Academic Programs Urban Studies Macalester College

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Urban Studies



Faculty

The Urban Studies Concentration is led by a steering committee that reflects the interdisciplinary nature of Urban Studies. Faculty and Staff for the Urban Studies Program consist of regular members of the core departments of Education, English, Geography, History, and Political Science.

Daniel Trudeau, Director
trudeau@macalester.edu
Daniel Trudeau, assistant professor of Geography and director of the Urban Studies concentration, teaches Urban Social Geography, Qualitative Methods, Political Geography, Introduction to Urban Studies and Cities of the 21st Century. His recent research projects include analyzing the role of nonprofit organizations in immigrant integration, the geographical implications of land-use politics in urbanizing communities, and the geography of the New Urbanism.

Ernesto Capello
ecapello@macalester.edu
Assistant Professor of History, teaches courses in Latin American history, cultural history and urban history. His research focuses on the cultural history of modern Latin America with a special emphasis on the intersections between space and memory, especially in Quito, Ecuador. He has authored several articles on this subject and is at present completing a book manuscript concerning the role that "History" played in crafting modern identities in Quito.

Casey Jarrin
cjarrin@macalester.edu
Assistant Professor of English, teaches courses in diasporic literary/visual culture and contemporary urban transformations (Diasporic London; Modernist Apocalypse), international film (Cinema of the City; Film Noir; Gangster Cinema), working-class studies/subcultural theory (British Youth Subcultures), the ethics and aesthetics of violence, and cultural legacies of the Vietnam War. She co-organizes the Violence Studies working group with Macalester colleague Olga Gonzalez and is faculty advisor to the ACM London/Florence study abroad program. She has published work in Eire-Ireland and Geographies and Genders and is now completing a book on 20th-century Irish prison cultures: Confessional Enactments: Penitents, Prisoners, and Embodiment in Irish Literary and Visual Culture.

Ruthanne Kurth-Schai
kurthschai@macalester.edu
Ruthanne Kurth-Schai, professor and chair of Educational Studies, teaches courses on social, philosophical, and political dimensions of education. Her research interests include philosophical and policy analyses centered on the role of public education in addressing social justice, environmental, and spiritual issues as well as contemporary reform efforts in the United States and abroad aimed at effective response to the challenges posed by globalization. Her recent book, Re-envisioning Education & Democracy, is co-authored with Charles R. Green.

David Lanegran
lanegran@macalester.edu
David Lanegran, John S. Holl professor of Geography and department chair, teaches courses in human and urban geography. His interests have led to extensive studies and comparisons of urban planning processes around the world. He has published several books, including Minnesota on the Map, A Historical Atlas, and articles on urban and cultural geography. He is a past president of the National Council for Geographic Education (1998) and serves as a consultant to the College Board for the advanced placement human geography test.

Peter Rachleff
rachleff@macalester.edu
Peter Rachleff, professor of History, teaches history of the U.S. working class, immigration and ethnicity in U.S. History, and African Americans and the transformation of the city, 1890-1945. He is past president of the National Working Class Studies Association (2006-2007) and a member of the National Executive Board of the Labor and Working Class History Association. He has been active in local campaigns around immigrant and labor rights.

Paru Shah
shahp@macalester.edu
Paru Shah, assistant professor of Political Science, teaches Urban Politics; Race, Ethnicity and Politics; American Politics and Empirical Research Methods. Her recent research projects focus on racial representation of minority groups and its impact on public policy, and the consequences of urban education reform.

Laura Smith
smithl@macalester.edu
Laura Smith, assistant professor of Geography, teaches Metro Analysis, Urban GIS, and a senior research seminar in Transportation Geography, as well as Statistical Research Methods in Geography and Regional Geography of the U.S. and Canada. Her most recent research projects have focused on the patterns and characteristics of mortgage foreclosures in the Twin Cities and on issues of American Indian land ownership and development in Minnesota.

 


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