2021: A Year in Review for the School of Modern Languages

Posted December 21, 2021

While it feels almost surreal that another year has come and gone, we’re proud to look back on 2021 as a year filled with accomplishments in the School of Modern Languages.

Perhaps most exciting this year was the return to in-person classes and events. We were honored to host distinguished guests including Kizito Kalima, founder and executive director of the Peace Center for Forgiveness & Reconciliation; child holocaust survivor George Rishfeld; and Anthropocene dramaturgs Duncan Evennou, Frédérique Aït Touati, and Clemence Hallé.

In the spring, we celebrated our faculty members, Britta Kallin, Lee Oh, and Satomi Suzuki Chenoweth, who were each awarded the Student Recognition of Excellence in Teaching: Class of 1934 CIOS Award. Adele Douglin, GLACT postdoctoral fellow, was recognized for their teaching achievements with the Center for Teaching and Learning’s inaugural “Honor Roll” award.

During the summer, the renewal of our Project Global Officer (Project GO) grant by the U.S. Department of Defense/Defense Language and National Security Education Office (DLNSEO) deepened our commitment to connecting globally by providing language training to cadets across the nation in Korean, Japanese, and Russian.

This fall, we said a bittersweet goodbye to our former chair, Anna Stenport, who was named Dean of the College of Liberal Arts at Rochester Institute of Technology. We were pleased to name David Shook, associate professor of Spanish with over 30 years’ experience in various leadership roles at Georgia Tech, as interim chair to serve for two years while we conduct an international search for a new chair.

The fall semester also saw the launch of two new interdisciplinary minors, African Studies and Latin American and Latinx studies (LAT), and the hiring of the following faculty:

  • Dr. Miguel Rosas Buendia, Assistant Professor of Spanish
  • Dr. Lu Liu, Assistant Professor of Chinese
  • Brigitte Stepanov, Assistant Professor of French
  • Hongchen Wu, Assistant Professor of Chinese
  • Bae Yoon (Becky) Keung, Assistant Professor of Korean.

Additionally, our alumni demonstrated success as global leaders. Ted Danowitz, B.S. IAML-Chinese 2010, was the recipient of the Ivan Allen College Distinguished Alumni Awards for the School of Modern Languages.

Our staff also excelled as industry professionals. Neta Kanny, academic program manager in the School of Modern Languages and an alumna of the M.S. in Applied Languages and Intercultural Studies-Spanish program, served as a panelist at the “Celebrating Atlanta's Global Youth Professionals: Global Talent for a Global City” event presented by the Atlanta Mayor's Office of International Affairs and the Greater Atlanta Coalition for Global Education and Research (GAcGEAR).

Lastly, the Atlanta Global Studies Center (AGSC), a unit in the School of Modern Languages, launched its Race Beyond Borders event series exploring where Atlanta intersect with the global conversation on race for concrete action, and Juan Carlos Rodriguez, associate professor of Spanish, was named the Center's new faculty co-director.

On our website, our top stories this year were:

  1. Ivan Allen College Schools Launch New Minors
  2. Georgia Tech Master’s in Global Media & Cultures Helps Student Design Dream Career in Diplomacy
  3. Undergraduate German Student Selected as Panelist for Anti-Black Racism Study Abroad Discussion
  4. Jonsson Co-authors Book Theorizing Tiqqun’s ‘Young-Girl’
  5. Kallin Recognized for Furthering Teaching of German
  6. Global Media & Cultures Graduate Student Designing Programs for Global Innovation
  7. New Speculative Fiction Magazine Hivemind Continues Georgia Tech’s Sci-Fi Tradition
  8. Two Ivan Allen Faculty Named Provost Fellows for Faculty Development
  9. Geary Publishes Article on Benefits of Recorded Group Videos in Asynchronous Courses
  10. Six Cross-university “Global at Home” projects funded through the AGSC-led Atlanta Global Research and Education Collaborative (AGREC)

Gracias, Merci, Dankeschön, Spasibo, Arigato, Xièxiè, and Gamsa haeyo to our students, alumni, faculty, staff, and supporters in the School of Modern Languages for an incredible year. We hope you celebrate a wonderful and safe holiday season and begin the New Year with prosperity and joy.

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Contact For More Information

Cassidy Chreene Whittle
Communications Officer
School of Literature, Media, and Communication | School of Modern Languages
cwhittle9@gatech.edu