Westmont Magazine Stellar Faculty Accomplishments
HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE PROVOST’S REPORT
Gregg Afman (kinesiology) co-authored a paper, “Muscle Glycogen Utilization During Exercise Following Ingestion of Alcohol,”
in Medicine Science in Sports and Exercise (MSSE), the third publication resulting from his collaboration with James Betts at the University of Bath. Their 2019 publication “The Energy Cost of Sitting versus Standing Naturally in Man” received considerable media attention and ranks in the top three publications in MSSE, the leading journal in the field.
Scott Anderson (art) contributed an illustration for the front page of the Sunday Business section of The New York Times for an article about the controversial therapy app Talkspace. He also painted a portrait of Ellen DeGeneres for Entertainment Weekly for an article on the hostile work environment on her talk show.
A partnership between Westmont and the Santa Barbara Symphony enables Yvette Devereaux to serve as a conducting artist and community liaison at the college. A graduate of Chapman University and Peabody Conservatory of Music at Johns Hopkins, she directs the Santa Barbara Youth Symphony. The accomplished violinist has played in numerous orchestras, including the West Coast Chamber Orchestra led by Michael Shasberger. She has extensive experience in lm and television conducting musical soundtracks and has taught at Mount St. Mary’s College, Compton Community College and Chapman.
Charles Farhadian (religious studies) has released a new book, “Christianity: A Brief Introduction” (Baker Academic), aimed at people less familiar with the Christian faith. It explores the shape of Christianity’s past, present, and future, examining the global reach of the Christian movement and the cultural, social and theological issues that have shaped Christianity worldwide.
Jonathan Hicks (theater arts) assisted the Electrics Department in lighting the fourth season of “American Idol” in Ojai, California. This learning experience will help the new lm minor develop equipment resources for the program and train students in the craft of lighting for television and film.
Russell Howell (mathematics) is one of 16 scholars chosen to write for a new interdisciplinary blog from the Christian Scholar’s Review. The journal has invited top Christian thinkers in various disciplines to contribute monthly blog posts to increase the resources discussing how “Christ animates learning across a broad range of fields.” In addition, Russ recently published an article in complex harmonic functions in the Proceedings of the American Mathematical Society, which is one of the most selective journals in mathematics.
A solo exhibition by Nathan Huff (art) “Meandering the Edges” was featured in the summer issue of Lum Art Magazine. He also received a Santa Barbara County Arts Commission 2020 Responsive Works Award for a painting he created in response to the COVID-19 shelter-in-place orders.
Tom Knecht (political science) and Ray Rosentrater (mathematics) contributed an article to the journal Electoral Studies: “The Glitterati Government?” They nd that while not many American celebrities run for public of ce, those who do usually win.
Caryn Reeder (religious studies) has co-edited a Festschrift in honor of John Walton, professor of Old Testament at Wheaton, with Adam Miglio (Wheaton), Joshua Walton (Capital University), and Ken Way (Biola). The book, “For Us, but Not to Us: Essays on Creation, Covenant, and Context” (Wipf & Stock), includes essays by scholars and former students of John Walton from a variety of disciplines, including Old and New Testament studies, archaeology and theology. She also contributed a chapter, “Jesus the Slave: The Gender of a Christological Metaphor in Luke and Paul,” to the volume.
A book by Sandra Richter (religious studies), “Stewards of Eden,” won the Christianity Today Jesus Creed 2020 Book Award for Old Testament Studies, and she has lmed the accompanying curriculum with Seminary Now. Patheos named her as one of 30 OT/HB Scholars to Read and Follow, and Catholic Biblical Quarterly has just published the nal installment of her work on “The Question of Provenance and the Economics of Deuteronomy.” She has lmed a new eight-session Psalms curriculum with HarperCollins, with an expected release of April 2021.
Chris Rupp (art) contributed artwork to two local exhibitions: Sullivan Goss Gallery’s popular 100 Grand exhibition; and a group exhibition at GraySpace Gallery in Santa Barbara’s Funk Zone.
Serah Shani (anthropology) has received a $230,304 grant from the John Templeton Foundation for research studying the “Cultural Evolution of the Conscience, Virtues, Character Development, and Human Progress” among Kenya’s Maasai people. Her research will explore the moral values and virtues Maasai parents teach their children to help them succeed in a competitive market economy. She’ll examine values held in common by traditional Maasai and the global influences on them.
Lesa Stern (communication studies) created a Facebook webpage, “Building Resilience through Communication,” for parents of incoming college students. It translates academic research into easily understandable nuggets with tips about cognitive, affective and behavioral action. View it by searching for @BuildingStudentResilience.
Paul Willis has published a young adult time-travel novel, “All in a Garden Green,” which jumps from the present day to the England of 1578. The story features a young woman who becomes part of a Catholic family’s attempts to entertain the Protestant queen, Elizabeth I. The story takes place in Hengrave Hall, which housed Westmont’s England Semester program from 1984 to 2004. The journal Light has nominated Willis’s poem “Shakespearean Candidates” for a Pushcart Prize.
Sameer Yadav (religious studies) received a three-year teaching fellowship from Yale's Center for Faith and Culture to develop a class on Christ and Human Flourishing. Sameer was elected to the executive committee for the Society of Christian Philosophers. He published an essay on the “The Immanent Trinity” for an edited volume of the L.A. Theology Conference.