Communique Winter 2020

WHO ARE WE? 9 Tsuneo Akaha discusses global migration.

AS NEEDED 11 What it means to customize language solutions.

Communiqué WINTER 2020

The Eagle and the Bear Experts discuss the state of U.S.–Russia relations. PAGE 14

THE VIEW FROM SEGAL

The Future Belongs to Globalists

Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of the Institute Jeff Dayton-Johnson.

Political scientist Robert Kagan warns of the effects of weakening international cooperation in global affairs; his most recent book is called The Jungle Grows Back.

Globalists—supporters of intercountry collaboration to address threats including climate change, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, destructively competitive trade policies—are increasingly under attack, in the United States and around the world. Indeed, the term globalist is widely used in a pejorative sense.

The Monterey Institute of Foreign Studies (as we were then known) was founded in 1955 to educate globalists. It was a very different era of history, but that remains at the core of our mission today.

We educate professionals to have successful and meaningful careers. That means that we need to be continuously looking at the skills and competence that prospective students want, as well as those sought by employers. Now more than ever, we are also motivated by what the world needs of our graduates. The world needs globalists.

This issue of Communiqué, like just about every issue, provides ample evidence that our alumni grapple with the world’s most pressing problems, from a variety of vantage points. Our graduates understand that the urgent problems of this

world, as well as their solutions, transcend national borders—and those problems are not generally zero-sum. They demonstrate that bridges of communication, negotiation, and linguistic proficiency are more productive approaches to tackling those problems than isolation and the building of walls.

Our alumni get things done by means of collaboration across divides, including those of language, culture, power, and privilege. Finally, our students bring an intellectual curiosity with them to the Institute; when they leave, they bring to their work a capability and a responsibility to gather data both quantitative and qualitative, to analyze it, to interpret it, to understand, to learn.

Whether they are civil servants safeguarding nuclear nonproliferation; interpreters in international diplomacy or courthouses or hospitals; entrepreneurs promoting a greener and more prosperous global economy; trade experts in the public or private sectors; localizers imbuing firms with processes and systems suited to the global marketplace; or language teachers facilitating communication and understanding—our students and alumni are globalists. The world needs them. And our future depends upon them. n

Now more than ever, we are also motivated by what the world needs of our graduates. The world needs globalists.

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COVER ILLUSTRATION BY ROBERT NEUBECKER | PHOTOGRAPH BY BRIDGET BESAW

FIVE MINUTES WITH HUNTER SYKES MAIEP ’05

Atonement

International Environmental Policy program alumnus Hunter Sykes MAIEP ’05 got his first rifle when he was seven years old, and his first shotgun at 12. In contrast to his grandfather, who as a boy had gone trophy hunting with his parents in Africa, Sykes grew up in “hippie Colorado,” where he shot guns for practice rather than hunting.

In the new documentary film The Hunter Legacy, Sykes, as a way to explore issues related to human-wildlife conflict and come to terms with the family legacy, connects with Alex Hunter, the grandson of the famous big game hunter who guided the Sykes family on their hunting trip to Africa in 1937.

Q: What set you off on this journey of discovery?

A:

My family was selling the family farm in upstate New York, and we were going through old family heirlooms and history.

On the property was a house—built while my grandfather, his brother, and their parents went on a 10-week safari to British East Africa in 1937—that was used to celebrate and store the trophies from their many hunting trips. Of particular interest to me were old films of the trip to Africa and journals they kept during their trips.

I decided to use these old family materials as the starting point for a documentary film exploring what has changed in the 80 years or so that have passed, with an emphasis on wildlife conservation. The documents and film provided a fascinating glimpse into a part of my family history that I knew little about and the worldviews that they had that differ from mine. Some of it was painful for me to watch and read.

A:

Alex Hunter is a third-generation Kenyan, the grandson of big game hunter John Alexander Hunter, who was responsible for the death of thousands of biggame animals. J. A. Hunter led my family on their safari in 1937 but later came to question his own role in the massive killing of animals to clear land for the growing human population. Alex and his sister are now very active in efforts to protect wildlife in Kenya. A constant theme in wildlife conservation today is not what you might expect—poaching—but rather human-wildlife conflict. In the film, Alex guides me across Kenya and shows the impact of those conflicts and what efforts are being made to address them.

Even though it is very depressing to see how close we as humans are to eradicating amazing species of animals, as Alex describes it this is a film about people who care about wildlife. So, while the starting point was to show the difference 80 years have made, we end up featuring many positive steps that are being taken and mitigation measures that have been implemented. At the end of the day it is

about finding common ground between improving human life and preserving wildlife.

Q: How

did someone who grew up in such a big hunting family grow up to be an environmentalist?

A:

I grew up in the mountains of Colorado, and I have always been an environmentalist. I was actually pretty radical as a young boy. When I was nine years old my friends and I chained ourselves to a tree to protest the construction of a gravel pit on our rural road. As I grew older, some of that radical activism was replaced by a desire to find practical solutions to environmental issues and conflicts. By the time I got to Monterey, I had mellowed in some ways, hardened in others. When I graduated, I started Coldstream Creative, a production company focused on creating documentaries for educational and community outreach, with my classmate Darren Campbell maiep ’04. Darren later left to form his own company, but we still collaborate, including on this film. n

Q: What is The Hunter Legacy about?

PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY OF HUNTER SYKES

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Words at Work

What does it take to be a translator and interpreter for a drug task force in New York City?

