spotlight
Iridian Pineda, a fourth-year Latin American and Iberian Studies major at UC Santa Barbara works with the Community Based Literacies (CBL) group to present Latin American history to Latinx children. Pineda combines her major in Latin American Studies with a minor in Education.
Emily Hu is a third-year UC Santa Barbara student double minoring in Chinese and Religious Studies. Soon after arriving at UC Santa Barbara in 2018, Hu got a better understanding of her own family’s culture and history. She says that growing up in a predominantly Hispanic community never gave her the chance to fully cherish her Chinese heritage. After taking several UCSB courses, Hu has developed a strong connection to her Chinese identity.
Sara Shahgholian, a fourth-year UCSB dance major, has turned to social media to share her choreography, which combines modern dance and Armenian traditional dance, in order to raise awareness of and donations for the unfolding war in Armenia.
Since going to remote learning. due to the pandemic, UCSB Linguistics has risen to the occasion and moved its peer tutoring labs online. Graduate student Jordan Douglas-Tavani recently sat down to discuss the process of moving their tutoring services online.
HFA videographer Denise Shapiro checked in with Humanities and Fine Arts students during fall 2020, to see how they were coping with the COVID-19 pandemic and to hear their perspectives on studying remotely. From writing commentaries to producing a mockumentary, UC Santa Barbara's students are keeping up with their education and keeping themselves entertained while social distancing.
For more information on how to protect yourself amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, check out UCSB’s Resource Index at www.ucsb.edu/COVID-19-information/resource-index.
Hannah George is a third-year English major at UCSB. After three years of working for The Daily Nexus as an Artsweek writer, she is now working towards becoming a professional journalist.
Why We March is a play written, directed and performed virtually, by UC Santa Barbara Theater students. The action takes place the night before the biggest fictional mass protest in the country. The play touches on heavy topics surrounding our world and the reform needed.
The art of five UC Santa Barbara students will be featured in a UC Santa Cruz’s online exhibition and webinar called “What Makes Us Human: An Art + Genomics Convergence.”
A Student Spotlight on Molly McAnany, a fourth-year double major in political science and english. McAnany shares her passion for music, classic literature, and educating others. She is able to combine all of these passions in her radio show on KCSB, “Shamrocked,“ where she airs Irish music and poetry.
As the academic year comes to a close, many stories from this years senior will go unheard as the pandemic forces Commencement to take place online. To highlight some graduates from the Division of Humanities and Fine Arts, Noe Padilla an HFA intern, interviewed the Bruhns Twins, Cooper and Calvin, and asked them to reflect on their time at UCSB. Cooper is graduating in Theater and Calvin is graduating in Film and Media Studies.
UCSB history student Michael Sanders recently organized the “Justice for George Floyd: Solidarity March,” to support the Black Lives Matter movement by peacefully protesting against police brutality. He sat down with HFA intern Raymond Matthews to talk about the protest and the experience of Black students.
HFA conducted an interview with this year’s recipient of the Dean’s Prize Teaching award, Julio Vega. Vega, a PhD candidate teaching assistant in the Classics department, discusses his passion for the classics, his teaching techniques, and his work with the UCSB-Howard University Initiative.
The Classics department may be one of the smallest at UC Santa Barbara, yet it houses one of the most highly sophisticated and intensive fields of study. For graduate student and classics PhD candidate Olga Faccani, a passion for studying friendship ties within Greek tragedies has earned her a spot as a participant in Harvard University’s Institute for World Literature (IWL) this upcoming summer.
Earlier this spring the HFA held a creativity contest with the prompt “Stories That Matter.“ Please celebrate their talent with us and learn more about the winning students and the stories they told with their work in poetry, prose, music, videos, visual art, and photography.
“Numbers,” by Connor Ding won first place in the prose category of UC Santa Barbara’s Division of Humanities and Fine Arts spring creativity contest, in response to the prompt “Stories That Matter.“ The personal essay is about Ding’s family back in China during the winter weeks of the novel Coronavirus outbreak.
An essay in memory of survivors of the Holocaust and its lasting impacts. This piece won second place in the prose category of the HFA Creativity Contest and is a call to continue to interrogate what the Holocaust represents for us today.
“This is Not a Drill" won third place in the prose category of UC Santa Barbara’s Division of Humanities and Fine Arts spring creativity contest, in response to the prompt “Stories That Matter.“ The spoken word play focuses on school shootings and spreading awareness about the March For Our Lives movement.
Earlier this spring UC Santa Barbara’s Division of Humanities and Fine Arts conducted a creativity contest with the prompt “Stories That Matter.“ Click here to read our full coverage of the contest. Listed below are the winners in the visual art and photography categories.
The following are the winners in visual art:
Marshall Sharpe is an MFA candidate in painting.
Paige Baldwinson is a second year art major in the College of Creative Studies.
James Gerety s a fourth year communications major. To see more of Gerety’s artwork check out @cardbordtoaster on Instagram.
Next are the winning photographs:
Andrea Hercules is a second year sociology major.
Delenn Jadzia is a third year triple major in chemistry, anthropology, and writing and literature.
Earlier this spring, UC Santa Barbara’s Division of Humanities and Fine Arts conducted a creativity contest on the theme “Stories That Matter.“ Explore the winning pieces in the video and music categories, including “What Would You Say” by Delenn Jadzia, “Days—An Experimental Narrative” by Jesse Camacho, “HAWAII” by Andy Arciaga, “First Love” by Jim Dyson, and “Canary” by Delenn Jadzia.
Earlier this spring, UC Santa Barbara’s Division of Humanities and Fine Arts conducted a creativity contest on the theme “Stories That Matter.“ Read the winning pieces in the poetry category here, including “re-forest-ation” by Forest Stuart, “Children of the Concrete” by Junho Jeon, and “Adulation to Him” by Monica Cornejo.
