Visiting Scholars

The Center for Urban and Global Studies (CUGS) has been honored to host visiting scholars from around the nation and around the world.

Current Visiting Scholar Programs

Kelter Postdoctoral Fellow in Urban Studies

The Kelter Postdoctoral Fellow in Urban Studies helps to advance the urban educational mission at Trinity College. The postdoctoral fellow is expected to have a Ph.D. in urban planning and design, geography, sociology, anthropology, public policy, or any other urban studies related discipline. The postdoctoral fellow teaches two undergraduate courses during two semesters that pertain to American cities with a comparative perspective, urban planning, land use, real estate, and/or spatial analysis using GIS. These courses are integral to the growing Urban Studies program and the Cities Program for first-year students, and can be cross-listed with the department or program of the fellow’s discipline. The fellow also contributes to the advising of Urban Studies majors and the Cities Program students. In addition, the fellow is expected to carry out his or her research while participating in and assisting CUGS research projects and activities.

The current Kelter Postdoctoral fellow is Arianna King. Dr. King holds a Ph.D. in Urban Studies (2023) from Tulane University’s City, Culture, and Community Program. Prior to doctoral study, she earned a B.A. in Philosophy and Fine Arts (2006) from Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts, and an M.S. in Urban Studies (2015) from the University of New Orleans with a focus in Urban Planning & Urban Anthropology. Dr. King is committed to the use of interdisciplinary approaches that combine historical, geographical, and anthropological theories and methods to explore our global urban world and the everyday practices of ordinary people in cities. Her teaching philosophy is grounded in people-centered research that helps students better understand the intersections between urban studies, gender studies, market trading, urban planning policy, and public space. Arianna is currently working on a manuscript based on her dissertation: Beyond the Market Walls: An Ethnography of Market Modernization in Cape Coast.
Contact: [email protected]

Visiting Rescue Scholar

Trinity College’s Scholar Rescue Program is a one-year fellowship supported by the International Institute of Education’s (IIE) Scholar Rescue Fund and the Scott Michael Johnson ’97 Memorial Fund, which was established by a former chairman of Trinity’s Board of Trustees, Tom Johnson ’62, Hon. ’05, P ’97, and his wife, Ann. They initiated the fund in honor of their son Scott, a member of the Trinity College Class of 1997 who lost his life in the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. The Johnson Fund supports rescue scholars while they are in residence at Trinity.  The IIE’s Scholar Rescue Fund supports scholars who are suffering severe and targeted threats to their lives and/or careers because of their academic work in their home countries. Scholars are brought to host institutions in safe countries where they can continue their academic work in safety.

CUGS has hosted scholars from the following countries since 2008:

Thomas Visiting Professorship

The Thomas Visiting Professorship at CUGS officially launched during the 2016-17 Academic Year. It is supported by The Karen and David Thomas China Urban Research and Teaching Endowment at Trinity College set up by former Trustee Karen Kelsey Thomas ’78, P’13 and David F. Thomas P’13. With this support, we invite and host one professor from Fudan University to teach one or two courses on general topics related to China at Trinity during each fall semester. The specific focus of the course(s) is determined between the Thomas Visiting Professor from Fudan, CUGS, and the department/program in which the course(s) are listed. Besides teaching, the Thomas visiting Professor carries out research at CUGS, gives one public lecture, and participates in other academic activities related to his or her scholarly interests. The Thomas Visiting Professorship is half of a symmetrical exchange program between Trinity College and Fudan University, also supported by the Thomas Endowment with partial financial support from Fudan University, that sends a Trinity professor to teach two courses at Fudan during each spring semester.

Past Visiting Scholar Programs

Luce Visiting Scholar

Supported by a major grant under the Luce Initiative on Asian Studies and the Environment (LIASE) from the Henry Luce Foundation, we host a visiting scholar from China or Southeast Asia at CUGS for one semester from 2013 to 2017. The Luce Visiting Scholar teaches one course related to the topic of sustainability in Urban Studies and carries his or her research at CUGS. The scholar also gives one public lecture, works with Trinity faculty to strengthen Trinity’s educational partnerships in China, especially with Fudan and Tongji Universities in Shanghai, and participates in other academic activities on campus related to his or her scholarly interests. Thus far we have hosted one short-term visiting scholar from Fudan University, two junior scholars from Tongji University, and one British scholar working on agricultural development and nature conservation in the Mekong River basin in Southeast Asia.

Raether Postdoctoral Fellow

From 2008 through the end of 2011, CUGS hosted three recent humanity or social science Ph.D. graduates as the Paul E. Raether Postdoctoral Fellow. Supported by endowed funds for the Center, the postdoctoral fellow taught one undergraduate course in each semester on the comparative issues and challenges facing American and world cities, with a comparative focus on cities of the global South. These courses helped to meet the teaching needs in Trinity’s growing urban studies curriculum and were cross-listed between the department of the fellow’s discipline and another department/program.