M. Cristina Alcalde is Professor of Gender and Women's Studies and Marie Rich Endowed Professor. She serves as Associate Dean of Inclusion and Internationalization in the College of Arts and Sciences. She is also Director of the new Online Graduate Certificate in Diversity and Inclusion. Between 2011 and 2015, she served as Faculty Co-Director of A&S Wired Residential College. She served as Director of Graduate Studies in Gender and Women's Studies until Spring 2017. She is an affiliate faculty member in Social Theory, Latin American, Caribbean, and Latino Studies, and Anthropology. Her research areas include gender violence, migration, exclusion, and race and racialization. Her most recent book is Peruvian Lives across Borders: Power, Exclusion, and Home (2018, University of Illinois Press). It is based on multi-sited research in Peru, the U.S., Canada, and Germany. Her other publications include The Woman in the Violence: Gender, Poverty, and Resistance in Peru (2010), La mujer en la violencia (Spanish edition, published in 2014 by the Instituto de Estudios Peruanos and the Fondo Editorial de la Universidad Católica del Perú), and a co-edited book (with J. Zavala), Visiones del Perú de académicos peruanos en Estados Unidos (Visions of Peru of Peruvian Academics in the United States (2008). She is also co-editor, with Susan Bordo and Ellen Rosenman, of Provocations: A Transnational Reader in the History of Feminist Thought (2015, University of California Press). She has also published articles in the journals Meridians: Feminism, Race, Transnationalism; the Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology; Latin American Perspectives; Journal of Consumer Culture; Latino Studies; Sexualities; Latin American and Caribbean Ethnic Studies; JARM: Journal of the Association for Research on Mothering; Men and Masculinities; the Journal of Popular Culture; Journal of Gender Studies; Chicana/Latina Studies; Feminist Formations; Global Networks; and Sexualities. Her work has also appeared in book chapters in collections including Local Violence, Global Media: Feminist Analyses of Gendered Representations, Anthropology at the Front Lines of Gender-Based Violence, and Teacher, Scholar, Mother: Re-Envisioning Motherhood in the Academy. During April-July 2013, she was an invited visiting professor in the Gender Studies Program at the Pontificia Universidad Católica in Lima, Perú, where she taught a seminar on feminicide and intersectionality. During June 2018, she was an invited visiting professor in the Gender Studies Program at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich, Germany, where she taught a seminar on gender and migration. Her current research project examines contemporary Chinese-Peruvian experiences of identity, belonging, and exclusion both in Peru and transnationally.
Dr. Alcalde also provides expert witness testimony for domestic violence asylum cases, and is a member of the Kentucky Advisory Committee of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
Emily Beaulieu Bacchus is the Director of the International Studies program and an Associate Professor in Comparative Politics in the department of Political Science. After majoring in International Studies at the Jackson School at the University of Washington, Emily received her Ph.D. from the University of California, San Diego, and then began working at the University of Kentucky.
In addition to directing CLIME and International Studies, and teaching courses in Comparative Politics, Emily is an active researcher and expert on topics of election fraud, protest, corruption and scandals, and violence in democracies. Her book, Electoral Protest and Democracy in the Developing World, with Cambridge University Press, examines election-related protests and their consequences for democracy. Emily has also published articles on democracy and perceptions of fraud and corruption. Thanks to grants from the National Science Foundation, she has been able to study how voting laws affect political participation through social networks, as well as ethnic politics and violence in the Caribbean. Currently, she is writing a book about parliamentary brawls in Taiwan and Ukraine.
Heather Campbell-Speltz is an Assistant Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies for the Hispanic Studies Department at the University of Kentucky. The latter position includes working with Education Abroad and students who choose to study abroad in Spanish-speaking countries. Her research interests include Feminist Theatre, 20th and 21st century Spanish Women’s Literature, and Translation. She also coordinates the coursework in Translation Studies and Spanish for the Professions in the department. She volunteers regularly as an interpreter for the Samaritan’s Touch Student Physical Therapy Clinic and works with UK’s Shoulder-to-Shoulder Global Health Initiative and has taught with the KIIS program in Segovia, Spain.
Kelsey Carew works as a Transfer Advisor in the Office of Undergraduate Admission at UK. She has been at UK for about 8 years and loves working with the transfer student population. Her primary focus is working with the Bluegrass Community and Technical College (BCTC) population and she also coordinates the BCTCblue+ Program; a dual enrollment program between BCTC and UK. In her free time, she loves going on adventures with her husband Peter and son Hank (6 YO), crafting, cooking, hiking and waiting for the time she can attend live music events again!
