Katherine Schaap Williams
Doctoral Student, English, Rutgers University
Katherine Schaap Williams is a doctoral candidate in the department of English at Rutgers University. She has held fellowships from the graduate school and the Center for Cultural Analysis at Rutgers University, where she is a fellow in the 2011-2012 “Public Knowledge: Institutions, Networks, Collectives” seminar. Her research interests include sixteenth and seventeenth-century English literature and culture, disability studies, and performance theory, and she is writing a dissertation tentatively titled Irregular Bodies: Disability on the Early Modern Stage.
Katherine Schaap Williams
Department of English, Rutgers University
Katherine Schaap Williams is a doctoral candidate in the department of English at Rutgers University. She has held fellowships from the graduate school and the Center for Cultural Analysis at Rutgers University, where she is a fellow in the 2011-2012 “Public Knowledge: Institutions, Networks, Collectives” seminar. Her research interests include sixteenth and seventeenth-century English literature and culture, disability studies, and performance theory, and she is writing a dissertation tentatively titled Irregular Bodies: Disability on the Early Modern Stage. She is the author of "Enabling Richard: The Rhetoric of Disability in Richard III,” a contribution to a special section on Shakespeare in Disability Studies Quarterly in 2009.
Iván Smirnow
Psychologist, Gender and Culture Studies, Universidad de Chile
Iván Smirnow received his Bachelors of Science in Psychology at the Universidad Diego Portales, and is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in Personal Coaching and Leadership from the University of Barcelona. He plans to apply to the Masters Program in Gender and Culture Studies in Latin America, Department of Philosophy and Humanities a the Universidad de Chile with a proposed thesis: “Cuerpos-hechos-por/para-el-trabajo: cuerpo, memoria y trabajo precario.”
Psychologist, Gender and Culture Studies, Universidad de Chile
Iván Smirnow received his Bachelors of Science in Psychology at the Universidad Diego Portales, and is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in Personal Coaching and Leadership from the University of Barcelona. He plans to apply to the Masters Program in Gender and Culture Studies in Latin America, Department of Philosophy and Humanities a the Universidad de Chile with a proposed thesis: “Cuerpos-hechos-por/para-el-trabajo: cuerpo, memoria y trabajo precario.”
Iván Smirnow es psicólogo chileno, radicado en Santiago de Chile. Ha trabajado en docencia e investigación y actualmente trabaja en su tesis (titulada Cuerpos-hechos-por/para-el-trabajo: cuerpo, memoria y trabajo precario) para obtener el grado de Magíster en Estudios de Género y Cultura Latinoamericana en la Facultad de Filosofía de la Universidad de Chile.
Working Group Affiliation
Didier M. Sylvain
Doctoral Candidate, Ethnomusicology, Columbia University
Didier Michel is a sound artist and PhD student in Ethnomusicology. His work focuses on the spiritual or phenomenological dimensions of “black” engagement with sound technology among Afrofuturist-identified music-makers and listeners in Haiti and the United States.Doctoral Candidate, Ethnomusicology, Columbia University
Didier Michel is a sound artist and PhD student in Ethnomusicology. His work focuses on the spiritual or phenomenological dimensions of “black” engagement with sound technology among Afrofuturist-identified music-makers and listeners in Haiti and the United States.
Didier M. Sylvain
Doctoral Candidate, Ethnomusicology, Columbia University
Didier Michel is a sound artist and PhD student in Ethnomusicology. His work focuses on the spiritual or phenomenological dimensions of “black” engagement with sound technology among Afrofuturist-identified music-makers and listeners in Haiti and the United States. He engages with dialogs on Afrofuturism and the speculative arts; ritual healing, self-transformation and embodiment; human-machine interaction and improvisation; histories and aesthetics of sound and media; and the relation between the virtual and the everyday.
In addition to his graduate pursuits, Didier serves as Editor-in-Chief of the peer-reviewed music journal, Current Musicology, where he is publishing a special issue on Race, Sound, and Technology (Spring 2017), featuring an interdisciplinary group of scholars writing on the mediations of racial formation in society. In Spring 2015 he collaborated with the Institute of Religion, Culture, and Public Life to organize “Tomorrow is the Question: Afrofuturism, Sound and Spirit”—a symposium of artists and scholars exploring what an “Afro-future” might sound like and mean today. Beyond Columbia, Didier’s professional career has centered on facilitation and the art of listening to elicit creative leadership in organizations and people across creative, entrepreneurial, philanthropic, and business communities.
Working Group Affiliation
Kate Trebuss
Doctoral Student, English and Comparative Literature, Columbia University
Kate Trebuss is a fourth-year doctoral student in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. Her dissertation, entitled "Critical Care: Medical Life Writing, Memory, and the Politics of Health," investigates how contemporary autobiographical stoies of illness and medical care facilitate the remembering and forgetting of certain histories and current conditions of violence, oppression, invisibility and inequality, as well as the connections between them.
Kate Trebuss
English and Comparative Literature
Kate Trebuss is a fourth-year doctoral student in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. Her dissertation, entitled "Critical Care: Medical Life Writing, Memory, and the Politics of Health," investigates how contemporary autobiographical stoies of illness and medical care facilitate the remembering and forgetting of certain histories and current conditions of violence, oppression, invisibility and inequality, as well as the connections between them. HEr work focuses on intersections between medicine and literature, in particular the ways in which illness narratives shape health policy and how literary knoweldge can contribute to the clinical and ethical training of medical professionals. Kate is currently a Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada Doctoral Fellow and the rapporteur for Columbia University's Cultural Memory Seminar. She holds a B.A. Hon. and an M.A. in English Language and Literature from the University of Toronto.