BY SARA THURBER MARSHALL

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ucía falcón palomar mati ’17 sits in a room full of people: an assistant district attorney (ADA), a detective, an investigator, and an agent from the Drug Enforcement Administration; in front of her sits a defendant with his attorney next to him. The meeting has been called to investigate an international narcotics trafficking network. It’s her job to interpret what the defendant is saying in Spanish to the English-speaking people in the room and interpret their questions into Spanish. For the next two or three hours, Falcón will be constantly working to find equivalent words or expressions in two languages, trying to be as accurate as she can, and often needing to interpret or sight translate convoluted legal clauses. By the end of the meeting, she is glad she’s helped the process, but she feels exhausted.

When Falcón was hired in 2017 as a translator and interpreter for the Office of the Special Narcotics Prosecutor for the City of New York, she felt she had landed a job that could combine her love of languages and law. Not only does Falcón have a master’s in translation and interpretation from the Middlebury Institute, she also has a law degree from a Mexican university. And she has been speaking English since she was six. Her skill set seemed a good match for the job, which involves working for the most part

on long-term narcotics cases, both transcribing and translating trial and investigation documents, and also interpreting for defendants as they are questioned by an ADA or for witnesses being prepared for trial.

She soon found out, however, that there’d be a hefty learning curve in her new job. “When I started, no one taught me anything, they just threw me in the meeting. It was pretty intimidating. I made a lot of mistakes,” she admits. What made it even harder was that Falcón is from Mexico; most of the immigrants she interprets for are from the Caribbean, which has its own dialect and culture.

It’s hard enough to be constantly trying to find the correct words in two languages; but when the words are slang, or code words for drugs, it’s particularly difficult.

She developed strategies. As unfamiliar words came up in the meeting, she would make mental notes of them and later check the Internet for their meaning. For slang, she was able to go to her father-in-law, who is from the Dominican Republic, and ask him for the meaning.

Context became essential for understanding. But mistakes still happened. “One time the defendant was talking about a supervisor in Spanish, and in English I used the word ‘butler.’”

Falcón is quick to point out that interpreters are not dictionaries who simply

translate a word. “We are really linguists.

We work with language, with words, and with context. But it’s more than that.

Our job is also about culture.” She understands that the defendants or witnesses are scared. Often the English speakers ask questions quickly, abruptly, and that can sound hostile in Spanish. “So I always try to add a ‘please.’ I’m not going to change the meaning of anything. But if I don’t do that, the person is going to stop working with them. That person doesn’t want to be there anyway, and they’re afraid of law enforcement because they think they are going to report them to immigration.”

Falcón learned a great deal about the immigrant community when she first moved to New York City. She worked at the Mexican Consulate in the Department of Protection. “It was an eye-opening experience for me because there you can see how immigrants live in this country and how hard it is for someone who has to try to navigate a different legal system, not speaking the language.”

Falcón feels giving a voice, through her own, to immigrants is important, especially at her current job. “For me it’s very clear I am helping a human being, someone who has rights. Even if it was a really bad thing they did, they still have the right to understand what’s going on with their case.” n

“When I started, no one taught me anything, they just threw me in the meeting. It was pretty intimidating.”

PHOTOGRAPH BY JON ROEMER

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Currents

Recently appointed associate director of the Institute’s Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counterterrorism, Kris McGuffie ’97, MANPTS ’19 reflects on what has led her to this point.

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erhaps you have felt it before: a clear insight, appearing as a flash of images or words that lands as if delivered from a wise friend. As you take action from that place of knowing, you allow yourself to be swept up with trust in the veracity of your idea. The decision to act on the faith of this insight feels like traveling in a current.

On each of the three occasions I have selected Middlebury as a place to be, to learn, and to grow, I’ve done so not just as an intellectual choice but also as an intuitive one. I felt a pull that I could not fully identify, feelings of certainty that I could not shake.

This current has transported me through two degree programs and into my new field. In this current, I have met the most significant people in my life. I fell in love and established a partnership that marks its 23rd year this fall. Many of my dearest friends are people I came to know through Middlebury. While it is common to forge connections while pursuing higher education, what is uncommon and distinctive is the quality of those relationships. My Middlebury community

has helped me to weather loss, despair, and disappointment. This community has enabled me to find humor in stress, clarity in confusion, and vitality in dysfunction.

I entered Middlebury College as a teenager and left as a young adult, steeped in the social sciences, in literature, and in writing. Middlebury helped me learn how to think and how to grow into myself.

When I returned to Middlebury, by way of its vibrant Institute, the current guided me into the international sphere. I immersed myself in the Summer Intensive Language Program (SILP), building a foundation in Arabic and preparing myself for two whirling years of intense study within nonproliferation and terrorism studies and a regional emphasis on the Middle East.

At the Middlebury Institute, I garnered insights about how to approach some of the most troublesome challenges plaguing our planet.

I have continued to move within the current now as an Institute employee at the Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counterterrorism (CTEC). The flow is faster, the water is deeper, and the connections to the big-hearted, passionate,

and good-humored people I’ve found in this current have multiplied exponentially. It’s a privilege to experience Middlebury as a staff member, serving the students and the larger institutional mission. My colleagues at the Institute carry a unique set of qualities I’ve come to love—they are individuals who focus on contribution and connection, dedicated to serving a larger purpose through their work in the world.

