Schuyler, Author at Fulbright Student Program Blog

Preparing for a Bauhaus-Filled Year in Germany

September 10, 2014

Meghan Forbes, 2014-2015, Germany, taking a lunch break by the waters of the Tiergarten

This September, I will be trading Ann Arbor, Michigan’s autumnal canopy of maples for the bicycles, parks, and museums of Berlin, Germany. On a Fulbright grant, I will be in Berlin to further my Ph.D. dissertation research, which contends the role of the Czech avant-garde is a significant yet overlooked link in the vast network of exchange that existed across various European centers of art making in the interwar period.

My research centers around the Bauhaus, a modernist school of art and architecture based originally in Weimar and then in Dessau in the period between the two World Wars. Although its unique pedagogy, functionalist aesthetic, and transnational influence have been documented, there is an absence in scholarly literature regarding the dynamic relationship between the school’s major figures in Germany and their peers in then Czechoslovakia. I aim to fill this gap by mapping the influence of the Bauhaus eastward and reciprocally, the influence of the Bauhaus’ eastern neighbor on the school’s aesthetic ethos.The implications of this revised telling are especially pertinent as the humanities move towards a more interdisciplinary approach, by encouraging a shift in historical narratives that sees multiple centers where once only one was perceived.

A large portion of my research will be in cooperation with the Berlinische Galerie and the Bauhaus and Werkbund archives. From these sources, I will be looking for correspondence and other documents that show a particular Czech influence on the German Bauhaus – for example, in theory and practice corresponding to typographic design.

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U.S. Fulbright

Back at School and Working on a Fulbright Application? Contact a Fulbright Alumni Ambassador.

September 4, 2014

(Back row, left to right) Kelly Rivera, Diana Heise, Cameron Kruse, MaSovaida Morgan, Paul Bostrom, Lauren Gaydosh, Carlos Rivas, Samuel Gordon, Giuseppe Cespedes, Jacob Vidourek, Sharief El-Gabri, Rebecca Littman-Smith, Alexis Schmidt, Janice Feng, Kia Hall; (front row, left to right), Mario Hoang Nguyen, Alyssa Meyer, Kevin Fomalont, A. Hameto Benkreira, Michael Young; (not pictured) Arienne Jones

Have you been working on a Fulbright U.S. Student Program application this summer and have questions, now that you’re back at school? If you’re enrolled in an institution or a recent graduate, you’ve probably been working closely with your Fulbright Program Adviser and Fulbright World Area Managers.

Fulbright Alumni Ambassadors are another terrific resource available to anyone thinking of applying or currently engaged in the application process.

The Fulbright Alumni Ambassador Program was established in 2008 to identify, train and engage a select group of approximately 15 Fulbright U.S. Student Program alumni to serve as representatives, recruiters, and spokespeople for the Fulbright Program. The Program was expanded to include U.S. Scholar Program alumni in 2009.

Fulbright Alumni Ambassadors are selected annually through recommendations from Fulbright Commissions and U.S. Embassy staff, partner organizations, and approved by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.

To learn more about the 2014 cohort of Fulbright Alumni Ambassadors, and to contact them directly, click here.

Good luck to all Fulbright applicants!

– See more at: http://eca.state.gov/fulbright/fulbright-alumni/alumni-ambassadors#sthash.epxNa862.dpuf

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U.S. Fulbright

The Fingerprints of a Fulbright Student

August 27, 2014

Cameron Kruse, 2012-2013, India (left), with fellow Fulbrighters Amruta Sarma, Ajit Rajiva, and Sabrina Dek surviving in the great Rann of Kutch

I wearily push my way through the crowd stepping around a cow as I approach the chai stand. I yell over the noise of the street “Dean masala chai baia,” which means, “three spiced chais please, brother,” in Gujarati. He expertly pours out three cups of chai as I wipe the unrelenting sweat from my brow. I grasp three small, dirty, chipped cups of chai welcoming the burning sensation on my fingers as it snaps me out of the lethargy induced by a losing battle against heat exhaustion; I spent the morning fruitlessly trying to determine the efficacy of medicinal plant extracts in a room far exceeding the ambient temperature of 120 ºF. Walking back to my colleagues, I distribute the cups. We stand sipping our chai as I address the ever-present curious onlookers in broken Gujarati: “My name is Brother Cameron. I am from the United States. I am here to study medicine from the drumstick plant. I am a Fulbrighter.”

At the risk of a third degree sunburn, I stand in the sun and allow my mind to drift back to when I was finishing my bachelor’s degree at Pepperdine University, trying to join the Fulbright family on a grant to India. I poured myself into countless drafts of my application, attempting to convey how I would leave my fingerprint on the world of medicinal plant science while engaging with my local host community. Look at me now, standing in the middle of the street, leaving my grimy fingerprint on a cup of chai, vainly trying to maintain forward progress on my research.

