Jody Shipka, associate professor of English, is featured in a new work. “Master Hands, A Video Mashup Round Table,” is a unique experiment in digital publishing that is featured in George Mason University’s journal enculturation.

Through the project, scholars created video mashups using the same source footage – a 1936 video entitled Master Hands – and respondents discussed the mashups. Artists had to use footage from Master Hands, could not provide a companion text, had to create a mashup that was no longer than ten minutes and were not permitted to see anyone else’s work until all five were completed. Five respondents will spend the next week discussing the mashups. At the end of the week, the conversation will be closed and the comments will remain as part of this publication.

There is a growing body of research indicating that laughter may improve immune function, help lower blood pressure, boost mood and reduce stress and depression, the Washington Post reported on October 24 in a story entitled “Laughing may help ease blood pressure, boost mood and enrich health in other ways.”

Robert Provine, professor of psychology, agrees. He said that laughter might benefit the body because it is “an energetic, stressful activity that stirs up all of our physiological systems… involving strong vocalization, an increase in heart rate and blood pressure and muscle contractions all over the body.”

Ellen Hemmerly, Executive Director at the bwtech@UMBC Research and Technology Park will receive the 2011 Innovator of the Year Award from The Daily Record on Wednesday, October 26.

Hemmerly, who has been Executive Director at bwtech for more than fifteen years, says that the award is less about her and more about the park’s cybersecurity incubator and the community of cybersecurity companies that have clustered there. The incubator currently has thirteen companies.

While there are about twenty incubators in Maryland, only one other focuses on cybersecurity. The bwtech@UMBC incubator is home to the CyberHive, which Hemmerly says is a unique space dedicated to bringing people in cybersecurity together to network and provides virtual incubator space to companies outside the region.

“I’ve been involved in incubators for twenty years,” says Hemmerly.  “In all my years of working with area incubators, the bwtech@UMBC cyber incubator is the fastest growing and has much potential economic impact.”

That, she says, is due in large part to its relationship to UMBC and to the incubator’s partnerships with both the public and private sectors.*

Public and Private Sector Partners*

• Baltimore County Economic Development
• Northrop Grumman
• Maryland’s Department of Business and Economic Development (DBED)
• Maryland Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO)
• Venable
• Whiteford, Taylor, Preston
• SB & Company LLC

UMBC sports economist Dennis Coates appeared on NBC Nightly News on October 23, discussing the effects of a possible NBA season cancellation. Although a lost season would negatively impact related businesses, such as sports bars, some suggest keeping a sense of perspective. Compared to the possible negative economic impact of a lost NFL season—recently averted—Coates argues that a lost NBA season would be “a drop in the bucket. The industry is just too small.” NBC notes that both fans and local business continue to hope for a resolution.

A new exhibit at the Jewish Museum of Maryland features work completed by Imaging Research Center (IRC) Fellows in the spring of 2011. “Chosen Food: Cuisine, Culture and American Jewish Identity” examines the diversity of Jewish eating and uncovers the messages in meals.

To make these ideas tangible in an exhibition setting, the IRC Fellows recorded audio and video interviews and produced location documentary works. The IRC Fellows documented food experiences of the farm, home and marketplace, and that content has been interwoven in the exhibition.

The exhibition will open at the Jewish Museum of Maryland on Sunday, October 23, with a reception from 12:30-4 p.m. The opening event will include tastings and samples of Jewish food from around the world.

“Chosen Food,” which runs through September 30, 2012, opens up conversations about the history and experience of being Jewish and American in the 21st century.

The Jewish Museum of Maryland is located at 15 Lloyd Street, Baltimore, MD.

Retriever Learning Center

This year, the real party is in the library.

On any given day, the Retriever Learning Center is packed. Students puzzle out problems on giant white boards. They snack and study. Or they order up pens, pencils and sticky notes from the academic “vending machine.”

After just a month, the Retriever Learning Center (RLC) feels like it’s always been a part of campus.

It opened in August on the first floor of the Albin O. Kuhn Library. And students, faculty, staff and alumni officially celebrated its opening at a ribbon cutting ceremony on September 19. The space is open 24 hours a day, secured by card entry, and provides students with the opportunity to study and collaborate at any hour – something they have desired for a long time.

“The greatest push has been from the students,” said Larry Wilt, director of the library. “They have advocated so well through shared governance for this project.”

Former SGA president Yasmin Karimian ’11, political science, was integral in making the center a reality. “Dr. Hrabowski spent a lot of time listening to us whine and complain about the need for a 24-hour space, even though I think he was extremely proud that this is what his students wanted.”

Faculty, staff and administrators recognized the need, Karimian said. It took time, however, to find the right space and the money to make it what it is today. It also took collaboration.

“SGA members had been involved in this process for a long time,” said David Hoffman, assistant director of student life for civic agency. “There was a presentation that Dr. Wilt made at an SGA senate meeting about two or three years ago, and people were really excited to see the initial mock-ups and drawings.”

Students backed up their enthusiasm by contributing funding to the project. The SGA contributed $30,000 for a second round of furniture in the RLC.

“A student explained why this is so important,” said President Freeman Hrabowski. “He said, ‘I can really say that the real party at UMBC is in the library.’”

(10/20/11)

Professor of the Practice of English Christopher Corbett spoke at the Smithsonian’s National Postal Museum on Saturday, October 8, at 1 p.m.

Corbett’s talk commemorated the 150th anniversary of the end of the Pony Express. Corbett is the author of “Orphans Preferred: The Twisted Truth & Lasting Legend of the Pony Express.”

A video of Corbett’s talk can be seen here.

In his latest Baltimore Sun column, UMBC political science professor Thomas Schaller explores the meteoric rise of Herman Cain as a GOP presidential candidate. Schaller argues, “his surprising showing actually tells us a lot more about the state of the national Republican Party” than about Cain himself. He suggests, “key segments of the Republican primary electorate desperately want an alternative to Mr. Romney,” who “presents himself as the candidate to fall in line behind, not fall in love with.” Read the full commentary to learn about Schaller’s take on Cain’s 9-9-9 plan and identification as a novice in government.

The Baltimore Sun reports that following a strong win in last month’s Democratic primary, Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake is meeting with each of her 40 Cabinet members “with an eye toward a possible shake-up of city leadership.” Such a move is not unusual, says Donald Norris, chair of public policy at UMBC, in the article.

“This is a reasonable time to expect those kinds of things to begin happening,” Norris remarked, continuing, “She now has been elected on her own. She’s clearly going to be setting her own agenda and putting her own people in power.”

The economic impact of the 2011 Baltimore Grand Prix was “vastly smaller than the projections by the events promoter,” UMBC economics professor Dennis Coates asserts in a newly released study (pdf), coauthoed with Michael Friedman of the University of Maryland. They estimate attendee spending as closer to $25 million than the anticipated $70 million and argue, “The bottom line is that the Baltimore Grand Prix was not a game changing event.”

After appearing on the front page of the Baltimore Sun and in the Baltimore Business Journal, the story was picked up by AP and printed in the Washington Post. Additional coverage included interviews with Dennis Coates on ABC2, Fox45 and WBAL Channel 11.