UW Faculty Members to Present International Research in Centennial July 17

Three University of Wyoming faculty members will present research during “Bridging Global Gaps: Faculty International Research” as part of the Centennial Speaker Series Thursday, July 17, from 4:30-6 p.m. in the Centennial Library, located at 27 Second St. in Centennial.

The speaker series, hosted by UW’s Center for Global Studies (CGS) and the Centennial Library, brings international concerns and discussions to the southeast Wyoming community.

Speakers are:

-- Chelsea Escalante, an associate professor in the UW Department of Modern and Classical Languages, and Conor McCracken Flesher, an administrative associate in the office of the vice president for UW’s Research and Economic Development Division, will present “Naming and Claiming: How Jerusalem’s Street Signs Reflect a Divided City.”

This presentation will explore how the naming of Jerusalem on public signage -- in Hebrew, Arabic and English -- reflects deeper struggles over identity, history and control in Israel-Palestine. Fieldwork reveals that signs often erase the traditional Arabic name “Al-Quds,” replacing it with “Urshalim,” a version that mirrors the Hebrew “Yerushalayim.” This subtle change sends a powerful message: Whose city is this, and who gets to define it?

“While public signage promotes an Israeli perspective, some private actors and organizations use Arabic or English names to push back, asserting Palestinian or Islamic identity,” Escalante says. “By analyzing these naming patterns, we suggest how language is used both to normalize Israeli authority and to resist it -- making even street signs part of the broader conflict.”

-- Zoe Pearson, an associate professor in the UW School of Politics, Public Affairs and International Studies, will discuss “Haaf Netting on the Solway Firth: Preserving Traditional Knowledge and Practice in the England-Scotland Borderlands.”

Haaf net fishing is said to have been brought to the Solway Firth in the United Kingdom over 1,000 years ago. Like many forms of traditional resource use and management globally, this fishing method is at risk of disappearing.

“My Center for Global Studies-funded research last summer allowed me to begin studying why a form of fishing that has lasted centuries is now at risk, and its role in people’s lives and local cultures and ecologies,” Pearson says. “In this presentation, I will share what I have learned so far and my plans for further research and knowledge preservation, which I will continue as a Fulbright Scholar next year.”

-- Nikolas Sweet, an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology, will present “Language and Mobility in West Africa.”

In recent years, migration across urban centers and national borders has radically reshaped West African societies and sparked a global debate on the legal and cultural processes of immigration. Along newly constructed international highways linking Senegal and Mali, young men and women travel between regional centers and their hometowns in the wake of a gold-mining boom that has brought new opportunities as well as risks.

Previous scholarship on migration has often emphasized the physical movement of bodies and things. Instead of considering language primarily to describe mobility as it happened, Sweet positions language as an essential infrastructure through which individuals forge material connections and communication channels across space and borders.

“This reinterpretation of migration emphasizes that language is a form of social action in its own right -- one that does not merely reflect experiences in the world but can bring things into being,” Sweet says. “Becoming a migrant in this setting not only reflects an individual's mobile history, but also depends upon that person’s successful embodiment of the migrant role through everyday verbal performance.”

Through ethnographic research on social interaction, verbal creativity and mobility in southeastern Senegal, this presentation explores how migrants use language to build social networks and mitigate risk amid socioeconomic and environmental precarity.

About the UW Center for Global Studies

The CGS is a core unit of WyoGlobal and is the go-to resource on the UW campus for global success. CGS supports students, faculty, communities and businesses in generating internationally engaged research, teaching and program opportunities. With an array of fellowships, grants, awards, partnerships and events, CGS cultivates effective collaboration between Wyoming and the world.

For more information, email cgs@uwyo.edu.