Political Science News and Events
Faculty News
Ira Rohter
The faculty, students and staff of the Department of Political Science are greatly saddened at the passing of our colleague, Dr. Ira Rohter. He passed away Monday, June 22, 2009. Ira was a tireless activist for environmental conservation and social justice in our community. Since he joined our department over 40 years ago, he has encouraged many generations of students to work for political change. Ira, we miss you. An outdoor memorial service took place on Saturday, June 27, 2009 at 9 am, at the Honolulu Waldorf School, 350 Ulua St., Niu Valley, HI.
Noenoe Silva
Congratulations to Associate Professor Noenoe Silva, who was awarded the Baldridge Prize for best book in history by a resident of Hawaii in 2003-2004. She won this award for her book, Aloha Betrayed: Native Hawaiian Resistance to American Colonialism. This book is published by Duke University Press. This prize is given out every two years.
Petrice Flowers
Congratulations to Assistant Petrice Flowers, who was awarded the Fulbright Fellowship for her project, "Expanding Protection: Increasing Coordination of Refugee and Anti-Trafficking Policies in Japan and Korea." The Fulbright is a nine-month research grand to conduct fieldwork in Japan. Her project is a comparative study that addresses three questions that will situate Japanese and Korean NGOs working on refugee issues and those focused on trafficking issues within a broader transnational context, analyze how the normative framework of international law impacts implementation into domestic policy and explicate the impact of increasingly dense transnational relations in Asia on possibilities for regional coordination to deal with forced migration and other pressing issues.
Jungmin Seo
Congratulations to Assistant Professor Jumgmin Seo, who was awarded the University Research Council, Research Relations Funds Award in the amount of $4,986.40. This award is for his project, "Politics of History and Memory in China: Dilemmas in the debate over 'the historical ownership of Koguryo'" and "Comparative Studies of Media and Official Reactions to Politicized HIstories in Japan, China, and Korea." He also received the Japan Studies Endowment Committee, Faculty Special Award for "Comparative Studies of Media and Officail Reactions to Politicized Histories in Japan, China, and Korea."
Jungmin Seo, Petrice Flowers and Manfred henningsen
Congratulations to Assistant Professors Jungmin Seo and Petrice Flowers and Professor Manfred Henningsen who, along with Edward Shultz(SPAS) and Ki-Woong Yang, have received a research grant from the Academy of Korean Studies for "Korean Civil Society and Re-emergence of Historical Memories". This project analyzes the interactions between the growth of Korean civil society and the re-emergence fo historical memories in Korea and in the international scence. The grant is renewable for one more year, contingent upon the first year's performance. If renewed, the second phase of the project will make a comparative study with Germany and Japan. The same project team also received a short term research grant (Edward Shultz as PI, Jungmin as coordinator) from the Northeast Asian History Foundation. The project analyzes American media and congressional responses to the conflicts over history in East Asia. the foundation will continue to support these history/memory related projects contingent upon the team's performance.
JUNGMIN SEO AND James SPENCER
Congratulations to Assistant Professor Jungmin Seo and Associate Professor James Spencer, who have just signed a contract to implement their project entitled, "From Origin to Destination: Policy Alternatives for Managing Two-Way Migration Pathways in Asia". The initial year's support is the successful phase of a three-year research proposal to the Korean Foundation, for which years two and three are contingent on the first year's work. thr project will support collaborative research with partners in Korean and Viet Nam to examine contemporary migration patterns between Northeast and Southeast Asian countries, provide policy and research questions for national and urban policy makers in the region, and suggest public policy avenues for addressing a grwoing mismatch between populations and governing institutions in the region. The project is in collaboration with Professor Yeanju Lee in the University of Hawaii at Manoa Sociology Department.