When we are carried by a current, we don’t always know our precise destination. We place trust in the current itself and in our own abilities to navigate within it. We may forecast the many destinations we could find before we are finally carried to shore, but the experience is one of moving toward the indefinite and unknown. The current I travel within now is carrying me into waters I had previously only imagined myself within. I’ve set my sights on a distant shore, and I trust this journey to be replete with people I’ve been destined to meet for a long time now. When they arrive, I will know them by the character of their hearts and the quality of their minds. n

My Middlebury community has helped me to weather loss, despair, and disappointment.

WESLEY LAÎNÉ

ILLUSTRATIONS BY GWEN KERAVAL

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ILLUSTRATION BY JASU HU

Winter 2020 7

WHAT I’VE LEARNED

Tsuneo Akaha Job Title Professor Areas of Research International migration, Russia East-Asia relations

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PHOTOGRAPH BY ED CALDWELL

Who Are We? An immigration scholar examines the issue anew—by expanding his geographical focus.

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rofessor tsuneo akaha has taught courses on migration-related topics at the Institute for decades, and during that time his academic area has been focused on the Americas and East Asia.

Last spring, Akaha decided to expand his geographical focus to Europe and the Middle East through a sabbatical in Bordeaux, France. His experience in France led to some surprising comparisons to his native Japan.

I define who I am. I have been in this country for 40 years. I never saw myself as an immigrant until I started teaching migration. My experience in this country has been so positive that I was never treated as different—as far as I know. I am who I am as an individual, and that is all that matters. When I return to Japan I now feel like a quasi-outsider, but at the same time, I feel less and less like an outsider here in the U.S. Views towards immigration are often linked to the economy of a nation. When any country experiences a booming economy, laws and policies tend to be adjusted to make it easier for companies to hire foreign workers. When there is a downturn in the economy, attitudes change. There are exceptions to this rule, though.

The media is not always accurate. Before I went to France to conduct my research, I had read a lot about negative attitudes toward refugees and migrants, but when I got there I realized that on the ground the reality is much more nuanced. There are still a lot of people who embrace the historical openness of the French society and even go so far as opening their homes and

volunteering their time to help. Others look at their culture as being “infiltrated” or “invaded.” The point is that it is often easier to tell a simple story in the media than a more complex story that is closer to reality.

Despite a growing need for workers, many rural areas are resistant to immigration.

In the wine-producing areas near Bordeaux, I found growing unease and even resentment about the influx of migrant workers at nearby wineries. Through my research I discovered that the main reason is that the people there fear that immigrants are threatening their sense of identity. At the same time, these wine producers feel under attack from wine producers in other countries that are producing wine and marketing it as “French” wine even though it is not. There are many factors that come into play, and sentiments about immigration are often complicated.

France is built on openness, but in reality there are a lot of frustrations. The economy is suffering, immigrants are seen as not making an effort to assimilate and become “French,” and the media picks up on sensational stories that add fuel to that particular fire. Immigrants experience information discrimination, and there is segregation between groups, even if that is not official. In some cases, there is societal self-selection, where people live with the group of people they identify with, but often it is a matter of economics, with migrants choosing to live where they can afford to live, which results in self-segregation. There has been a politicization of immigration issues, and now France is moving in the direction of more restrictive policies.

Japan is moving in the opposite direction.

Society is slowing down in Japan and the structure has to change. There is a need for migrant labor, but politicians are running on nationalist, anti-immigration sentiments. Economic needs and politics are not in sync there. The myth of cultural and racial homogeneity is very strong in Japan.

Famously, Japan does not accept dual citizenship, but more than that, a foreigner born and raised in Japan but looking “foreign” is not considered Japanese. In that respect, citizenship is based on looks rather than values.

Bookkeeping matters. France’s commitment to cultural assimilation means that government officials are not allowed to ask or record the ethnicity of people they deal with. In reality, however, people make assumptions, and there is indirect discrimination. Not having records makes it hard to correct for antidiscrimination policies.

This is one example of how the French are holding onto old ideals of who they are as a country. In Japan, on the other hand, the government wants to know everything about you. Some of the statistics they publish, such as crime statistics, are purposefully discriminatory. The crimes they cite include breaking immigration law, which makes it appear that, statistically, foreigners commit more crimes.

We are at a period in time when nations are asking themselves, “Who are we?”

Questions about what makes a nation, what the thresholds are for a minority to have a voice, and other issues like that are bubbling up around the world. At the Institute you can have very open and liberal discussions about these issues because of the diverse backgrounds of students. n

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PHOTOGRAPH BY ED CALDWELL

As Needed

Within the Institute’s Custom Language Program, no two solutions are the same.

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n the first floor of the McGowan Building on Pacific Street, Alicia Brent matesol ’03 is running what amounts to a start-up incubator; yet, unlike most start-ups, this initiative is actually turning a profit. Custom Language Services (CLS) began as a small program specializing in one-on-one language lessons and has expanded into an initiative that offers customized (thus the name) language learning sessions to interested parties around the world. We asked Brent to give us a few examples of current CLS projects.

