College of Humanities and Fine Arts

CHFA is proud to welcome alum and singer-songwriter S.G. Goodman as the featured guest for the 2026 Charles and Marlene Johnson Colloquium Series. Goodman will share experiences that shaped her as an artist and perform selections from her acclaimed albums on Thursday, September 17 at 7:00pm in Lovett Auditorium. The event is free and open to everyone.

A native of Hickman, Kentucky, S.G. Goodman graduated from Murray State in 2013 with a B.A. in philosophy and a minor in creative writing. She has released three studio albums, Old Time Feeling (2020), Teeth Marks (2022), and Planting by the Signs (2025), and has headlined sold-out tours and opened for artists such as Tyler Childers and Jason Isbell in venues from Red Rocks to the Grand Ole’ Opry. Goodman has also been a featured artist on Mountain Stage, World Cafe, NPR’s Tiny Desk Concerts and Austin City Limits. Find out more.

The Humanities+ program began its 2026-27 event series on with "Stage Ready: A Guide to Mastering Presence in Interviews, Presentations, and High Stakes Moments" with Dr. Ashley Cumming from the Department of Music. Dr. Cumming presented practical tips and strategies for managing our nerves in stressful situtations, including striking a Power Pose!

HUM+ September events include

• Friday, Sept. 11 @ 2:00pm in Faculty Hall 208: "Passport to Discovery: Student Research Abroad"
• Monday, Sept. 14 @ 4:00pm in Waterfield Library Gallery: "Pages & Possibilties: Art Journaling" (Register for a seat here; space is limited!)
• Friday, Sept. 18 @ 8:45am-4:00pm in Faculty Hall 208: HUM+ Career Ready Student Conference

All events are free! Details on all HUM+ events can be found on the program website.

"I received a Scholarship Award from the LPA (Little People of America) because I am short. My best advice about scholarships is that you never know what you might accomplish if you're too afraid to try it. Submit those applications!"

Doctor of Arts program alumnae Susie Fries and Julie Eng are published in the current issue of Teaching English in the Two-Year College, the journal of the Two-Year College English Association (an NCTE constituent group): "Faculty Perceptions of Multimodality in Community College Composition Classrooms in Tennessee and Virginia". The study addresses faculty perceptions of multimodality and multimodal assignments across the majority of community colleges in Tennessee and Virginia.

Dr. Julie Eng is an assistant professor of English at Paul D. Camp Community College in Franklin, Virginia, and Dr. Susie Fries is a visiting lecturer of English at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga.

Tanzina Halim and Shanjida Halim recently published their article, "Postmethod as Negotiation: Narratives of Teacher Agency in Gulf EFL Contexts" in the Journal of Language Teaching and Research, Vol. 17, No. 4. This study explores how six experienced EFL teachers across three Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries interpret and enact postmethod principles within standardized educational systems.

Over the summer, Lily completed a photography internship with the Paducah Chiefs, the summer collegiate baseball team in the Ohio Valley League at Brooks Stadium in Paducah, Kentucky. She is currently working as a photographer with Murray State's Office of Athletic Communications. "I truly love being able to document these moments of raw emotion, as well as the big moments in people’s lives."

On Saturday, August 29, senior Hiistory majors Emmi Knight and Dylan Ellis from Dr. Christine Lindner’s HIS 400: Senior Research Seminar course visited a number of historic sites in Hopkinsville, guided by Alissa Keller, executive director of the Museums of Hopkinsville-Christian County. The theme of this semester’s class is the History of Death, and the students were shown a variety of artifacts held at the Pennyroyal Area Museum, including mourning outfits, embalming equipment, funeral announcements, and demographic records from the nineteenth to twentieth centuries, which the students are planning to use in their research papers. The students also toured historic cemeteries in Hopkinsville and helped preserve history by cleaning graves at the Union Benevolent Cemetery #5, which is a historic Black cemetery in Hopkinsville.

This past June, Dr. James Humphreys, Dr. Tamara Feinstein and Dr. Christine Lindner from the Department of History joined History students Emma Alexander and Gabe Crass to participate in the annual meeting of the Kentucky Museum and Heritage Alliance that took place in Paducah. The group shared their experiences as teachers and students of Public History on the roundtable discussion “Experiential Learning Through Public History: Teaching History Beyond the Classroom.” History alumni Nathan Lynn also attended the annual meeting presenting the paper “Paducah’s Laying Around the Bend: The Mary Wheeler Collection.”