Working Group Affiliation
Alanna Valdez
Doctoral Student, Philosophy, CUNY
Alanna Valdez is a Master’s student in philosophy at the City University of New York, Graduate Center. She also holds a Master’s degree in Ethics, Peace, and Global Affairs from American University’s School of International Service, where she wrote her thesis on how the recently ratified UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities shifts disability rights to a human rights perspective. Her philosophical interests include: personhood, agency, and non-rational justifications for human rights.
Alanna Valdez
Philosophy, CUNY Graduate Center
Alanna Valdez is a Master’s student in philosophy at the City University of New York, Graduate Center. She also holds a Master’s degree in Ethics, Peace, and Global Affairs from American University’s School of International Service, where she wrote her thesis on how the recently ratified UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities shifts disability rights to a human rights perspective. Her philosophical interests include: personhood, agency, and non-rational justifications for human rights. She is particularly interested in the intersections between the opposing models of disability and exploring possible ways for their compatibility.
Emmanuel Von Schack
Doctoral Student, Art History, Hunter College
Emmanuel von Schack is a deaf art history graduate student at Hunter College; his master's thesis focuses on German artists who were veterans of the First World War and the works of art they created during and after the War. By interweaving disability theories with Foucauldian feminist and queer theories, he explores the complex relationship between masculinity and disability as conveyed in Weimar culture and art. He works as an educator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Solomon R.
Emmanuel Von Schack
Art History, Hunter College
Emmanuel von Schack is a deaf art history graduate student at Hunter College; his master's thesis focuses on German artists who were veterans of the First World War and the works of art they created during and after the War. By interweaving disability theories with Foucauldian feminist and queer theories, he explores the complex relationship between masculinity and disability as conveyed in Weimar culture and art. He works as an educator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and he is the director of ArtASL, a project he founded to develop art lexicon in American Sign Language. He also collaborates with European and American professionals on other projects intended to increase museum access for deaf people.
Working Group Affiliation
Alexa Woodward
Doctoral Student, Bioethics, Columbia University
Alexa Woodward is a newly accepted graduate student in the Bioethics program at Columbia University School of Professional Studies. She graduated with honors from California State University Chico with a B.S. in Cellular and Molecular Biology in 2015, having also competed an Honors Thesis focused on autonomy, futility, and end of life issues. After graduate school, she plans on attending medical school or pursuing a Ph.D. program. Outside of academia, Alexa is an ardent fitness enthusiast, artist, and vocalist.
Alexa Woodward
Graduate Student, Bioethics, Columbia University
Alexa Woodward is a newly accepted graduate student in the Bioethics program at Columbia University School of Professional Studies. She graduated with honors from California State University Chico with a B.S. in Cellular and Molecular Biology in 2015, having also competed an Honors Thesis focused on autonomy, futility, and end of life issues. After graduate school, she plans on attending medical school or pursuing a Ph.D. program. Outside of academia, Alexa is an ardent fitness enthusiast, artist, and vocalist.
Working Group Affiliation
Armanc Yıldız
PhD Student, Anthropology, Harvard University
Armanc Yildiz is a PhD student in the Department of Anthropology at Harvard University. His current research interests are sexuality, race, labor, political economy, colonialism, migration, Germany, and the anthropology of Europe. He received his master’s degree (with Distinction) in International Performance Research at the University of Warwick. He has a bachelor’s degree (with Honors) in Cultural Studies with a minor on Art Theory and Criticism at Sabanci University.
Armanc Yıldız
Armanc Yildiz is a PhD student in the Department of Anthropology at Harvard University. His current research interests are sexuality, race, labor, political economy, colonialism, migration, Germany, and the anthropology of Europe. He received his master’s degree (with Distinction) in International Performance Research at the University of Warwick. He has a bachelor’s degree (with Honors) in Cultural Studies with a minor on Art Theory and Criticism at Sabanci University.
Working Group Affiliation
Rafia Zaman
Doctoral Student, Political Science, Jawaharlal Nehru University,
Rafia Zaman is presently pursuing her doctoral thesis in Political Science at Jawaharlal Nehru University, India under the supervision of Prof. Gurpreet Mahajan. She is interested in the intersectionality of gender and identity politics represented by Muslim women. As part of her M.Phil, she wrote a dissertation on the topic “ ‘Islamic Feminism’: A Critical Appraisal”. Her current research focuses on Muslim women’s activism in India from the period following the Shah Bano controversy till the present.
Rafia Zaman
Rafia Zaman is presently pursuing her doctoral thesis in Political Science at Jawaharlal Nehru University, India under the supervision of Prof. Gurpreet Mahajan. She is interested in the intersectionality of gender and identity politics represented by Muslim women. As part of her M.Phil, she wrote a dissertation on the topic “ ‘Islamic Feminism’: A Critical Appraisal”. Her current research focuses on Muslim women’s activism in India from the period following the Shah Bano controversy till the present. A research paper, “(Re) Framing the Issues: Muslim Women’s Activism in Contemporary India” has been accepted for publication in the January, 2013 issue of ASIEN. Rafia has previously taught the Bachelor’s in Education program at Jamia Millia Islamia and GGSIP University, both in New Delhi.