Graduate Student News
James white
James White, who got his PhD with us in 2003, recently was named Associate Director, International Programs, and Senior Research Scientist at Georgia Tech. His current research projects include a comparative study of the outsourcing of municipal services in the U.S., with a focus on questions of citizen satisfaction and government accountability; a collaboration with the Department of Mass Communications at the American University of Sharjah in developing a research program for the Arabic-speaking world, looking at global communications, communications public policy, and the intersect between computation and media; and an ongoing attempt to build a comparative analysis of the impact of global information flows in China and the Middle East-all in the context of what he calls his "ongoing obsessions with civil society, globalization, and futures research."
sydney iaukea
Recently, Sydney Iaukea, Political Science PhD candidate, was the recipient of the Mellon-Hawaii Postdoctoral Fellowship for the 2008-2009 academic year. This award comes in the amount of $50,000. Assistant Professor Hokulani Aikau will serve as Sydney's Fellowship Mentor. Along with this award, on July 28, 2008, Sydney successfully defended her dissertation.
Congratulations to Sydney Iaukea who has an article forthcoming in the journal of Pacific Studies. Her piece, "Land Agendas vis a vis Wind Discourse: Deconstruction Space/Place Political Agendas in Hawai`i." will be out early in 2009.
Joseph Iokepa salazar
Iokepa Salazar received the Ford Foundation 3-year pre-dissertation fellowship.
Bianca Isaki
Bianca Isaki has been awarded the Asian American Studies Postdoctoral Fellowship for the 2008-2009 academic year. This award was granted to her by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. This prestigious research award includes $42,000 plus an additional $5,000 in research/travel monies. Along with this award, on May 7, 2008, Bianca successfully defended her dissertation.
Keanu Sai, Kuhio Vogeler, Sydney Iaukea, Malia Kaaihue, Kalawaia Moore
Keanu Sai, Kuhio Vogeler, Sydney Iaukea, Malia Kaaihue and Kalawaia Moore were all awarded the Oiwi Akamai Fellowship.
Melisa casumbal
Melisa Casumbal was recently awarded the Graduate Division Award for Excellence as a Teaching Assistant. In addition to this award, Melisa has been awarded the Dai Ho Chun Award from Graduate Division for conference travel to the Cordillera, Philippines. She also received the Nobumoto Tanahashi Scholarship from the Matsunaga Peace Institute for dissertation fieldwork in the Cordillera, Philippines for the academic year 2008-2009.
In addition to these fine awards, the Department of Political Science Grants and Awards Committee and Department Chair have selected Melisa to be the first recipient of the Jorge Fernandes Award. This award recognizes her exceptional record as a graduate student and her dissertation project which will be supported by a $1000 contribution. As the first recipient, Melisa makes a wonderful model for the Fernandes award.
Ponipate Rokolekutu
Ponipate Rokolekutu is the Spring 2008 recipient the Harry Friedman Memorial Award.
Jason Adams
Jason Adams has recenlty published three pieces:
"To Place Oneself Within a 'We' " (Review of "I Am Not a Man, I Am Dynamite: Friedrich Nietzsche and the Anarchist Tradition") Theory and Event, forthcoming, 2008.
"Power and Voice" (Review of G. Agamben "Infancy and History: On the Destruction of Experience") Symposium: Canadian Journal of Continental Philosophy, forthcoming, Fall 2008.
"Only a Stranger at Home: Urban Indigeneity and the Ontopolitics of International Relations" Affinities, forthcoming, 2008.
Jake Dunagan
Jake Dunagan is the recipient of the Schubert Award for the '07-'08 academic year.
Shanah trevenna
Shanah Trevenna received President David McClain's "Making the Elephants Dance" award. Please click Shanah for more details.
YongShin Kim
Congratulations to Yongshin Kim, a first year doctorial student in our department (and a RA for the migration project involving a number of our faculty) was just notified that he received a research grant from Northeast Asia History Foundation ($18,000), that will support his graduate study and field trip to China during this summer. His project title is "Forgotten and Remembered: A Comparative Study on Lushun Massacre (1894) and Nanjin Massacre (1937)."
Keanu Sai
Congratulations to Dr. Keanu Sai, who earlier this month, entered into a contract with UH Press to publish his dissertation. The tentative title is "American Occupation of the Hawaiian Kingdom: Transition from Occupied to Restored State."