Over the three days, the group met with museum professionals from across the Commonwealth who discussed their collections and spoke about their experiences working in the field of public history. They also learned new skills to read historic documents, like quilt drafting charts! The meeting included excursions to local historic sites including a visit to Wickliffe Mounds, the Hotel Metropolitan, the Quilt Museum and the Market House Museum that was hosting an exhibit on regional artist Helen LaFrance.

Over the past summer, Anabelle had the privilege of interning with Judge Blau and Judge Erin Sizemore at the Campbell County District Court. During the internship, she gained hands-on experience assisting with juvenile, guardianship, and small claims cases, while observing proceedings ranging from arraignments and bench trials to a jury trial and oral arguments before the Kentucky Supreme Court in the Masters case.

"I am incredibly grateful for this opportunity to learn from the judges, the talented attorneys in the Campbell County Public Defender's Office and County Attorney's Office, the bailiffs, and the dedicated Circuit Clerk's Office, who are the true backbone of the courthouse. Being able to work with these dedicated individuals was incredibly rewarding and inspiring."

Last fall, Takeda, along with a colleague, presented their research at the JALT International Conference in Tokyo. Just last month, that research, titled “Acquiring Collocations Through Multimodal Flashcards,” was published in the conference’s post-conference publication. "The journal editors said that only about half of the submitted papers were accepted for publication, so I feel very proud of the research!"

Dr. Carthell published a book chapter earlier this summer. "Promoting learning and academic success: A principle-based, student-centered approach to providing feedback in college writing courses" appears in Progress in Education (R. V. Nata (Ed.), Nova Science Publishers, Vol. 91, pp. 177–191).

CHFA education faculty Drs. Rebecca Williams (Art), Latricia Trites (English & TESOL), Olga Koulisis (History), and Joan Eckroth-Riley (Music) were part of MSU's Lesson Plan Taskforce in which they worked with College of Education and Human Services faculty and community partners to redesign the Lesson Plan format for all Murray State University education students. Not only is it a new streamlined format, but it includes student examples across grade levels and detailed instructions and resources for pre-service teachers. Check it out!

Dr. Clardy offered historical perspective and analysis on Kentucky and national political issues in a variety of regional and statewide media venues this summer, including on WPSD Local 6, WKMS, The Paducah Sun, Forward Kentucky and Progress Kentucky’s Colonels of Truth podcast. His commentary addressed the May 2026 Kentucky primary and upcoming elections, the future of U.S. Sen. Mitch McConnell’s Senate seat, campaign-finance law, the nation’s 250th anniversary and Kentucky’s annual Fancy Farm Picnic. He also discussed Kentucky’s growing data-center industry and other public-policy issues, drawing on his expertise in American political history and his longstanding interest in Kentucky politics and public life. Read more about Dr. Clardy's summer appearances here.

Joan Eckroth-Riley and Dan Johnson have co-edited a second book in the series "Lessons Learned; Another Dozen Lesson Plans for Orff Process and Improvisation." This series of books includes lesson plans and assessments that integrate the Orff Schulwerk process of singing, speech, moving, and playing instruments in a playful manner for the general music classroom. All lessons include detailed assessments, and many are cross-curricular. Books can be purchased on Amazon, West Music, or directly through Kendall Hunt Publishers at https://www.innovativeinkpublishing.com/iip-product/lessons-learned-2 .

Dr. Fritz delivered an invited talk at the "V Congreso Internacional para la Enseñanza del Español" organized by the University Internacional de San Isidro Labrador (UISIL) in Pérez Zeledón, Costa Rica. The talk, titled "Notas para un análisis interpretativo de 'La ventana' de Carlos Herrera Salazar," discussed a close reading of the short story "La ventana" by Costa Rican author Carlos Herrera Salazar in the context of the teaching of Spanish to native speakers as well as those learning it as a second language.

Dr. Gianforte served on the jury the Carmel-Klavier International Piano Competition, from June 24 to June 28, 2026. The competition brought over 150 pianists, aged 5 to 18, to Carmel, Indiana from 20 states and several countries across the globe.