Language for the wine industry. Brent confesses that while the research phase for this newest CLS program has not exactly been drudgery, the idea is to create language programs for people who are truly serious about wine rather than casual sippers—from sommeliers and people involved in import-export to wine investors and aficionados. The pilot program is a collaboration with the University of Rioja, a partner school of Middlebury Schools Abroad in Spain. Regional content experts have brought a great deal of enthusiasm to this project, according to Brent, who is thrilled with the collaboration. The participants will embark on a two-week Spanish language journey of winemaking with insider perspectives on the industry in La Rioja. Through a hands-on approach, experts in viticulture and oenology work hand-in-hand with language faculty while participants network with fellow wine-industry professionals from around the world. “We are talking about a high-quality educational program.” Assuming

ILLUSTRATION BY JASU HU

this pilot program is a success, there is a plan to create related programs in other wine-growing areas where Middlebury has partnerships, such as Italy, France, Argentina, and Chile—and, of course, our very own Monterey County.

English for public diplomacy. Through a partnership with the U.S. Department of State, CLS conducted a needs assessment with several Indian government institutions. This led to the creation of a course called English for Public Diplomacy that Brent teaches regularly at the renowned LBSNAA Civil Service Academy in Mussoorie, India. This partnership followed years of experience creating programs for diplomats and civil servants, as well as another project in India where the Institute created and delivered an online module for training English teachers.

English for disaster management. Another project to come out of the needs assessment in India was a hybrid course for the Kerala Government Civil Authority in Disaster Management. The 12-week online, five-day face-to-face course was designed to guide participants through various types of English communications in disaster relief, incorporating field-specific tasks such as assessing risk, requesting funding, developing partner relationships, and transmitting critical information up the chain of command. Building on the foundation of the program in India, Brent, CLS Curriculum Specialist Lisa Donohoe matesol ’09, and Brandon Lambert matesol ’15 delivered a similar program to disaster management professionals

from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in Indonesia this year and have future sessions planned. “We are very happy with how this program has progressed,” Brent says, adding that the hybrid model allows participants to build professional relationships while honing their language skills to handle real-world communications.

Internationalization and intercultural communication. Katherine Punteney, MIIS International Education Management program chair, is working with Donohoe to develop a program designed to help global institutions of higher education integrate an intercultural and global dimension into postsecondary education.

CLS hopes to work with Middlebury university partners in Brazil to offer this intensive hybrid program to their faculty and staff. “Our model of creating a foundation for a pilot program and building on that to customize courses to meet the needs of our clients is working very well,” Brent says.

CLS is also running multiple programs on campus this fall, some lasting several weeks, others the whole semester. These programs include English for journalism and for the energy industry, and intensive training for diplomats in several different language combinations. “The best part about our business model is that we build on the strengths, expertise, and networks of our diverse Middlebury community,” Brent says, adding, “That also means the possibilities for growth are infinite.” n

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WHAT I’VE LEARNED

Vision Quest

What one sees in the world may very well depend on how one looks for—or at—something.

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research associate with the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Margaret Croy manpts ’18 talks about North Korean WMD proliferation, her unusual career trajectory, and opportunities found in unexpected circumstances.

Researching the nuclear activities of North Korea (DPRK) consumes a great deal of my time at the moment. I spend most of my day looking at satellite images of North Korea, analyzing their state media reports, looking for other information in the open source domain, and trying to figure out the amount of progress they have made on the projects they are working on. My main focus at the moment is their nuclear fuel cycle, and my goal is to go through it and better understand it from start to finish.

One of the things that we have been trying to do is to challenge our assumptions about how the North Koreans view their production of nuclear weapons. That is, we’re attempting to analyze their activities not through the lens of how we might do things (a “Western” lens) but rather trying to step outside of our usual frame of thinking and consider the way North Korea might approach the same challenges. And it’s not even enough to try to see beyond a “Western” frame of reference; to a certain degree, the Russian or Chinese models for producing nuclear weapons are

helpful when assessing North Korea (as is the U.S. workflow), but none of these models can simply be transposed onto the DPRK—it’s a distinct culture and society that has formed distinct ways of thinking about these issues, just like any other nation-state. This seems obvious, but it is so easy to slip into a set of assumptions about how another is doing something just because you do it that way. As analysts, we have to be very mindful of this pitfall.

I have done open source research focused on other regions of the world, and I will certainly say that North Korea’s clamp on information is firm and challenging. That said, I am consistently surprised by how much information it is possible to find.

My colleague, Dave Schmerler manpts ’15, has a magical ability when it comes to ferreting out information, discovering it on all corners of the Internet, and noticing things in satellite imagery that have sometimes gone unnoticed in the open source world for years. We call him “geolocation Jesus.” Jeffrey Lewis is, of course, like this too. I’m grateful to have had them, Melissa Hanham, and Catherine Dill manpts ’13 as mentors and colleagues. There’s no better set of people to learn from.

This type of research is more of a teachable skill than I had originally thought or guessed. We grow up doing research papers throughout elementary school, middle school, high school, college, graduate

This seems obvious, but it is so easy to slip into a set of assumptions about how another is doing something just because you do it that way.

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school, and beyond. The classic methods of research still apply to the problems I work on every day, but there are so many other tools and tricks and new technologies that I’ve learned to use and leverage for my research at CNS. I think back and go, Gosh, if only I had known how to do this years ago.

I studied cultural anthropology at Dartmouth College, and I found it fascinating because the discipline sought to explain how and why various groups of people make decisions the way they do, and how they conceptualize their existence in wider society.

A marvelous anthropology class led me to develop an interest in the Middle East, and later, I was fortunate to go and work in Kuwait for a term. To someone born and raised in the U.S., the Middle East seemed a relatively small geographic region (though the anthropologist in me must point out that the term “Middle East” itself is contested, as is the landmass it describes). And yet, there is such diversity of language, culture, religion, ethnicity, tribalism, and nationalism in this relatively small landmass when compared to American conceptions of size. To me, that richness of diversity, which is both so lovely and which is also often blamed for the many hardships facing the region, was fascinating to study as an anthropologist.

