Cynthia Clopper

Hired in 2005 as an assistant professor in the Department of Linguistics, Cynthia Clopper (Ph.D., Indiana University) spent last year on a postdoctoral fellowship at Northwestern University funded by the National Institutes of Health. Her major areas of expertise are phonetics, speech perception, sociophonetics, and laboratory phonology. The author of numerous articles, Professor Clopper is currently conducting research for three projects: the Nationwide Speech Project (which collects and analyzes recordings of young male and female talkers from six dialect regions of the United States); perceptual dialect classification (which examines how listeners categorize dialects of speakers they do not know); and variation and speech intelligibility (which explores the role of dialect in speech processing and listener comprehension). This year, Professor Clopper is teaching both undergraduate and graduate courses in phonetics. She has also been the recipient of the prestigious Bloch Fellowship, given by the Linguistic Society of America to the most promising graduate student applicant for the society’s biennial summer institute.

Ryan Friedman

Ryan Friedman (Ph.D., Northwestern University) joins our Department of English as an assistant professor specializing in film studies and African American literature, with additional expertise in nineteenth- and twentieth-century American literature. His dissertation, entitled Negro Talking Pictures: Race, Migration, and Musical Performance in Early Sound Film from Hollywood, explores how sound technology generated a new demand for African American musical performance in the Hollywood cinema of the late 1920s and early 1930s. Professor Friedman has held visiting teaching appointments at Rice University and Northwestern University. This year, he is teaching “Introduction to Film”; “Race and the American Cinema, 1900-1950”; and courses on film theory and the African American autobiographical tradition. Professor Friedman also serves on the Interdisciplinary Committee on Film Studies.

Daniel Hobbins

Daniel Hobbins (Ph.D., University of Notre Dame) is one of our new assistant professors in the Department of History. His field is medieval history, and he most recently held an appointment in that area at the University of Texas-Arlington. Professor Hobbins is the author of The Trial of Joan of Arc (Harvard University Press, 2005) as well as seven articles. His article published in The American Historical Review received the Van Courtlandt Elliott Prize from the Medieval Academy, which recognizes the best first article in any area of Medieval Studies. Professor Hobbins is working on a book, Authorship and Publicity Before Print: Jean Gerson and the Transformation of Late Medieval Learning, which argues that Gerson—a French scholar, theologian, and chancellor of the University of Paris—was a paradigmatic figure in the cultural and intellectual shifts of the later Middle Ages. This fall quarter, he is teaching Introduction to Historical Thought and an upper-level undergraduate course on Medieval Europe.

Danielle Ooyoung Pyun

Danielle Ooyoung Pyun (Ph.D., Ohio State University) joins our Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures as an assistant professor specializing in Korean language and pedagogy. Before she came to Ohio State, she taught at the University of Chicago and Indiana University’s East Asian Summer Language Institute. Her dissertation investigated the effects of networked computers in second language learning by comparing synchronous online discussions with face-to-face discussions. She is interested in developing Korean language materials in such areas as vocabulary, listening, and standardized tests. Currently she is working on a beginning level Korean language textbook for independent learners. Professor Pyun also has research and teaching interests in Korean culture and society, particularly in the areas of the Confucian influence on Korean society and the cultural identity of contemporary Korea. Besides all levels of Korean language acquisition, she has taught courses in Korean pedagogical syntax and Korean culture.

Abe Roth

Specializing in philosophy of mind and action, Abe Roth (Ph.D., Princeton University) has been hired in our Department of Philosophy as an associate professor. His previous position was at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and he has also been a faculty member in the Philosophy Department at UCLA. Professor Roth is the recipient of several fellowships and awards, including an NEH Summer Stipend and, most recently, a Spencer Foundation Fellowship. He is the author of a number of articles, such as “Practical Intersubjectivity,” “The Mysteries of Desire,” “What was Hume’s Problem with Personal Identity?”, and “The Self-Referentiality of Intentions.” Currently, Professor Roth is working on several projects including one on the epistemology of testimony, which attempts to determine what, if anything, could justify the presumption of trust characteristic of testimony. He also maintains research interests in David Hume’s philosophy. This year, Professor Roth will teach "Honors Introduction to Philosophy", "Advanced Epistemology", and a seminar in the epistemology of testimony.

Carmen Taleghani-Nikazm

Carmen Taleghani-Nikazm (Ph.D., University of Texas-Austin) joins our Department of Germanic Languages and Literatures as an associate professor specializing in German applied linguistics, foreign language pedagogy and TA development. An expert as well in conversation analysis, she has recently published a book, Request Sequences, on the intersection of grammar, interaction, and social context. Professor Taleghani-Nikazm is also the author of a number of essays on topics such as the teaching and learning of socio-cultural aspects of foreign languages, politeness during web chats, the social action of requests in conversation, the interactions between native and nonnative speakers, and politeness in telephone conversation. She has native fluency in three languages—German, Persian, and English. The recipient of a Fulbright Research award in 2003, Professor Taleghani-Nikazm also received several teaching awards at the University of Kansas, where she previously taught. Her primary courses include teaching German as a foreign language, German sociolinguistics, the structure of German language, cross-cultural pragmatics, and conversation analysis.

Wayne Wu

Wayne Wu (Ph.D., Berkeley), an assistant professor in the Department of Philosophy, works in the philosophy of mind, the philosophy of perception, and the philosophy of action. In his dissertation, What's Attention Got to Do with Action?, he revises the view that perception causes thought which then causes action. Instead, he argues, perception directly guides our actions as a characteristic of action itself. Professor Wu has additional research and teaching interests in philosophy of cognitive science, philosophy of language, philosophy of science, moral psychology, and Aristotle. This year, he will be teaching "Introduction to Logic"; the department’s First-Year Graduate Seminar, which introduces students to philosophical methodology; and a graduate seminar on disjunctivism in perception.