Lisa Cliggett is Professor and Chair of Anthropology at the University of Kentucky. Cliggett, a native of Northern California, received her BA in Anthropology from Connecticut College and her MA/PhD from Indiana University. Prior to coming to the University of Kentucky, she held a Mellon Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Population Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. She is a cultural anthropologist with expertise in Economic and Environmental anthropology, as well as migration, development and kinship. She has carried out economic and ecological research in Zambia since 1992, working with Gwembe Tonga people who were displaced from the Zambezi river by the building of Kariba Dam in 1958, and their descendants. Cliggett has taken on the leadership role for this longitudinal project, known as the Gwembe Tonga Research Project (GTRP), started by anthropologists Elizabeth Colson and Thayer Scudder in 1956. Most recently Cliggett’s research has focused the economic, ecological and socio-political dynamics of new road development in the Gwembe Valley (NSF BCS-1736413). Prior to this she examined migration and the politics of land access and land cover change with migrants from the Gwembe Valley who are pioneering areas in conservation buffer zones next to Kafue National Park in central Zambia (NSF BCS 0236933; NSF BCS 0518492). This project included a collaborative study (with D. Crooks) of food security and nutrition in the context of migration (NSF BCS 0517878). During this project Cliggett ran a multi-year ethnographic field school for US graduate students in anthropology (NSF BCS 0353137). Her other work with Gwembe Tonga people has examined livelihood diversification, household economies and support systems for the elderly. One outgrowth of the longitudinal research with the Gwembe Tonga Research Project is her work on digital data preservation and access (NSF BCS-1157418; NSF BCS-1159109). Her published work includes the monograph “Grains from Grass: Aging, gender and famine in Africa,” “Economies and Cultures: foundations of economic anthropology” co-authored with Richard Wilk, the co-edited (with L. Pedersen) SAGE Handbook of Cultural Anthropology, a co-edited volume (with V. Bond and B. Siamwiza) of Zambian and Zimbabwean scholars’ work emerging from the Gwembe Valley: “Tonga Timeline: Appraising 60 years of multidisciplinary research in Zambia and Zimbabwe,” the co-edited volume (with C. Pool) “Economies and the Transformation of Landscape,” and articles and book chapters in disciplinary, topical and area studies journals and volumes.
Dr. Greg Feeney is Provost at Bluegrass Community and Technical College. Prior to this, he served as Vice President of Academics and Workforce Development, Academic Dean, Dean of Academic Support, Assistant Dean of History, Languages, and Social Sciences at the College and as a faculty member. He achieved the rank of professor and has been at the College for 23 years. He earned his doctorate, with an emphasis in interpersonal and health communication, at the University of Kentucky. He completed his masters at Northern Illinois University, with an emphasis in communication theory and organizational communication.
Dr. Jim Fenton is an associate professor at Bluegrass Community Technical college where he teaches courses in Anthropology, Composition, Humanities, ESL, and Spanish. He completed his undergraduate studies at University College, London, his M.A., M. Phil. and Ph.D. in Anthropology at Columbia University in the City of New York, and an MA in Spanish language and culture at the Universidad de Salamanca, Spain. He has researched and published on prehistoric landscapes, symbolic archaeology, and most recently completed an MA study of the landscapes of terror that characterized Spain following the Spanish Civil War. Jim started teaching fulltime at BCTC in 2005 and has loved every minute of it. He serves as faculty advisor to Latinx and immigrant students and is a founding member of the board of Casa de la Cultura Kentucky, a pan-Hispanic arts and culture organization based in Lexington. He can get by in Spanish, French, Italian and English.
Jenn Garlin is a senior academic advisor in the College of Arts and Sciences, where she has been advising students since 2010. Jenn earned her bachelor’s degree from Bates College and her Master’s in Social Work (MSW) from Simmons College. Studying abroad for a semester in Ecuador was one of the most impactful experiences she had as an undergraduate. After graduate school, she lived abroad in Costa Rica where she continued to improve her Spanish and attempted to learn to dance. Jenn is a strong supporter of students participating in meaningful experiences including education abroad, research, and internships. She is excited to be a member of the CLIME advisory board to enable more students to participate in these experiences.
Erin Howard currently serves as the Latinx and Immigrant Services Office (LISO) Director at Bluegrass Community & Technical College in Lexington, Kentucky. Recently she was appointed to serve as the interim Associate Dean for the newly created BCTC Global Learning Center and teaches Humanities, Latinx Studies and Spanish courses at the college and through an ethnic studies focused dual credit program. She serves as the chair for United We Dream Action, the 501c4 organization that leads the civic engagement and political strategy work complimenting the United We Dream Network. She has taught abroad through the Kentucky Institute for International Study in Costa Rica. For nearly 16 years, she has focused her time on advocating for undocumented immigrant youth to have access to educational, leadership and career opportunities. She is a self-taught artist and gymnast for life.
Erin Koch is a cultural anthropologist who works at the intersections of medical anthropology, feminist science and technology studies, and critical global health studies. She has conducted research in the Republic of Georgia about state health care reforms, responses to tuberculosis, and the health effects of protracted displacement and civil unrest. Her current research employs community-based research methods and focuses on relationships between social justice and health inequalities in the United States. Erin teaches graduate and undergraduate courses on qualitative ethnographic research methods, medical anthropology, global health inequalities, and histories of theories about culture in anthropology. Her research has been funded by various organizations including the National Science Foundation, The Social Science Research Council, and The National Council for Eurasian and East European Research. Her research, teaching, and service activities are anchored in anti-racist and decolonizing praxis.