Continued on page 16

Margaret Croy MANPTS ’18 Job Title Research Associate Employer James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies

PHOTOGRAPH BY ADAM EWING

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FACULTY ADVICE

All Eyes on Russia and the U.S. It may very well be the most dysfunctional relationship on the global stage, if not the most discussed. Yet, when many talk about Russia and the United States, the discourse can quickly devolve into schoolyard taunts and superficial portraits that belie the depth of the issues in play.

To bring more clarity to the topic, we asked six faculty experts to tell us what concerns them most about the state of U.S.-Russia relations in the world today.

Having grown up during the Cold War and been trained as a Soviet specialist, I vividly recall the enemy images that dominated media coverage in both countries back then. Yet, during that very dangerous era, decision makers in Moscow and Washington recognized that some issues transcended the prevalent Cold War rivalry. In particular, following the nearly disastrous Cuban Missile Crisis, the U.S. and USSR began to cooperate in preventing the spread and use of nuclear weapons.

Today, there is no longer a sense of any shared interests or respect for or understanding or trust of the other side.

We therefore face not only a world in dis-

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array, but one in which there is a much greater chance that nuclear weapons will be used by accident, by miscalculation, or out of spite. The next generation of nonproliferation specialists we are training at MIIS is our last, best chance to avoid this existential threat.

—William C. Potter, Director, James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies and Sam Nunn and Richard Lugar Professor of Nonproliferation Studies My concerns about the state of U.S.-Russia relations are multifaceted yet interconnected. I’m worried that hostile American rhetoric toward Russia—combined with Western sanctions—will strengthen the nationalistic and anti-Western base of Putin’s supporters.

This could turn Russian youth away from the West while also increasing pressure on the Russian government to give up on trying to engage the United States in resurrecting joint efforts in arms control. A new arms race would redirect funds that must be invested in the modernization of Russia’s infrastruc-

ture, education, medical services, and international efforts in slowing down consequences of global warming.

At the same time, in the United States, I see a degradation of media discourse on Russia that I find reminiscent of the McCarthy era. This leads to an exaggeration of the “Russian fear factor” in American domestic politics, which distracts the American public and politicians from addressing the modernization of education, infrastructure, and improving quality of life in the United States. If the U.S. continues to paint Russia as an evil country, a permeation of fear will increase, leading to groupthink that is hostile to necessary contacts between scholars, students, and journalists—not to mention diplomats— of the two countries.

—Anna Vassilieva, Professor of Russian Studies and Director, Graduate Initiative in Russian Studies I am most concerned with what the U.S.-Russia relationship leaves out— rampant discrimination and xenophobia against millions of labor migrants in Russia. For example, hundreds of thousands of immigrants from Kyrgyzstan, including my close family members, live and work in Russia in response to demand for low-skilled jobs there. It is heart-wrenching to hear their firsthand accounts of how they are treated with contempt and discriminated against. This happens at every step of the way—from using public

ILLUSTRATION BY ROBERT NEUBECKER

NEWS

transportation to experiencing frequent law enforcement raids in their cramped rentals simply because they have darker skin. Offenders are not just far-right groups but also police and other public servants. I stopped traveling to and via Russia because I, too, have been discriminated against, although this is nothing compared to what labor migrants who live and work there have been experiencing for over a decade. Non-U.S. media has been covering this problem to some extent. Sadly, I believe the United States has ceased to be a human rights champion at home, let alone globally.

—Mahabat Baimyrzaeva, Associate Professor of International Policy and Development What concerns me is the fact that the United States (at least its leadership and the mainstream media) does not seem able to entertain the possibility that Russia may have legitimate interests of its own, which do not have to be aligned with America’s goals or directly oppose them.

As a result, every Russian success is decried as a threat, and every problem Russia faces is hailed as a welcome challenge to the “regime.” This zero-sum-game mentality prevents meaningful cooperation between the two countries and reduces the complexity of the world’s affairs to a simplistic, albeit convenient, “us vs. them” standoff.* —Dmitry Buzadzi, Visiting Professor of Translation and Interpretation I’m most concerned about the impact of U.S.-Russia relations on the position of the Baltics and other “Westward”-looking Eastern European countries. Mainly,

will the U.S. guarantee their safety and honor its prior commitments to these nations?

Also, I believe that there is such an imbalance between the two countries when considering language skills and cultural understanding. There are so many more people in Russia who understand English and American culture than there are Americans who really understand Russia and Russian. The American ideology of “we can get by anywhere with English” puts the United States at a decided disadvantage in listening to and convincingly arguing our positions to Russians in their own words and their own ways of understanding.

—Thor Sawin, Associate Professor of Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages/ Teaching Foreign Languages What concerns me most is both quite simple and profoundly unsettling: the seeming inability for the two countries to reach each other on a human level. This job is first and foremost about relationships, and there was a time—back in the early 2000s after 9/11—that the United States was able to work relatively closely with Russia on chemical and biological weapons nonproliferation issues. We had some hope of that happening again these past few years related to Syria, but that obviously didn’t materialize. Around the offices at CNS, I’m continuously reminded that such relationships are possible, but on the international stage I’m not seeing it.

