Laura Goering, Professor of Russian at Carleton College, had her 2003 article "'Russian Nervousness': Neurasthenia and National Identity in Nineteenth-Century Russia" recently named one of the "highlights of the decade" by the journal Medical History. The article delves into the idea that although Russian popular understanding of neurasthenia bears little resemblance to the American version, both function similarly as cultural metaphors.

Liz Raleigh, Assistant Professor of Sociology at Carleton College, and her colleague Grace Kao (University of Pennsylvania), recently published a paper, "Is there a (transracial) adoption achievement gap?: A national longitudinal analysis of adopted children's educational performance" in Children and Youth Services Review. Although much of the social sciences literature consistently finds that adopted children do not, on average, perform academically as well as children in biological families, Raleigh and Kao's research is one of the first studies to dig a little deeper by disaggregating adopted children by their type of adoption.

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum will welcome Andrew Flory, assistant professor of music at Carleton College, as the next guest speaker in the American Musicological Society/Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum Lecture Series – a joint collaboration that brings scholarly work to a broader audience and showcases the musicological work of the top scholars in the field.  Flory will give the lecture, “Reissuing Marvin: Musicology and the Modern Expanded Edition” on Wednesday, December 5 at 7 p.m. EST in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum’s Foster Theater.  The event will be live streamed on rockhall.com, and a webcast will be made available on the AMS web site.

Carleton has received a major federal grant to advance the study of the Middle East on campus from the U.S. Department of Education. The College earned the $172,206 grant through the Undergraduate International Studies and Foreign Language (UISFL) Program for a two-year project, “Consolidating Middle East Studies at Carleton College.” The project will be directed by Adeeb Khalid, the Jane and Raphael Bernstein Professor of Asian Studies and History, and Stacy Beckwith, Associate Professor of Hebrew, Chair of the Department of Middle Eastern Languages and Literatures, and Director of the Program in Judaic Studies.

Deborah Appleman, the Hollis L. Caswell Professor of Educational Studies and Chair of Educational Studies, returned to Syracuse University, where she served as a visiting professor, to receive the prestigious Tolley Medal in recognition of her work on literacy and areas of scholarship related to life long learning. While on campus, Appleman delivered a lecture entitled "Liberal Learning behind Bars: Literacy Education with the Incarcerated."

Tun Myint, assistant professor of political science at Carleton, appeared on Dec. 2 on LinkAsia TV regarding Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's recent visit to Burma/Myanmar. Myint's appearance comes a little under four minutes into the segment. He spoke about what reforms might be possible within the country and which the current regime are likely to oppose.

Carleton alumnus Andrew Nieuwkoop '06 (Holland, Mich.), who graduated with a B.A. in chemistry, has been awarded a Junior Research Fulbright Fellowship to conduct post-doctoral research in Berlin, Germany. Nieuwkoop will be studying membrane protein function and structure under Hartmut Oschkinat at the Leibniz-Institut für Molekulare Pharmakologie in order to find future targets for pharmaceuticals. His position builds upon research he conducted for his Ph. D., which was awarded in 2011 by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Chemistry professor Daniela Kohen has coauthored an article published in the Council on Undergraduate Research Quarterly, a journal about student-faculty collaborative research. The article, "Developing a Regional Computational Chemistry Consortium Through Undergraduate Research Conferences," was coauthored by Macalester College professor Keith Kuwata and Hope College professors Will Polik and Brent Krueger.

Joel Weisberg, the Herman and Gertrude Mosier Stark Professor of Physics and Astronomy and the Natural Sciences at Carleton College, was recently featured in an article on the website of the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. The article was an interview with "experimental geographer" Trevor Paglen, with whom Weisberg wrote a paper for the August 2012 issue of Astronomical Journal. Paglen, whose work often focuses on covert or "black" government operations in space, was introduced by Weisberg at an appearance at Carleton last year.

Ruben Ramirez '12 (St. Louis Park, Minn.), who graduated from Carleton last June with a B.A. in economics, has received the second-place award in this year's Undergraduate Student Paper Contest from the Minnesota Economic Association. The MEA, which is sponsored by the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, is a professional connection between business and economic professionals and college economics professors. Ramirez won the award for his paper "Historical Economic Integration in Europe: Application of a Threshold Auto-Regressive Model With Price Data from 1295-1914," which looks at the gradual process of economic integration among European cities.

Congratulations to Tripp Ryder (Bookstore Trade Book Manager), who was named President of MIBA (Midwest Independent Booksellers Association) at its annual conference October 3-5. Tripp will serve as president through early October of 2013. MIBA is a regional not-for-profit trade association that includes locally owned and operated independent bookstores in Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin, as well as the Upper Peninsula of Michigan.

Media outlets around the state of Minnesota are praising former Carleton College swim team captain Josh Meltzer, Class of 1995, with saving three people on Monday, who were caught in a dangerous rip tide off the shores of Lake Superior in Duluth.

The Duluth News-Tribune reports that Meltzer pulled two women and a pre-teen girl out of Lake Superior after they were overcome by a rip current at Park Point.