Arts and Humanities
Letters Home: Another side of Ernest Hemingway
With Penn State’s acquisition of intimate Hemingway letters, new aspects of the famed writer’s personality come to light.
From Welfare to Workfare
Jennifer Mittelstadt examines the origins of welfare reform.
The Perfect Hour
Author James West explores the romance between F. Scott Fitzgerald and the "real Daisy Buchanan."
The painful, joyful heart
Liberian poet Patricia Jabbeh Wesley gives voice to her vibrant, embattled homeland.
What the world was like
The Ape in the Tree tells the story of the human link to Proconsul.
Is God going South?
Philip Jenkins discusses the transmigration of Christianity.
Who won the Civil War?
Historian William Blair discusses how the period is remembered.
Charging ahead, trusting the process
Writer Steve Sherrill shares his aspirations and reads an excerpt from his latest novel.
The psychology of terror
Kevin Murphy discusses his concerns about using polygraphs to make important decisions about people.
The Legacy of Three Mile Island
The anniversary of a disaster: Remembering the accident at Three Mile Island, more than a quarter-century later.
Lines of departure and return
Poet Julia Kasdorf recites and discusses her writing.
Found in translation
A conversation with Slavic literature expert Michael Naydan.
Great God A'Mighty
Legendary groups like the Fairfield Four and the Dixie Hummingbirds are introducing gospel music to a new generation of listeners, and Jerry Zolten is spreading the word.
Behind the Bulldozers
According to historian Adam Rome, the house-building boom that followed World War II caused an environmental catastrophe.
Warm Welcome
Americans' adoption of international children has doubled from just a decade ago. In her book, Lita Linzer Schwartz discusses the possibilities and challenges of the adoption process.
Picture it Digital
James Wang is training computers to be art historians by teaching them to analyze images and create statistical models of artwork.
Dark Legacy
Heather Hartley could not have guessed what forgotten pieces of history she would stumble upon while researching the Italian-American experience.
In Our Minds and On Our Backs
Randall Miller and William Pencak say that history is neither a bunch of facts nor a fixed, unchanging thing to be memorized.
Stravinsky's Saliva
Stravinsky changed the ears of the world with his musical compositions, which were inspired by the sounds and rhythms of language.
Times of Sorrow and Hope
Between 1935 and 1943, a group of American photographers fanned out across the country to document the effects of the Depression and war on the American people.
Boys Life
How has the world of boys shifted shape in the wake of societal change? Priscilla Ferguson Clement and her colleagues attempt to answer this in the book, Boyhood.
Modeling Emergencies
The threat to a community's health may not only be medically related, but may also involve the design of the treatment facility.
Planted in the Past
Plants are at the heart of Lee Ann Newsom's research, and despite being told she couldn't do archaeology in the Caribbean, she has used plant remains to track the movement of humans from South America north through the Caribbean islands.
An Officer and an Actor
After wrecking his knee and dashing his dreams of becoming a Navy pilot, Tyrus Lemerande discovered a new love: Acting.
Drawlings
Artist Jenny Rogers believes "we are all like grains of sand upon a field, gathering in pockets, only to be subject to our inevitable displacement."
Saga House
Paul Durrenberger is using archaeology to study the political system of Iceland. He wants to find out how chiefs lost power and were replaced by a centralized state.
Fairy Tale
Photography students experiment with lighting, materials, and color to communicate their ideas of angels and fairies.
Flood Watch
Andrew Jones' latest film project takes him to Johnstown, Pennsylvania, a city prone to flooding, where he seeks to both explore and influence people's views on this natural phenomenon.
Bach to Basics
The modern trumpet, or valve trumpet, is not, according to Penn State graduate student Bryan Proksch, the trumpet that Bach and his contemporaries intended to be in their music.
Home is Where the Art Is
You could say Katie Murken's idea of housework is a little different from the norm. Her mops and vacuums function not only as cleaning tools, but also as integral parts of her artistic projects.
First Impressions
A Penn State student travels to New York City weeks after the bombings of September 11. Through film, she captures the heartbreak and hope of a city struggling to rebuild itself from the ashes of a horrific event.
Shadow
Penn State art student Stacy Olenoski examines the different sides of herself as she explores the images and emotions of her shadows.
History through the Negatives
Robin Hoecker uses film to explore past and present race struggles throughout America and within Penn State.
The Infinite in the Intimate
"To me, it's a poetic approach, rediscovering something about painting and myself each day," says David DiPietro who is recreating his own connection with the landscapes he paints.
The Land of the Pharaohs
An archaeologist with 40 years experience in Egypt, Donald Redford's exploration continues to unfold with exciting new discoveries about this ancient culture.
Keepers of History
The histories of West Africa are not necessarily buried inside the pages of crumbling volumes. They rest within the griots and griottes-African masters of word and music.
The Producer
Apur Parikh takes his love of movies to the next level by pushing himself and his visions for cinema to the cutting edge of technology.
Take Five mit Funken
The life of Alex Meixner has taken him through a whirlwind of musical instruments, styles, and groups, beginning as early as adolescence with his first CD recording.
Land of Discord
Increasing international tension with countries like Afghanistan can blind us from their rich cultural traditions. Penn State archeologists and professors attempt to recreate a common humanity through a collection of artifacts.
Carpet of Sand
For Kat Kleman Davis, "fiction is very much a mixture of life and imagination." His new novel explores the unique relationship between a man and the hopelessly foreign terrain of a desert.
Practical Education
A Research Penn State writer travels to Iceland to enrich a passion for Icelandic sagas that her career has caused her to put aside.
Rocks
"I consider these rocks to be both beings and land," states Karsten Boyer, an M.F.A. candidate at Penn State, who shares her passions and musings on the subject of one of her drawings.
The Art Diaries
Imagine an art class where you're graded not on the final product, but on the steps you've taken to achieve it.
Resident Vampirologist
The villainous, blood-sucking image of the vampire first appeared before the 1700s as a cause for mysterious deaths. Heidi Crawford studies the literary history of this horror ballad.
