Academics

Anna Brailow ’17 interviews Professor Martha Billips Listen on Soundcloud Transcript [MUSIC PLAYING] NARRATOR: Welcome to another Campus Conversation, discussions with Transylvania University faculty highlighting their interests, passions, and pursuits. Here is Anna Brailow. ANNA BRAILOW: I’m here with Dr. Martha Billips, and we are talking about Kentucky women. Your work has been published in a collection called Kentucky Women– Their Lives and Times, a work to which 17 scholars have contributed their writing on influential women from across the state. What do you feel is it that makes this work so essential among literature about Kentucky’s history? MARTHA BILLIPS: I do think it is essential. In part, of course, because of the focus on women. But it also has the broad focus chronologically about women from settlement times till the contemporary times. It has a broad cross-section of geography, as the introduction makes clear, from the mountains to the [INAUDIBLE]. So it’s very, very deliberate. And it offers in one place essays on a variety of important women across the Commonwealth, and that is unprecedented. We have only one previous book, interestingly, written by a former Transy professor. [INAUDIBLE] was a Transy professor, Kentucky Women from 1977, I think. So that’s the only other book devoted solely to Kentucky women, a wide assortment. The other reason I think this is important– it’s part of a series on Southern women writers’ lives. And the fact that Kentucky was not represented

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Brandon Trapp ’19 interviews Associate Professor of Biology Dr. Sarah Bray and Senior biology student Jaylen Beatty Listen on Soundcloud Transcript [MUSIC PLAYING] SPEAKER 1: Welcome to another “Campus Conversation,” discussions with Transylvania University faculty highlighting their interests, passions, and pursuits. Here is Brandon Trapp. BRANDON TRAPP: I’m here with Professor of Biology Dr. Sarah Bray and senior biology student Jaylen Bailey. And we’re here to talk about their research in invasive plant species. So first I want to ask, what does that mean? I’m assuming it’s not plants coming down from space with laser guns taking over Earth. SARAH BRAY: Yeah. Usually, a lot of times when I introduce my research to new groups of people, I put in really bad B-run kind of sci-fi movies like that, invasions of the whatever. So when we talk about invasive species, what we really mean is an organism that is brought to a new location where it has not previously been. Sometimes, those introductions are not a problem. And they’re just a minor component of the system. But we call them invasive when they start to displace native members of the community. And my training is in plant and microbial ecology. And so I’m really interested in invasive plants. So in this part of the country, people are usually aware of kudzu. The vine that ate the South is probably the famous one. Since I’ve come to Kentucky, I’ve been working

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Griffin Cobb interviews Professor of Spanish Dr. Veronica Dean-Thacker and Professor of Art Jack Girard Listen to the interview on Sound Cloud Transcript [MUSIC PLAYING] SPEAKER 1: Welcome to another campus conversation, discussions with Transylvania University faculty, highlighting their interests, passions, and pursuits. Here is Griffin Cobb. GRIFFIN COBB: This is Griffin Cobb, and I’m here with Dr. Veronica Dean-Thacker, professor of Spanish, and Dr. Jack Girard, professor of art and art history. The two of them have been working together since 1991 on various projects involving artists who create both Spanish language literature and visual art. I want to start with the project that many people listening will likely have seen while going on here on campus– the visit of Spanish artists Juan Carlos Mestre and Alexandra Domínguez. The two artists had their work and poetry exhibited in Morlan Gallery, and there was a poetry reading in Carrick Recital Hall. So first of all, thank you for sitting down with me. VERONICA DEAN-THACKER: Thank you for coming, Griffin. GRIFFIN COBB: And do you remember how the idea to do something with those artists, Mestre and Domínguez first occurred to you? VERONICA DEAN-THACKER: Yes, it was a long time ago. It was actually in 2009 when Mestre first came to Transylvania as part of a group of Leonese– that’s Northern Spain– Leonese writers to participate in some conferences at Transylvania, some receptions in town, and also the Kentucky Foreign Language

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