From the Daily Nebraskan, written by Kim Buckley:

A panel of three professors talked about how fiction affects the study of history.

Patrick Jones, associate professor of history, talked about using oral history to study racial justice in the urban north.

Ariana Vigil, assistant professor in English, discussed using Latino poetry and civil rights.

Kwakiutl Dreher, associate professor in English, talked about how celebrities write about themselves.

Read more in the Daily Nebraskan article.

Historicizing Fiction, Fictionalizing History was on Wednesday, November 18, 2009.

The Office of Academic Support and Intercultural Services hosted a workshop led by Willis-Esqueda last night in the Nebraska Union. The workshop, “American Indians and Violence: Social and Legal Issues,” focused on the prevalence, attitudes and laws surrounding violence and domestic abuse in American Indian culture. 

Read the Daily Nebraska article.

Carranza is a professor of Sociology and Ethnic Studies whose work focuses on the integration of Mexicano/Latino immigrants into communities in the northern Great Plains region. This research encompasses the factors that influence the 'quality of life' that long-time and recent Latino immigrants experience in these rural and urban communities.

• The Associated Press story is here.

He was also a founding member of the Midwest Consortium for Latino Research, a partnership of ten Midwestern universities focused on Latino research issues, as well as one of the founding members of the Latino Research Initiative, a university-community collaborative effort here at UNL, whose primary goal is to address the needs of Nebraska's Latino population through research.

• His bio with Ethnic Studies is here.

Eileen Hebets          Laura White          John Janovy Jr.     Thomas Gannon

Eileen Hebets, assistant professor of biological sciences and previous Academic Star, will give a talk called "Exploring the Secret Lives of Spiders: From Courtship to Cannibalism."

Laura White (associate professor of English), John Janovy Jr. (Paula and D.B. Varner professor of biological sciences), and Thomas Gannon (assistant professor of English and ethnic studies) will talk about Darwin in poetry and literature.

The symposium will take place March 26-28.