—Richard Pilch, Director, Chemical and Biological Weapons Nonproliferation Program, James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies n

Today, there is no longer a sense of any shared interests or respect for or understanding or trust of the other side. * Editor’s Note: We recognize that our choice of cover illustration might feed into the “zero-sum game mentality” that Professor Buzadzi speaks of. Would love to hear readers’ thoughts about this.

A Foray into Online Learning The Middlebury Institute has launched its first fully online graduate degree. The online Master of Arts in Translation and Localization Management (TLM) is an advanced-entry degree, designed for working professionals. Applications are now open and the first students will start pursuing their degrees in the fall of 2020.

This new 32-credit degree was created as a response to requests from people working in the field of localization management who would like to earn their degree, improve their skills, and take the next step in their career, without taking time away from their careers. “While our on-site enrollment is fantastic, we wanted to be able to offer the degree to those who can’t easily relocate,” says TLM Program Chair Max Troyer. “Our online students will learn the skills that will let them take their careers to the next level and also apply what they learn to their current positions.”

The localization and language services industry, which focuses on the translation of products into local languages and the adaptation of products to suit local cultures and markets, is a $40 billion market, projected to grow at a rate of more than 7 percent annually.

“We are thrilled to launch this online degree in fall 2020,” remarks Laura Burian, dean of the Graduate School of Translation, Interpretation, and Language Education. “It will be a great fit for alumni from our translation, translation and interpretation, and conference interpretation degrees, and for others in the field with work experience who want to continue working full time while gaining more in-depth localization skills.” n

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WHAT I’VE LEARNED

Continued from page 12 Eventually, I started to consider radicalization patterns within the context of the Middle East, both historically and in modern times. How does someone transform some point of dissatisfaction in their lives into a willingness to carry out a terrorist attack? What are the steps in that process?

Then? Then I became a professional photographer. [Laughs.] I had my own business throughout college, and when I graduated, I moved to New York City to run it full time.

Life circumstances led me to close my business, leave the East Coast, and return to California, where I had grown up.

As I started to think about my next move, or next step in life, I kept returning to that question of radicalization that had begun to form in college—how does it happen?

Why does it happen? What can we do to prevent it? I also found myself missing school and academia, and the type of structured learning that transpires in such an environment. Bounded by geography, I started looking for graduate programs that could be a good fit for myself and my family. Then I discovered the Middlebury Institute, and I thought, This is the perfect solution for me . . . if I can get in!

Just as my background in anthropology has helped me both with my pursuit of graduate education and with the work I do now, so has my photography

experience. Spending a lot of time with a camera up to your face teaches you to look at the world in a different way, and it teaches you to be quite observant. So now, when I look at a satellite image, I try to put myself back in the same frame of mind as when I was composing photographs. No detail is too small to examine. My anthropology background always serves as a good reminder not to consider the world, and the problems I’m studying, without recognizing my own perspective and biases, which is useful both in this work and in life in general.

May I add one more thing? Perhaps the most important, really. The reason I moved back to California, the reason I closed my business, and the reason I started to look at graduate schools was because my mother had gotten a diagnosis of early-onset Lewy body dementia and Parkinson’s. She lived in California and I felt absolute conviction that coming home to take care of her was both the right thing to do and what I wanted to do, so my search for what I was going to do next was very much bounded by geography. I said earlier that the Middlebury Institute was a perfect solution, and a big part of that—in addition to location and mission and the NPTS program— was the kindness and patience shown to me by the faculty as I navigated being a student, a caretaker, a graduate research assistant, and a human in my mid-20s all at once. They were so gracious and supportive as I worked through it all, and for that, I will be forever grateful.

My mom passed away about a month ago, so I’ve been reflecting on how . . . let’s call them a series of accidents . . . has led me to where I am today. I didn’t expect to close a business that was doing well, I didn’t expect to move back across the country with no concrete plan of what to do next, I obviously didn’t expect to lose my mother in my mid-20s; I saw none of this coming. But I’ve found a lot of hope and solace in the notion that while this path of mine has had substantial challenges, it also has yielded opportunities I could not have imagined were possible.

I’ve been fortunate to work at the Naval Postgraduate School, the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and CNS, first as a graduate research assistant, and now in my capacity as a research associate. I’ve been the youngest person (and the only lady!) in the room for a number of meetings, seminars, conferences, and dialogues where I’ve thought, I never imagined I would get to sit here and witness history in action (full disclosure: I’m a massive history nerd). I met my husband in the Middlebury Institute Summer Intensive Language Program; we were in the same Arabic class. A friend offered to let me write as a coauthor on a paper near the beginning of my time in the NPTS program, and I fell head-over-heels for the nonproliferation and arms control world.

I never would have expected to have such good fortune and such sadness coincide, but the life I find myself fortunate to be leading now has been a beautiful salve to my grief. I can’t help but be grateful. n

Spending a lot of time with a camera up to your face teaches you to look at the world in a different way, and it teaches you to be quite observant.

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IN BRIEF

recent news from members of the institute community in monterey and around the world.

SIGHTINGS ›› This fall, Chelsea Jordan MAIEP ’16 ran her first 50k ultramarathon. It was the culmination of an 8-month season of the “Becoming Ultra” podcast, which each season features two novice ultrarunners and then follows up as they run the race together. The other runner, by total coincidence, was a fellow Institute graduate—Heather Ficke MAIPS ’16. While they both studied at the Institute in 2015, they had never met before they ran together at the marathon in Norton, Virginia, the weekend of October 12–13.

