A Florida State University professor has received a Fulbright Specialist Award to continue research at the Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro, or UFRRJ, in Brazil. 

Ming Cui, a professor of Human Development and Family Science in the College of Health and Human Sciences, will work with faculty and graduate students in the UFRRJ’s Graduate Program in Social Sciences, or PPGCS, to encourage and promote cross-cultural collaboration and research through academic exchange. 

“I hope my visit will be mutually beneficial for the host institution and my home institution,” Cui said. “I am excited to have this opportunity and look forward to working with the faculty and graduate students of PPGCS.” 

The Fulbright Specialist Program was established by the U.S. Department of State and provides a unique opportunity for U.S. academics and professionals to engage in short-term exchanges at host institutions across the globe.  

During her visit, Cui will complete two presentations on emerging issues in the social sciences, offer a workshop on the theory and practice of research in social sciences and develop a strategic collaboration plan with PPGCS researchers. 

“I hope my effort will bring international visibility and recognition to our Human Development and Family Science program at FSU while also helping PPGCS to build and expand their program,” she said.  

Cui’s research interests include adolescent and young adult development, such as emotional and behavioral problems; the influence of family of origin, or parenting, on adolescents and young adults; cultural diversity in family and child studies; and research methodology. 

This is the second Fulbright award Cui has received. In 2017, she visited the University of Helsinki in Finland, where she taught a graduate-level methodology course and conducted collaborative research as a Fulbright Scholar. 

For more information, visit healthandhumansciences.fsu.edu. 

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A Florida State University faculty member from the Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics is traveling to Austria this fall to conduct new linguistics research thanks to a prestigious Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award.

Tatjana Soldat-Jaffe, an associate professor of German and linguistics in the College of Arts and Sciences, received the award in support of her work on language translation and its role in social media, with a focus on migrant populations. Soldat-Jaffe will spend fall 2023 at the Karl-Franzens-Universität’s Institute for Theoretical and Applied Translation in Graz, Austria, working on her next project, “Translation as a Social Practice: Refugee Writing in Social Media.”

“As a Fulbright Scholar, I will join the ranks of many distinguished program participants,” Soldat-Jaffe said. “It is the most widely recognized and prestigious international exchange program in the world with an acceptance rate of only 20 percent. So, I feel confirmed in my scholarship but humble to have received such a prestigious award.”

The Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program offers over 400 awards in more than 135 countries for U.S. citizens to teach, conduct research and carry out professional projects around the world. Five FSU faculty members received Fulbright Scholar Awards for 2023-2024.

Soldat-Jaffe will spend four months conducting research in Austria, a cultural melting pot in the center of the European Union. The country hosts approximately 146,000 refugees and subsidiary protection holders and over 18,000 asylum-seekers, largely from Syria and Afghanistan, according to the United Nations Refugee Agency reports. In Austria, Soldat-Jaffe will work collaboratively with international partners in educational, political and cultural fields while teaching students in translation studies at the University of Graz.

“I am excited to work with the Institute for Theoretical and Applied Translation Studies at the Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz, Austria, which is known for its interdisciplinary approach to the study of translation from a sociocultural perspective,” Soldat-Jaffe said.

Soldat-Jaffe, who joined the FSU faculty in 2016, conducts research on language and identity, the politics of language, minority languages and translation studies. This upcoming research was inspired by what she calls a need to reevaluate current academic approaches to translation since the definition of the text — or what needs to be translated — as well as the translation process itself, has changed.

“With the ever-changing technology in mind and an increase in migration, social media has provided refugees — and, generally speaking, migrants — a way to maintain and expand their network of communication,” Soldat-Jaffe said.

Facebook, Soldat-Jaffe said, illustrates how social media can be used to provide social innovation for a diasporic community by means of sharing their experience, despite multilingual challenges. For example, the availability of a button that allows users to instantly translate text on the social media platform has made the translation process itself invisible to some extent, potentially skewing the way multilingual exchanges are perceived.

“This questions the traditional approach to translation studies: who is the translator and is the translated text still perceived as a translation?” Soldat-Jaffe said.

