Faculty Accomplishments

An article in the spring issue of Northern Woodlands magazine featured Amanda Gallinat, lecturer in environmental studies, and a museum exhibition and research project she worked on with her ES335 Phenology class last year. Gallinat and her students partnered with the Fairbanks Museum in Vermont to analyze over a century of volunteer-collected records of plant flowering and bird arrival times, showing shifts with climate change that could put some species at risk of becoming mismatched in time. The article highlights Colby students’ work digitizing handwritten ledgers, analyzing shifts in seasonal timing, and developing independent projects that expand an understanding of changes in the spring timing of birds, plants, and bees in Vermont.

Adam Howard, the Charles A. Dana Professor of Education, Lawrence Martin '26, and Declan Greene '24 coauthored a paper recently published in the International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education. Titled "Brotherhoods of power: whiteness, masculinity, and elite identity in all-boys schools," the article "examines the intricate and interwoven relationship between whiteness, masculinity, and elite status within U.S. secondary elite all-boys schools. Drawing on a study of 127 recent alumni from these institutions, the authors explore how brotherhoods within these schools act as a relational infrastructure for the production and reinforcement of eliteness."

Kaushik Tekur, visiting assistant professor of English, has an article recently published in the journal Humanities. Titled "The Global Ballad: Kuyili, Female Militancy, and Romantic Untranslatability," the article "examines the revival of the Romantic Ballad in contemporary anglophone writing through Vanavil K. Ravi’s The Ballad of the Warrior-Girl, which reimagines the Tamil folk figure, Kuyili, and her role in the Sivagangai rebellion, a Romantic-era anti-colonial uprising in South India," Tekus writes in his abstract.

A short play by Bess Welden, senior lecturer and co-chair in performance, theater, and dance, has been chosen for production at the 2026 Maine Playwrights Festival, running May 15–24. The production, Soul Suds, is a 10-minute play about letting go, moving on, and a very special car wash, said Welden, an award-winning playwright who amplifies marginalized voices. The Maine Playwrights Festival, celebrating its 25th year, champions the voices of Maine playwrights, cultivates new work, and connects artists with the community.  

Zach Peckham, the Jennifer Jahrling Forese Writer-in-Residence, has published As If And (New Mundo Press), his first full-length poetry collection. "As If And is a splintered, thrilling sink into the linguistic hijinks of systems incompetence, labor hypocrisy, and 'the literal it.' Zach Peckham’s ear is stellar, offering jokes within jokes, 'increasingly mirrored' mumblecore, and a line’s real-time iterations," said author Caryl Pagel in her review of the collection. Peckham is also the author of the chapbook "cycle hum" (Sistrum Books, 2025).

Assistant Professor of English Sam Plasencia wrote an article titled "Methodological Revolutions for Teaching Phillis Wheatley Peters" that was published in ABO: Interactive Journal for Women in the Arts, 1640–1830. In the article, Plasencia discusses a course she designed "titled 'Phillis Wheatley Peters and Her Literary Afterlives,' which sought to (re)introduce Wheatley Peters to mostly white students as a literary foremother, and to do so by way of Black feminist writing that considers method," she wrote in the article's abstract. 

An article by Sam Plasencia, assistant professor of English, was published in the Journal of Nineteenth-Century Americanists (Volume 13, Number 1). Titled "Disrupting Anti-Blackness: David Walker’s Fugitive Inhabitation of an American Grammar," the article "offers a reading of Walker’s insurgency, arguing that his unique typographical performance usurps dominant grammatical and rhetorical forms (italics, em-dashes, negative questions, shifting pronouns, commas, metonymic slippages, and repetition) in order to scramble the governing anti-Black episteme, wherein language is variously deployed to suppress, elide, mask, legitimize, and normalize the violence of anti-Blackness," according to the article's abstract.

Kaushik Tekur, visiting assistant professor of English, wrote a book review of Before Equiano: A Prehistory of the North American Slave Narrative that appeared in Biography: An Interdisciplinary Quarterly (Volume 47, Number 2). The book, written by Zachary McLeod Hutchins, "argues for fragmentary accounts of enslaved people—in the form of runaway advertisements, newspaper accounts, among others—to be considered slave narratives," writes Tekur. "The book ultimately makes a bold claim for reinterpreting the 'origins' of the slave narrative in the Anglo-American world. It emphasizes a different reading practice, rooted in an eighteenth-century cultural practice of reading newspapers, which gathered details about Black people over the span of several weeks, if not months, to be able to construct a fuller account of their lives."

The Maine Art Education Association has named the Colby Arts Office its 2026 Art Advocate of the Year. Established in 2020, the Colby Arts Office creates a culture of creativity across campus and in Waterville. "We applaud your belief in the arts as a powerful force for building vibrant, thriving communities," said Maine Art Education Association President Matthew Johnson in a letter to the Arts Office. "What truly distinguishes your work, however, is your sustained dedication to the arts through the revitalization of downtown Waterville and the creation of spaces where communities can gather, connect, and grow through artistic expression. Your willingness to collaborate, innovate, and champion local schools is both inspiring and deeply meaningful."

Carrie Levan, the Montgoris Family Associate Professor of Government, has a new book soon to be released. Neighborhoods Matter: How Place and People Affect Political Participation is forthcoming this April from New York University Press. "Participation in official governmental institutions and activities has declined dramatically," said the publisher. "Americans are less inclined to express trust in, or cooperate with, political leaders and each other to address society's most pressing problems. In Neighborhoods that Matter, Carrie LeVan explores this growing crisis in civic engagement, arguing that where we live—and the people who live around us—may be to blame."