CAS News

SOCIOLOGY - Hannah Waight, an assistant professor of sociology in CAS, and her collaborators found that the use of state-planted propaganda is on the rise in China. And it’s not just a tool for spreading ideological content. It’s also used to control and constrain other kinds of information beyond political ideals, including natural disaster and public health reporting in China.

CHEMISTRY AND BIOCHEMISTRY, ANTHROPOLOGY - Two University of Oregon faculty members have been named 2024 fellows by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), joining 471 other newly elected members whose work has distinguished them in the science community and beyond. This year’s fellows and their areas of research are Darren Johnson, chemistry and biochemistry, and Stephen Frost, anthropology.

SOCIOLOGY - In 2020, CAHOOTS became national model for de-escalation. Amid a budget crunch, on Thursday, April 10, researchers from the University of Oregon College of Arts and Sciences and Portland State University School of Social Work will share their findings on the impact of CAHOOTS on the Eugene-Springfield community.

LINGUISTICS - Ichishkíin, also known as Sahaptin, is a severely endangered Native American language of the Pacific Northwest. Several Tribes from the region are working diligently to revitalize the language and a committed group of educators, linguists and Tribal members at the University of Oregon are working to support those efforts. The latest achievement is the extension of the two-year language learning program to include a third year of instruction in Ichishkíin.

CREATIVE WRITING - In 2017, an all-girls robotics team from Afghanistan captured international attention as they fought for a chance to compete on the world stage. Their story is on the big screen, brought to life by Jason Brown, a creative writing professor in the College of Arts and Sciences.

PHILOSOPHY - Pigeons and AI share something in common: They can’t care about patients. In Ramón Alvarado’s latest paper published in the American Journal of Bioethics, he and co-author Nicolae Morar, a bioethicist and environmental philosopher at the UO, underscore that health care isn’t just about finding results. It's about actually caring for patients. That’s a level of engagement from providers not easily replicated by a machine.

PSYCHOLOGY - Dare Baldwin, a psychology professor in the College of Arts and Sciences, is working with undergraduate researchers to better understand how people behave during an earthquake. The research team will bring in families to campus to have them participate in an earthquake simulation. Observing how long it takes families to mobilize and how their behavior unfolds will help researchers determine the best way to educate people to take appropriate protective action.

ENGLISH - Courtney Thorsson was named an honorable mention for the 2024 MLA’s William Sanders Scarborough Prize for her 2023 book The Sisterhood: How a Network of Black Women Writers Changed American Culture. The prize was awarded in December for “outstanding scholarly study of Black American literature or culture.”

Faculty in the College of Arts and Sciences are on the frontline of addressing the world's most pressing issues, including AI, Alzheimer's, ice sheet loss in Greenland—and more. These are big problems, and our faculty members are relying on millions of dollars in grant funding to explore solutions for a better tomorrow. Read more in the 2023-24 annual report, out now.

ECONOMICS, SPANISH - Adrianna Vaca-Navarro has spent her life fighting against a system that was built against people like her. Now, she is a law student working to help others in need. Vaca-Navarro graduated in 2021. Now, she's a law student at the University of California, Berkeley. She is working to leverage her identity to help communities in need, aiming to fill the gaps within the legal system that she is studying.

SPANISH – Cissy Jones, BA ’02 (business administration, Spanish), is an award-winning voice actor and a fierce advocate of protection for voice actors in the wake of generative AI. In March 2024, she became the CEO of ETHOVOX, a company she co-founded to develop an ethical AI voiceover dataset that collaborates with artists and ensures fair compensation.

HUMAN PHYSIOLOGY, NEUROSCIENCE - Using functional MRI brain imaging, or fMRI, University of Oregon researchers have unraveled some of the neural circuitry behind basic human actions. Their insights, described in a paper published in the journal eNeuro, can be used to improve the design of brain-computer interface technologies, including brain-controlled prosthetic arms that aim to restore movement in people who have lost it.

GEOGRAPHY, INDIGENOUS, RACE AND ETHNIC STUDIES - Oregon’s historical markers, those roadside signs commemorating the state's past, give a version of history that University of Oregon researchers say is skewed. But a team of students is working to address the histories that highway markers omit through an online interactive map.

ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES - Nicholas Burns (class of 2025), isn’t afraid to stop and smell the roses. Burns is dedicated to finding and applying strategies to create new pollinator habitats and combat their decline. He studies the fitness of flowering plant species in response to neighboring competition and pollination alongside mentor and professor Lauren Hallett at the University of Oregon Hallett Lab.

DATA SCIENCE - In Applied Data Science for Social Justice, a new course developed by Associate Professor Rori Rohlfs in the School of Computer and Data Sciences, students partnered with the Eugene-based CAHOOTS program to help its organizers sift through data they’ve collected from thousands of dispatch calls to glean insights on how they can improve their services. CAHOOTS works to help people with mental health struggles.