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Enrichment Foreign Fulbright Fulbright-Millennial Trains Project

Making a Connection

August 21, 2014

In the words of Alyas Widita, a Fulbright Foreign Student from Indonesia:

Fulbright Foreign Student from Indonesia Alyas Widita reflecting on his upcoming trip to Chicago, IL

I had a great time in Milwaukee. During my time there, I sensed from the millennials I met with an eagerness to transform the physical landscape and image of the city with their hands and hearts. I was a bit sad to leave, but also excited for the adventure awaiting the Fulbright-MTP group in Chicago.

Prior to departing for Chicago, I reminded myself to spend at least an hour of the trip sleeping. By the time the Fulbright-MTP group were on their way to Chicago, and MTP’s Patrick Dowd introduced one of the Chicago visit speakers, Charlie Monte Verde, Government Affairs Specialist at Amtrak, I could not help but stay awake to listen to him. Charlie Monte Verde spoke about topics that I am very interested in: the future of transportation, urban development, and how Amtrak will factor into all of these developments. Charlie reiterated Amtrak’s strategic importance in connecting communities throughout the country, especially the role of long distance rail routes. He pointed out that long distance rail routes are not merely a form of transportation, connecting point A to point B, but also a way to promote economic development and urban growth. Following his lecture, we had a lively discussion in which everyone had a chance to voice his or her views about Amtrak. It was a truly compelling moment as Fulbright-MTP participants were deeply engaged in the discussion with Charlie, and also exchanging opinions with each other about how millennials can play a role in shaping the future of Amtrak – as well as the future of cities and regions. As the marvelous Chicago skyline started to come into view, the fruitful discussion with Charlie ended.

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U.S. Fulbright

Architecture amidst the Trees in Helsinki

August 20, 2014

Rebecca Littman-Smith, 2010-2011, Finland

In a landscape of trees, the fields appear like islands, providing intermittent view corridors while riding the train from Helsinki to Turku. The trees are prevalent, dominating the Finnish countryside both in nature and in the built environment. Birch, pine and spruce trees are harvested and employed in a variety of ways. Timber is part of Finnish identity, from the forests that thrive in the Nordic climate, to the tradition of building a summer cottage within the landscape.

My Fulbright U.S. Student Program grant took me to Helsinki, Finland to study the use of wood in Finnish Architecture. As a material to use in the construction of buildings, timber is unique. Timber breathes, it feels warm to the touch, it shrinks and expands and preserves the organic qualities that give it a connection to life. In the words of Juhani Pallasmaa, Finnish Architect and scholar: “Wood speaks of its two existences and time scales; its first life as a growing tree and the second as a human artifact made by the caring hand of a carpenter or cabinetmaker.”

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U.S. Fulbright

Lab Science – Not for Loners

August 13, 2014

Kevin Fomalont, 2012-2013, Russia, preparing for the day’s injections of inflammatory factors

There is the impression that laboratory scientists do their work in isolation, plodding through their experiments uninterrupted. It is often overlooked that to maintain a controlled experimental environment, researchers accept some chaos in their own lives. After a few months working at the Institute of Experimental Medicine in St. Petersburg, Russia on my Fulbright project to investigate the effect of early life exposure to stress on behavioral development in a rodent model, I realized how similarly laboratories in Russia and in the United States function. To collect all the data during our narrow time points, we borrowed labor from other laboratories to be paid back in the future. We shared materials to be returned on pain of death. Our experiments started at 5:00 p.m. sharp to take into account the daily rhythm of stress hormone – the rats have outsized influence on our schedules. Five of us created an assembly line, and hurried at each step not be late for the next. Meticulous planning and troubleshooting preceded the harried action of the experimental day. Although there were many languages spoken, one sentiment was shared: “don’t blow it, or wait six months to repeat the experiment.”

Science research is a fundamentally collaborative activity, and that is why a laboratory-based project proposal is well-suited for a Fulbright grant. Successful Fulbright proposals have an element of community engagement. I became interested in the Institute’s research at a conference, where I also learned about its famous history. The Physiology Department of the Institute includes Ivan Pavlov’s preserved office to commemorate the location where he conducted his groundbreaking conditioning experiments. One of his students discovered that the immune system could be conditioned to overreact to innocuous substances, using the principles of Pavlovian conditioning. Although performed in the 1920s, these experiments were not well regarded in the United States until 50 years later when they were revisited at the University of Rochester. If Soviet and American scientists had worked together over those 50 years to reconcile their different experimental approaches, progress would have proceeded more quickly.

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