2023 Appel Fellows

"On an island between the North Pole and Norway, the Svalbard Global Seed Vault is a fortress built deep into the bedrock, with over one million seeds banked in the permafrost to safeguard their genetic information against any cataclysmic planetary event. Although the logistics of the project are so crucial for humanity, the greater interest for me is not the vault, but the people around it. I plan to compile oral histories from the tiny population here. I want to talk with seed bank employees, the sheriffs who provide protection for and against polar bears, the descendants from the Soviet era mines who have found safer work supporting research teams,  and all hardy, everyday folk who live in the existential shadow of humanity’s ark. I would like, most of all, to learn what the weight of this shadow is. I want to journey to the real fortress at the end of the world so I can share with this campus the true wonder and hope of human potential."

"As an Appel Fellow, I will highlight women's generational and cultural identity struggles in the Latinx community. I will conduct research using the Claremont Library resources and my travel data to find out more about feminism within the Latina community alongside how language barriers disconnect generational relationships. I will share how the Americanization of Latinas has led to women in the Mexican community becoming more open about their views, ambitions, and personal interests."

"As a midwesterner, I've noticed a tendency towards pessimism and sarcasm. To examine the relationship between the two, I'm traveling to Germany to do a deep dive into Arthur Schopenhauer's philosophy of pessimism, comparing the conditions that led to his philosophy with the conditions of the Midwest. Finally, I'm going to consider humor as a coping mechanism by reading the works of satirists from Germany and the Midwest."

"My home state of Kentucky is rife with monocultures and coal mines, extractive industries that leave scarred landscapes and hollowed-out communities in their wakes. Kentucky author Wendell Berry writes about the power of 'local knowledge' to heal our relationship with the environment. I will spend this summer working on family farms in Ecuador, a country whose environmentalism has been defined by indigenous understandings of the land. As I live, work, and learn in rural Ecuador, I will write a collection of essays and poems, inspired by Wendell Berry and exploring local knowledge, sustainability, and the subtle connections between Ecuador and Kentucky."

"'Arabic (is) for Life.' As one of the oldest written languages in human history, the Arabic language is deeply complex and rooted in religion and culture—which is something I desire to thoroughly examine, experience, and understand following my completion of a year-long introduction to Arabic. I hope to capture the ideas of community, beauty in culture, artwork through the mediums of poetry, photography, and traditional calligraphy ('خط') in Amman, Jordan. I want to engage with the intricacies of Arabic, from its history, morphological structure, and prosody, to its function as a macro-language that unifies numerous regions together via dialects."

"Everything from my name to my facial features are indicative of Korean descent; but throughout my childhood I never felt Korean, or even Korean American. Food, however, became an avenue through which I could connect to and participate in Korean culture. Through the Appel Fellowship, I hope to delve into how food is produced in South Korea, from farm cultivation to restaurant and household cooking. I will also aim to learn more about how these processes are influenced by the country's highly-organized waste management strategies as well as the attitudes toward these policies."

"At eight years old, my Gong Gong (Mandarin for 'Grandfather') was orphaned by the Chinese Communist army. He was shuffled from concentration camp to concentration camp, eventually bribing his way to escape into Taiwan. Gong Gong’s traumatic story is shared by almost 2 million other Chinese-Taiwanese refugees, yet these accounts remain largely obscured. Interviewing Taiwanese residents and observing Gong Gong’s hometown, I hope to shed light on these long-neglected stories."

"As my grandfather passed away before I was born, I have always been intrigued by his story. I will spend my summer in Valdobbiadene, the small village in Italy where he is from, to unfold my past and what could have been my present if he hadn’t moved to Brazil after World War II. Through interviews, I plan to connect with relatives and my grandfather's friends to learn about who he was before assimilating into Brazilian culture. I also plan to explore how the conflict affected the village. For my project, I will craft a documentary that will honor my grandfather's memory and shed light on the impact of WWII on this small community."

"As someone who is half-black, half-Latina, with a brother who has a disability, I often find myself living in two different worlds. In Quito, Ecuador I will volunteer with children who have disabilities and will learn about how Integrated Music, Art, and Dance therapy impacts their daily lives, and how people can find connection and their authentic selves through this approach. I will be creating six written pieces and a video documentary that showcase the stories of resilience of young people from around the world."

"After dreaming of playing soccer professionally for 11 years, I am learning to accept that this dream will not come true. I will be attending Major League Soccer games in 5 different cities: Austin, New York, Washington D.C., Portland, and Seattle. During these MLS games, I will interview fans to learn how soccer has impacted their lives. Through these conversations, I hope to discover what these 11 years brought to my life and how soccer will continue to play a role in my life. I will then create a blog to provide guidance to other athletes and to illustrate my evolving relationship with soccer."

"With my Appel Fellowship I will create a documentary film about the complex interactions between bus passengers in my native Chicago and my newfound home in the Los Angeles area. I will write a personal journal, and two 'love letters' to the cities themselves. Riding the bus has defined my experience of love, allowing me to see a beauty in my city through all of its passengers and inhabitants. Through my writing and film I hope to find the same sense of fondness for LA that I currently have for Chicago, and to share my experience with people who might not be in the same rooms I have entered."