Dr. Martina Martin is the Associate Director of Student Transitions and Family Programs: First-Generation and Off-Campus Student Services. Martina oversees current programming and new initiatives for first-generation and off-campus students. In addition to her work with first-generation and off-campus students, Martina is a member of NASPA: Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education and the Kentucky Association of Blacks in Higher Education (KABHE). She is also involved with the Graduate and Professional School Showcase and Jamal Mashburn Scholarship Committee. Martina considers Lebanon, KY her home. In her spare time, she enjoys volunteering for the American Cancer Society.
Niamh Minion serves as the Assistant Director of University of Kentucky Education Abroad & Exchanges (UK EA). Her primary responsibilities include oversight of the ongoing processes for enrollment management, student advising, on-going orientation, curriculum integration efforts, promotion and outreach, scholarship awarding, program evaluation, and student billing for UK EA. She was born and raised in Texas. Niamh attended Louisiana State University and received a Bachelor’s degree in Geography and minors in Political Science and Spanish. During the summer after her junior year, she studied abroad with a partner program in Granada, Spain. After her experience abroad, she decided to pursue a career in International Education. Niamh attended The University of Texas at Austin and received a Master’s Degree in Higher Education Administration. Prior to moving to Kentucky, Niamh worked at The University of Texas at El Paso for six years running the Study Abroad Office.
Dr. Sue Roberts is Associate Provost for Internationalization at the University of Kentucky where she is also Professor of Geography. Her BA is from the University of Leicester (in Britain) and her MA and PhD are from The Maxwell School at Syracuse University. She has been a faculty member at the University of Kentucky since 1991. Sue is a specialist in economic and political geography. She has taught undergraduate and graduate courses focused on international and global issues. She has published a co-authored book, two co-edited volumes, and numerous papers. Sue has won research funding from the National Science Foundation for several projects, and has conducted research in Southern Mexico, the Caribbean, Ireland, and Australia. From 2012-2017, she was North American Editor of the top-ranked journal Progress in Human Geography. From 2008-2012 she was Chair of the Department of Geography at the University of Kentucky. In 2015-16 she served as Associate Dean for International Affairs in the College of Arts and Sciences and directed the International Studies Program, a popular interdisciplinary undergraduate major. Sue has spent periods of time living and working in England, Mexico, Australia and Finland. She was a Fulbright Scholar at the University of Turku, Finland in 2012-2013. And she has been Fulbright Specialist in South Africa, working with colleagues at the University of Western Cape. Sue has been leading the University of Kentucky’s internationalization since July 2016. As the university’s Senior International Officer, she leads the University of Kentucky International Center, which includes: Education Abroad and Exchanges; International Student and Scholar Services; International Student Recruitment; International Research and Partnerships; International Health, Safety and Security; Global Health Initiatives; and the Office of China Initiatives.
Jeanmarie Rouhier-Willoughby is a Professor of Russian Studies, Folklore and Linguistics. Her research focuses on vernacular religion, rituals, and holidays in contemporary Russia. She served as chair of the Department of Modern & Classical Languages, Literatures & Cultures for eight years. In that role and as current president of the Kentucky World Languages Association, she is dedicated to showcasing the wide range of professional pathways for bilingual students.
Todd Stoltzfus is the Program Director for Experiential Education and Service-Learning at the University of Kentucky (UK). In this role, Todd provides leadership, planning, and support to all aspects of UK’s Experiential Education (EXP) program. In addition, Todd helps lead the UK Center for Service-Learning and Civic Engagement which supports service-learning initiatives among faculty, community engagement, and internship programs. Todd has over 10 years of international experience with NGOs and at the U.S. Department of State working on complex humanitarian emergencies and refugee assistance programs, particularly in Africa. He also brings 10 years of business management, finance, and negotiations experience from a Fortune 500 company. Todd received his bachelor’s degree at Georgetown University and a Master's in Public Administration (MPA) at Cornell University.
Dr. Pat Whitlow has served as the Director of the Office of Nationally Competitive Awards since October 2011. She also serves as faculty and advisor for the Chellgren Student Fellows program. Pat began her employment at UK in 1994 as the Associate Director of Residence Life. She completed her doctorate in sociology at UK in 2002 and began work as the Assistant Dean of the UK Graduate School in 2003. In 2020, Dr. Whitlow was awarded the inaugural UK Global Impact Award for Distinguished Staff Achievements in Education and in 2019, she was named the Outstanding Staff Member for the division of Student and Academic Life. As a fellowships advisor, she has served nationally on review panels for the Gilman Study Abroad Scholarship, the Critical Language Scholarship, the Congress-Bundestag Youth Exchange and the American Association of University Women Fellowships. Dr. Whitlow also served as a board member for the Lexington Children’s Theatre and a long-time CASA, Court Appointed Special Advocate, for children in foster care who have active cases in Fayette County Family Court.
