Thom McClendon, associate professor of history, presented a paper entitled "Makwerekwere: Separating Immigrants and Natives in Colonial Natal, 1847-54" at the annual meeting of the African Studies Association in Boston on Nov. 1. The paper was on a panel called "Historical Demography of Empire" and featured Africanists from several Texas universities.

David Tabb Stewart, assistant professor of religion and philosophy, has edited a special edition of Southwestern's Brown Working Papers series, "Waco: Ten Years After." This volume includes the papers of the 2003 Fleming Lecturers in Religion, responses by Southwestern students, and a closing paper by Stewart, "The Branch Davidians and The Bacchae." [Brown Working Papers] Stewart also has helped organize the new Central Texas Biblical Studies Seminar. The inaugural meeting in October attracted a dozen faculty from six colleges and universities in Central Texas-all specialists in biblical studies-where he was respondent to a paper on disability interpretation of the major prophets. He also gave a public lecture titled "The Old Testament: Why Bother?" in October at St. John's United Methodist Church in Georgetown.

Heather Martin, a senior chemistry major, has been awarded the 2004 I.M. Kolthoff Award for undergraduate research by the American Chemical Society (ACS) Division of Analytical Chemistry. As part of the award, the ACS will sponsor Heather's trip to the ACS National Meeting in Anaheim, Calif. in March to present her research on determining phthalate ester concentrations in PET bottles exposed to UV radiation. Heather is working collaboratively on this research project with Emily Niemeyer, assistant professor of chemistry.

November 7, 2003

Rick Roemer was hired as a professional guest director at Texas State University at San Marcos, and his production of Howard Ashman's and Alan Menken's 1950s sci-fi spoof "Little Shop of Horrors " will open on Wednesday, Nov. 12, at 7:30 p.m. Performances are at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 12-22, and at 2 p.m. on Nov. 16 and 23 in the Main Theatre on Texas State University's campus. For tickets, call 512-245-2204.

Preservice teachers Lisa Cook and Katie Peterson's paper was accepted to be presented in November at the National Association for Multicultural Education Conference in Seattle, Wash. Their paper is titled, "We are Two White Women What do We Know: Two Preservice Teachers Embark on a Journey to Avoid Miseducating Students." Also, preservice teachers Aaron Bowser and Manjah Fernandez and assistant professors of Education La Vonne I. Neal and Alicia Moore's paper was accepted to be presented at the following two conferences in November: the National Association for Multicultural Education Conference in Seattle, Wash., and the National Middle School Association Conference in Atlanta, Ga. The paper is titled, "Braids, Fades, and Razorblades: The Educational Function of the African American Barbershop."