Department of Modern Languages and Linguistics chair Reinier Leushuis said Soldat-Jaffe’s Fulbright Scholar Award not only allows her to explore these questions but also serves as a testimony to her cutting-edge research focus on sociolinguistics, the study of language as it relates to social elements, such as bilingualism and regional dialect, gender and class differences.

“Dr. Soldat-Jaffe’s Fulbright Scholar Award is a recognition for the quality of her interdisciplinary explorations in language and identity, particularly in relation to minority languages,” Leushuis said. “I am thrilled that both Fulbright and the Karl-Franzens-Universität’s Institute for Theoretical and Applied Translation have recognized the importance of sociolinguistic studies such as hers on the intersection of migrant, refugee and minority communities and their linguistic behavior in mainstream media.”

Leushuis adds that the department — which offers coursework in linguistics and across 10 different languages to prepare students for careers in federal government, foreign services, non-governmental organizations and the private sector — places great emphasis on the cross-disciplinary investigations of global language, culture and identity, and Soldat-Jaffe’s interests are a prime example of this vision.

For more information, visit modlang.fsu.edu.

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Nine current and former Florida State University students have earned scholarships through the prestigious Fulbright U.S. Student Program.

Winners include graduate and undergraduate students and represent a host of majors and areas of research. Five will pursue teaching assistantships while the remaining four will conduct research. They’ll pursue that work in: Taiwan, Bulgaria, Scotland, Brazil, Spain and its Canary Islands, Uruguay, Uzbekistan and one student will split their time between Greece and Türkiye.

Jesse Wieland, associate director of the Office of National Fellowships (ONF) at FSU, said the Fulbright application process is especially rigorous.

“This year’s Fulbright awardees spent many months and, in a few cases, years developing their research projects and preparing their application materials,” he said. “These students truly represent academic excellence and what is obtainable for FSU students at both the undergraduate and graduate degree levels.”

Wieland added that the hope from his office is that FSU’s Fulbright awardees inspire other students to dream big and embark on the application process. Bonnie Garcia-Gloeckner, assistant director at ONF, echoed Wieland.

“Undergraduate students, graduate students and recent alumni interested in applying for the current Fulbright cycle should contact our office now,” she said. “The first campus deadline is June 7 and we would welcome the opportunity to work with students and recent alumni on their applications.”

For more information, visit FSU’s Office of National Fellowships.

Rachel Harbin Blankenship

Memphis, Tennessee 

Master’s student 

Major: Art Therapy 

Fulbright type: Fulbright/University of Stirling Award in Health, Well-being and Sport 

Destination: Stirling, Scotland, UK 

Fulbright work: Sport Psychology 

Denisha Campbell

Chicago, Illinois 

Doctoral candidate 

Major: Communication Science and Disorders 

Fulbright type: English Teaching Assistantship 

Destination: Uruguay 

Fulbright work: Interest in literacy practices 

Miguel Gonzalez

Miami, Florida  

Senior 

Major: International Affairs  

Fulbright type: English Teaching Assistantship 

Destination: Brazil 

Fulbright work: “Beyond teaching English, I will create and host multi-cultural activities on my designated university’s campus, and I will also work with local LGBT organizations to promote LGBT right and public health for all.”  

Arria Hauldin

Cooper City, Florida 

Graduated 2020 

Major: Anthropology  

Fulbright type: English Teaching Assistantship 

Destination: Uzbekistan 

Fulbright work: Teaching English at the university level 

Mia Hernandez

Miramar, Florida 

Graduated 2022 

Major: Dual degree in English and Psychology    

Fulbright type: English Teaching Assistantship 

Destination: Canary Islands, Spain 

Fulbright work: “I will be conducting a podcast project to spotlight the different refugee aid organizations in the Canary Islands, working to provide visibility for, and connect locals and non-locals to, resources in the community.” 

Caitlin Mims

Fort Walton Beach, Florida 

Doctoral candidate  

Major: Art History 

Fulbright type: Greece-Turkey Joint Research Award 

Destination: Greece and Türkiye  

Fulbright work: Research into Byzantine amulets held in collections in Greece and  Türkiye in order to understand the ways amulets slipped between the boundaries of magic and religion. 

