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I administered and lead on Midwest Energy News' 40 Under 40 campaign. I wrote, edited, and published all the landing pages. In addition to that, I coordinated nomination and judging efforts from dozens of partner organizations across the midwest.

The Politics of Fear and Hope: African Politics

"Monkey Cage Assignment"

I edited, provided feedback, and created a website to publish student writing on current events in African politics.

Research

Highlighted Academic Writing

Senior Honors Thesis

"Playing the Other: Interpreting Colonial Encounters in Earthbound"

This project looked at how one video game fit into Edward Said's theoretical framework of Orientalism. To translate that into nonacademic speak, I look at how an idea of "the East" is created through features unique to video games. This research was a wildly fun way to spend her senior year of college, and if you run into Ana, please talk to her about it.

Abstract: This paper draws attention to the potential for interdisciplinary enrichment between post-

colonial theory and videogames studies. Although some scholars have accounted for Orientalism in video games (Consalvo 2016; Tucker 2006), there has yet to be a thorough engagement between post-colonial theory and video games scholars. This paper starts by elaborating on the colonial nature of games and establishes video games as a fruitful site of post-colonial discourse. After applying post-colonial frameworks from Blaney and Inayatullah (2004) and Nandy (1983) to the video game Earthbound (Ape and HAL Laboratory, 1994). I find that the character Prince Poo and his region Dalaam, are spatially and temporally othered in its depiction and mechanically. For the second case, I find Mr. Saturn challenges these categories of difference.

Research in Political Communications

"Immigrants and Refugees in Minnesota"

I worked as part of a team to create a digital timeline that documents the history of immigration in Minnesota for International Institute of Minnesota. This upper level political science course instructed me in the fundamentals of archival research methods and ethnographic field methods.

"Organization Building and the Leap Manifesto: A Metaphor for the Movement"

I wrote about the environmental movement, new media, and manifesto as a genre. This project familiarized me with methodologies from communications studies like rhetorical analysis. It was selected for the St. Thomas University Conference for Journalism and Communications.

Behavioral Psychology

I worked for over a year and a half on designing an energy monitor that implemented principals from psychology to promote energy saving behavior in student dorms. A professor, one other student, and I co-authored an academic article for publication on the research for the sponsor of the research, MAMAC Systems.

Presentations

Midwest Political Science Association, Pi Sigma Alpha Honors Conference

"Playing the Other: Interpreting Colonial Encounters in Earthbound"

Macalester College Institute for Global Citizenship

"Empathy Craft: Video Game Design Possibilities"

I presented a part of my honors thesis research for the 2018 international Roundtable. I did a comparative analysis of Undertale and Earthbound to illustrate ways to promote empathy with video game characters.

The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE)

"Making Energy Matter: The Psychology of Energy Feedback"

Presented research on designing and presenting energy consumption data to students.

St. Thomas University Undergraduate Conference for Communications and Journalism

"Organization Building and the Leap Manifesto: A Metaphor for the Movement"

Presented research in political communications at undergraduate communications conference.

Projects

Creative Projects

Global Game Jam 2019

"Extrophile"

I made an interactive fiction game about making home in a cold place for the 2019 Global Game Jam.

Creative Writing & Story Telling

"Moving On"

A nonfiction piece written for my upper level speculative and autobiographical fiction course.

"Coffee with a Tall Man"

An audio piece written, recorded, and produced by me to raise money for a local charity event.