And as a bonus, they came in first and second for the women’s 50k!

›› “If we don’t understand the threat, then we can’t defeat the threat,” alumnus Clint Watts MAIPS ‘05 testified before the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs on Countering Domestic Terrorism in September, making the case for increased funding for research and training, among other things. ›› “Behind every language is a mentality.” The Associated Press featured alumnus Alexandre Ponomarev MACI ‘00, chief interpreter at the Tokyo Olympics next year.

“I believe that in acquiring a language, you also acquire a certain mentality.” ›› “We are freelancers by choice,” Professor Barry Slaughter Olsen MACI ‘99 told the Wall Street Journal about how new California law AB 5, which has been called the anti-gig economy bill, impacts interpreters and translators. “I cannot see how being a parttime employee of six or seven different agencies or entities is feasible.”

series hosted by Middlebury President Laurie L. Patton. ›› “Every morning when I wake up and read the newspaper I am scared to see what treaty the U.S. is leaving,” Russian Ambassador to the U.S. Anatoly Antonov told students in Dr. William Potter’s NPT Negotiation Simulation class.

On October 8, students had the opportunity to engage directly with Ambassador Antonov, who formerly headed a number of Russian NPT delegations.

PRESENTATIONS ›› Jason Blazakis, director

interpretation assignment, it does not get much better than interpreting for the President of France. In October, Petal Gahlot MATI ‘20 interpreted at a meeting between Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh and French President Emmanual Macron in Paris, France. Gahlot is part of a cohort of Indian diplomats studying in the translation and interpretation degree program.

of the Institute’s Center on Terrorism, Extremism, and Counterterrorism presented at the Soufan Center’s Global Security Forum in Doha in October, along with Ali Soufan, Peter Bergen, Mia Bloom, and a host of international security experts. This year’s event focused on security challenges related to modern disinformation. Blazakis also presented on using open source tools to counter terrorism finance at a regional workshop organized by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime in Mongolia in September.

›› Temie Giwa-Tubosun MPA

›› Three faculty members

’10 discusses her work as the founder of LifeBank, a social enterprise that saves lives across Nigeria by efficiently delivering blood to labs and hospitals across the country, in the third episode of MiddMoment: Ideas of Our Day, a new podcast

presented on their research at the Fall Faculty Forum at Middlebury College in September. Professor and co-chair of the International Trade and Economic Diplomacy degree Wei Liang presented on “U.S.-China Rivalry: Trade War, Tech

›› As a first formal

War, or New Cold War?” Gabriel Guillen, associate professor of Spanish, gave a presentation on “Language Learning Entrepreneurship for the 21st Century,” and Philipp Bleek, associate professor of Nonproliferation and Terrorism Studies, presented on “Answering Threats with Threats: Are Iranian Biological Weapons Fears Driving Offensive Development?” ›› Bleek and Cyrus A. Jabbari MANPTS ‘20 presented their joint research on Iranian government officials’ and affiliates’ biological weapons threat perceptions and responses at Middlebury’s Washington, D.C., office earlier in September. The talk was attended by a combination of Middlebury Institute and Middlebury College alumni and U.S. government officials. ›› This past summer, Associate Professor Moyara Ruehsen conducted training for Pakistani government officials and law enforcement in Islamabad, Pakistan. The training focused on open source tools for financial crime investigations and suspect identification. This is the fifth training of this kind that Professor Ruehsen, who oversees the Institute’s Financial Crime Management program, has conducted in collaboration with the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime. ›› Also this past summer, Associate Professor Mahabat

Winter 2020 17

IN BRIEF

“Any well-crafted apology must claim responsibility for the transgression—not attribute one’s actions to happenstance or external factors.”

—Lisa Leopold, associate professor of English language studies, writing about the art of apologizing in The Conversation.

Baimyrzaeva facilitated a strategic planning retreat for the Roza Otunbayeva Initiative (ROI) in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.

“The retreat enabled the leadership and the staff of ROI to rethink their own individual and organizational strengths, as well as refine their organizational strategy in the context of the country’s development.” ›› The Center for the Blue Economy (CBE) and Blue Frontier Campaign coconvened a meeting of thought leaders from across industry, government, academia, and the conservation community of California in October.

Attendees worked to refine the Ocean Climate Action Plan, a.k.a. the “Blue New Deal,” and prepare it for the national stage. CBE and the Blue Frontier Campaign put forward the Ocean Climate Action Plan as a way for the U.S. to respond to climate impacts on the world’s oceans.

AWARDS AND ACHIEVEMENTS ›› A professor of education at Teachers College at Columbia University, Michelle KnightManuel MATESOL ‘84 has been named the executive editor of the Teachers College Record.

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The Record is a monthly peerreviewed journal of research, analysis, and commentary in the field of education. ›› Two students were awarded Boren Fellowships for the study of less commonly taught languages in world regions critical to U.S. interests and underrepresented in study abroad. Abby Richardson MAIPD ‘20 studied Arabic over the summer in Jordan, and Nicholas Seltzer MANPTS ‘20 studied in China during the fall semester. ›› Seven students were awarded the Critical Language Scholarship to study language over the past summer. Three were awarded the fully funded scholarship to study Arabic: James Taylor MPA ’20 in Oman, Jonelle Still MAIPD/MAITED ‘20 in Jordan, and Kelsey Keehfus MANPTS ’20 in Morocco. JoAnn Doll MAIEM ’19 studied Indonesian in Malang, Indonesia, and Benjamin Wollam MAITED ’19 studied Chinese in Changchun, China. Umile Belmonte MATESOL ’19 spent the summer in Chandigarh, India, studying Punjabi, and Adriana Threlkeld MAIPD ’20 worked on her Portuguese in Florianopolis, Brazil.

