September 2025 Featured Scholar

Dr. Laura M. Calkins, Associate Professor (Department of History)

What are you watching/streaming?

The BBC’s natural history film series (with Sir David Attenborough) Blue Planet and Blue Planet II.

What games are you playing?

Spectator sports: Big Ten NCAA Football & Women’s Basketball:  Michigan State! Go Green!

What are you listening to?

John Martyn, Sweet Little Mysteries: The Island Anthology; Jackson Brown’s "solo acoustic" catalog; Heart, Heart Live at The Royal Albert Hall.

What are you reading?

William Cobbett, Rural Rides; E̒mile Zola, The Belly of Paris; Caroline Moorhead, A Train in Winter; Rebecca West, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon.

What are you writing/thinking about?

Totalitarianism.