From June 27 to July 11, he served as a member of the faculty of the Indiana University Summer Piano Academy, The IU Piano Academy has been one of the foremost summer programs for pre-college pianists for nearly 40 years.

Dr. Gianforte also began a one-year term as a member of the 2027 Music Teachers National Association Conference Planning Committee. The committee is responsible for reviewing over 600 applications from teachers and scholars across the U.S. and selecting proposals to include in the 2027 MTNA Conference in St. Louis.

This summer Dr. Koulisis conducted research at UMass Boston, the Boston Public Library, and the Wisconsin Historical Society. She looked at the ethnic press and the papers of Greek American politicians to examine political rhetoric on identity, family, and democratic belonging in the 1980s. She also visited the National Archives, the Library of Congress, and several Smithsonians in Washington D.C. for the nation's semiquincentennial. In August, she attended the "America at 250 Educators Summit" on engaging learners through civics, inquiry, and media literacy sponsored by Wisconsin PBS.

Dr. Martinson celebrated the publication of his third novel, Blood River Witch, in June (Counterpoint Press). Set on Kentucky’s Blood River, the novel follows Deputy Sheriff Alicia Moore as she investigates the death of her ex-fiance, whose brutal occultist murder strongly resembles a similar murder decades ago.

Dr. Martinson also had two essays about crime fiction published this summer: "(A.C.A.G.) All Cops Are Grotesque: Writing the Southern Gothic Police Officer" in Crime Reads and "Behind Every Bad Boy" in Oxford American.

Dr. Park served as an official collaborative pianist for the Carmel Klavier International Piano Competition on June 28 in Carmel, Indiana.

Dr. Park also served as a faculty member of the Indiana University Summer Piano Academy from June 27 to July 11. The Piano Academy brings serious pianists from all over the country and abroad to Bloomington each summer.

This past May 2026, Dr. Picech presented at the Annual Congress of the Asociación Canadiense de Hispanistas, an international conference hosted by the University of Salamanca, Spain. Her paper Más allá de las palabras (“Beyond Words"), examines contemporary artistic representations of street visual art that use the body as a point of convergence and a medium for conveying powerful messages.

In July, Dr. Seward's research article was published in the Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis. The article, titled "Examining the effect of session duration on step count during the Step it UP! Game" and written with co-authors Ryan Redner and Brooke Emmert, presents a study that evaluated how changes in the duration of an interdependent group-contingency physical activity intervention affected step cadence and pauses in step-taking among young adults with disabilities.

In May 2026, Dr. Connor Viets completed his final project and earned his Doctor of Music degree from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music.

His doctoral document, entitled “Sonic Architecture: Navigating Design, Bravura, and Organized Expression in Andy Akiho’s Seven Pillars,” examines Andy Akiho’s groundbreaking 80-minute work for percussion quartet. The research explores Akiho’s biography and artistic development, the deeply collaborative process between the composer and Sandbox Percussion that shaped the work from its inception through its premiere, and five analytical perspectives designed to inform performance practice.

Dr. Viets presented his research at the National Conference on Percussion Pedagogy, held at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, Texas, on May 18, 2026. The full document is available through the Indiana University institutional repository.

In May, Dr. Xia collaborated with Elsa Aderson on a TESOL International Professional Development Webinar, “Strategies That Speak: Teaching Literacy Through Cultural Lens.” Their presentation explored culturally responsive pedagogy and strategies for incorporating students’ cultural backgrounds into literacy instruction.

In June, Dr. Xia presented her research, “Transforming Parent-Teacher Communication Through Parental Involvement Tasks: A Hands-On Preparation–Action–Reflection TBLT Approach,” at the international conference Task-Based Language Teaching (TBLT) in Asia 2026 in Tokyo, Japan.

Dr. Xia also served as a facilitator for a TESOL Press Book Club session in August featuring AI-Enhanced ELT: Innovative Strategies to Transform Your Classroom by Samaheh Eslamdoost. She hosted the session and facilitated discussion and questions among English language teaching professionals from around the world.

The CHFA Shout-Out is a newsletter featuring both faculty and student accomplishments, as well as student organization activities and class projects from around the College of Humanities and Fine Arts. Find out more here.