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Marissa Juarez: Capoeira … blends music, world histories, bodily movement, dance, philosophy,
spirituality. I was very honored to receive an 1885 Society
Fellowship. It has allowed me to complete my doctoral research in Rhetoric, Composition
and the teaching of English, where I explore the Afro-Brazilian art form of capoeira as
a form of bodily communication. I’ve been playing capoeira for going on 8 years now,
and the more I studied rhetoric, the more I starting seeing connections between my practice
in capoeira class… as a communicative art. My dissertation seeks to find out actually
what these practitioners take from it and how they make meaning from it within their
own lives. My experience at the U of A has been so fulfilling. I’ve come from a program
that is one of the top-ranked in the country that supports its graduate students through
professional development, through research opportunities and through taking on the kinds
of projects that demand us to be more creative and to think out of the box. The University
of Arizona set me up for success and I’ve already gotten my dream job. I have received
a full-time faculty English position and I’m very excited to start that next chapter in
my life.
Marc Dash: The 1885 Society is an annual giving program.
The purpose of the Society is to provide the president of the university with unrestricted
money. Sometimes it’s used to support professors to keep them with our university. Sometimes
it’s used for student.
Chris McGinnis: I was awarded the 1885 Society Fellowship
in the Humanities in 2010 for the Development o f my thesis which was Progress and the Great
Productive Machine. I was interested in the beginning of Ford’s Highland Park plant
which opened in 1910. That was such a heightened time of industrial expansion and technological
advancement it really ended up impacting what it means to be American. I was really inspired
by scientific management studies in the 20s and 30s working with assembly line workers
to try to make them more efficient. One of the ways they did this was to take long photographic
exposures of them with lights attached to their hands while they were creating an object.
So I was using this in the industrial scene for a metaphor of the mechanization of society
as a whole. Since graduating I’ve been teaching at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts and
working in the studio, a lot. I was really grateful to the 1885 Society for providing
me the money to pursue this project and giving me the vote of confidence.
Patty Dash: I think sometimes we forget as a society how
important our public universities are. Without them, we wouldn’t have research. We wouldn’t
have technological innovation. We’re not alums of the University of Arizona Both of
our sons came to the U of A. The first one, out oldest son is Jeff. Jeff was a swimmer.
His younger brother, Elliott, was manager of the swim team.
Marc Dash: One of the things that’s very interesting
about the 1885 Society is there are a number of members who are not alumni of the University
of Arizona and do not have children who attended the University of Arizona. They believe as
we do that philosophically something that Dr. Hermann Fasel:
This award really changed my academic life in more ways than one. I was about actually
to leave the university at that time. I was being recruited by other universities. I always
loved the University of Arizona. This award really convinced me this is my place for good.
The things I could do with the funds from the 1885 Society for which there are no other
funds available at the U of A was to send a group of students to an international competition
– involving this airplane. It’s called AUA Design Seafarer Competition. The mission
was such that you have to autonomously find a target on the ground and report the exact
coordinates of the target to the ground station. Already in our first appearance at this competition
our team was actually able and the only one able to recognize and find the target. And
we were awarded the best designed and best looking plane in the whole competition. I
was very proud of the accomplishments of our team.
Patty Dash: You don’t meet one of these professors who
is not excited about their work, and they convey it, and it’s so exciting to hear
their excitement. It’s like a new education every time we go to an 1885 Society function.
Hermann Fasel: I really deeply want to thank all the members
of the Society for having the idea of establishing this award. And also would like to thank on
behalf of all the students and all the positive things it was able to inspire with those grants.
I’m just deeply grateful that all of you made that possible.
Patty Dash: Had people not given to the universities that
we went to, we wouldn’t be where we are today. So we’re all about giving back. And
we feel so strongly about this that we individually, we both give to the university through the
1885 Society.
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