Rachel Neale

Crystal River, Florida 

Master’s student 

Major: Slavic studies 

Fulbright type: Research 

Destination: Bulgaria 

Fulbright work: Bulgarian language study, research in Bulgarian oral-traditional epic to investigate Slavic women’s roles in societies within the Ottoman sphere of influence, translation of Bulgarian epic songs. 

Michelle Perez

Miami, Florida 

Graduated 2023 

Major: Double major in International Affairs and Economics  

Fulbright type: English Teaching Assistantship 

Destination: Spain 

Fulbright work: Teaching English in a high school setting and helping with Global Classrooms and Model United Nations. 

Tessa Santner

Niceville, Florida 

Graduated 2021 

Major: East Asian Language and Culture Masters Degree, graduated 2021 

Fulbright type: Master Degree Program award: National Kaohsiung Normal University 

Destination: Taiwan  

Fulbright work: Teaching Chinese as a Second, Foreign Language 

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A Florida State University professor has been awarded his second prestigious Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award and will return to Tokyo, Japan, to teach next year.   

Perry Howell, a senior lecturer in the Department of English, earned the 2023-2024 Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award and, starting next spring, he will teach two classes each at Tokai University and J.F. Oberlin University, both in the Tokyo area.    

“Every Fulbright placement presents its own unique challenges, so you have to respond flexibly to what each particular university needs from you,” Howell said. “Like studying abroad, teaching abroad challenges your habitual ways of seeing and responding to the world, so the experience can inspire a lot of creative thinking.” 

The Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program offers over 400 awards in more than 135 countries for U.S. citizens to teach, conduct research and carry out professional projects around the world. Fulbright scholars teaching in Japan focus their classes on various aspects of American culture. 

One of two courses Howell will teach examines U.S. ideals and values as expressed in famous public speeches throughout U.S. history, such as Sojourner Truth’s 1851 speech titled “Ain’t I a Woman?” The second course investigates how public apologies function in the U.S. and will explore differences between the U.S. and Japan in handling public apologies with curriculum focusing on famous American apologies. Both courses will align with Japan’s spring semester schedule, which typically runs from March to July.  

“Students in Japan are, in my experience, extremely interested in learning about American culture,” Howell said. “They question beliefs and assertions about the U.S. that most American students would take for granted, which makes for lively discussions.” 

“Students in Japan are, in my experience, extremely interested in learning about American culture. They question beliefs and assertions about the U.S. that most American students would take for granted, which makes for lively discussions.” 

— Perry Howell, a senior lecturer in the Department of English

Howell has lived in Japan twice before. During the 2009-2010 academic year, Howell finished his doctoral program at the University of Iowa remotely while his wife Judith Pascoe, the FSU George Mills Harper Professor of English used her own Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award to teach at two different universities in Tokyo. A decade later, Howell earned his first Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award, allowing them both to live in Yokohama while he taught at Yokohama National University for the 2019-2020 academic year.  

“I have great respect for the challenges my Japanese students accept by signing up for my courses,” Howell said. “Anyone who has gone from learning a foreign language in a classroom to using that foreign language in the real world can understand this challenge — it is both exciting and anxiety-provoking for students, and it is fun from the teacher’s side to be a part of that process.” 

Including Howell, nearly 20 faculty members from the Department of English have lectured internationally since 2017. Department chair and Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor Gary Taylor said Howell’s continued international engagement reflects FSU’s strategic global orientation. 

“Dr. Howell’s Fulbright awards contribute directly to the international reputation of FSU as the home of outstanding faculty,” Taylor said. “It is also further confirmation that the English Department at FSU is recognized globally as a leader in English language research and teaching.”  

In addition to teaching in Japan, Howell has also lectured abroad in Italy through FSU’s Florence Study Center — he was part of the team to first offer the Editing, Writing and Media program there in 2022. 

“Teaching in foreign countries heightens your awareness of what is happening around you, so you notice with new energy many of the things in your everyday life that, in your home country, you screen out as too familiar,” Howell said. “That is one of my goals in teaching abroad: to bring that sense of energy and wonder back to my teaching here at FSU and to inspire a similar perspective in students here.” 

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