›› Just before she graduated last spring, Samantha Vila MATI ’19 learned that she had won the World Literature Today student translation contest. In addition to a monetary award, her entry was published in the online edition of World Literature Today magazine.

Vila’s submission for the contest was a translation of the short story “Herford” by Gunter Silva, a young Peruvian writer. ›› Katharina Gruenwald MAIPD ’19 was selected as the firstever Amnesty International USA Fellow, funded by the Jan Knippers Black Fund for Human Rights Protection.

PUBLICATIONS ›› “We’re not teaching students enough about weapons of mass destruction—and it shows,” warns Sarah Bidgood MANPTS ‘16, director of the Eurasia Nonproliferation Program at the Institute’s James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, in her article, “The Bomb in College Classrooms,” published by Inside Higher Ed. ›› Associate Professor Lisa Leopold’s “3 tips for Justin Trudeau on how to say ‘I’m sorry’” was published by The

Conversation in September. The article is based on Leopold’s research on the language of public apologies. Her research was featured in the Inside Higher Ed “Academic Minute” podcast. ›› The latest issue of Foreign Language Annals (52/2) includes an article by Lama Nassif MATESOL ‘07: “Salience in the Noticing and Production of L2 Arabic Forms.” She is currently an assistant professor of Arabic studies at Williams College in Williamstown, Mass. ›› Professor Jeffrey W. Knopf, chair of the NPTS degree program, coedited Behavioral Economics and Nuclear Weapons, a new collection of essays examining how insights about decision making from behavioral economics can inform nuclear policy. ›› International Education Management Assistant Professor David Wick is one of the editors of a new virtual issue of Frontiers: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Study Abroad dedicated to diversity and inclusion in education abroad. ›› Associate Professor Netta Avineri coedited (with Laura

Communiqué R. Graham, Eric J. Johnson, Robin Conley Riner, Jonathan Rosa) the Routledge Publishers volume Language and Social Justice in Practice. ›› The article “How Terrorist Actors in Pakistan Use Nuclear Weapons for Political Influence” by Associate Professor Sharad Joshi was published in the journal Asian Security. This article expands on the current research on nuclear terrorism by investigating how terrorist actors seek to capitalize on the nuclear weapons discourse in a country to gain domestic political influence.

PASSAGES ›› Ron Beimel MATI ´11 died tragically in June when he was one of eight climbers swept away by an avalanche in the Himalayas. Ron and his group were climbing Nanda Devi East, one of the twin peaks of the 21,000-foot Nanda Devi mountain in India, when the avalanche struck, according to Indian officials. Recovery efforts were slowed by difficult weather and terrain, but were recently completed. ›› The son of an American father and Japanese mother, Beimel mastered both English and Japanese and was building a successful career as a translator while also leading tours in Japan with his father’s company, Esprit Travel & Tours. In addition, Beimel was a passionate outdoorsman who hiked and climbed extensively, including on Mt. Shasta, Mt. Whitney, Mt.

Kaweah in Sequoia National Park, in Yosemite, and in the Sierras, as well as in the Scottish Highlands, on the Cascade volcanoes in British Columbia, and in Iceland.

“Ron was an excellent student and translator,” Professor Tanya Pound Williams says.

“He was also very artistic, as is evident in his photos.”

Ron’s Instagram account for his climbing and outdoor adventure photos, @summitviews, is filled with images of natural beauty. ›› “Ron’s warm and adventurous spirit will be missed, and we offer his family and friends our deepest condolences,” Jeffrey DaytonJohnson, vice president for academic affairs and dean of the Institute, shared in his message to the alumni community. ›› Heather Frank MAIEM ’13 passed away in August after succumbing to complications of a rare neurological disease.

Frank was part of the first cohort of International Education Management students who arrived on campus in the fall of 2012. From 2014 until her passing, she was employed at LinkedIn, where she worked in recruiting. ›› “Heather was a true internationalist and a dedicated international educator,” says Katherine Punteney, IEM program chair.

A dedicated alumni volunteer and strong supporter of the Institute, Frank regularly connected with IEM students in the cohorts that followed

her, helping advise them in their career searches. She was also one of the founders of the Bay Area Young Professionals in International Education networking group. “Heather was so passionate about the field of international education and how to help others achieve their dreams,” says her friend, classmate, and former colleague at LinkedIn Michelle Carrega MAIEM/MPA ’13. ›› While at the Institute, Frank worked with Admissions.

She was elected by her peers as the IEM Student Council representative and worked closely with students and faculty to build community, organizing events and celebrations for the cohort and representing student perspectives in program meetings. Her language of study was Chinese, and in the summer after her first year, she was awarded the highly competitive Critical Languages Scholarship (CLS) to further her Chinese studies in Qingdao, China. ›› “Heather was such a bright light, filled with so much love for the world and helping others—she dedicated her life to making the world a better place,” says Carrega.

Adds Punteney: “She encouraged and supported those around her, and brought joy to our lives through her presence. I am honored to have been able to work alongside her, and grieve her loss while treasuring her memory.” n

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