Past HSS Expo Winners
Celebrate the HSS Student Expo winning presentations—representing the creativity, research, and hard work of Brooklyn College students across the humanities and social sciences.
2026 Winners
OUTSTANDING ACADEMIC PRESENTATION BY A GROUP
Carina Alessandro, Adrian Gonzalez, and Radiyah Hanif – Philosophy: The Ethics and Politics of Green Infrastructure and Urban Forests: the Urban Sustainability Tree Inventory and analysis of the Brooklyn College campus.
OUTSTANDING ACADEMIC PRESENTATION
Hajer Alshame – English – Presentation titled: Identity as Performance and Collapse
Nasanya Brown – Communication Arts, Sciences and Disorders – Presentation titled: Follow the leader (if you can): does early ASL sign production correlate with memory for movement?
Nicole Celenza – History – A historical examination of The Anatomy of the Human Body by William Cheselden (1712)
Moussa Cisse – Philosophy – Presentation titled: Asking the Right Question in the Right Context: Why Abelard is a Nothing Grower”
Ifeoma Ezike – Political Science- Presentation titled: Women In Politics During The Civil Rights
Julia Fernandez – MMUF – Presentation Titled: Bodies Bound, Voices Freed: Gender and Ritual in the PDM Gynecological Spells & the Knidos Curse Tablets
Mandy Francois – Linguistics – Presentation Titled: “As Serious As Your Life”
Aya Ibrahim – Communication Arts, Sciences and Disorders – Presentation titled: Bridging Two Languages: Supporting Speech & Literacy in a Turkish-English Bilingual Child
Julia Krysztalowicz – History – Presentation titled: Playing with Mystery: Understanding Catalan Identity Through Medieval Performance
Cobe Liu – History – Evaluating Command and Control Systems for Taiwan Strait Defense: Adapting Maven, Lattice, and Indigenous Capabilities
Saveliy Markan – History – BC Archives Presentation titled: “How The English Book of Common Prayer Represents the Protestant Reformation”
Aaliyah Martin – Africana Studies – Deconstructing the paradox: Haitian Bodies, Blackness and Labor”
Kathleen Saint-Amand – Political Science – Presentation titled: Money, Power, Respect: Structural Violence and the Issue of Security Within the South Sudanese Civil War (2013-2020)
Sierra Smith Vasquez – Puerto Rican and Latinx Studies – Presentation titled: Bridging the gap: Fostering Leadership among Latinx Youth in NYC Public Schools
Carmine Tepedino – Philosophy- Cruel Optimism, Wishful Thinking, and the Ethics of Pediatric Precision Oncology
Matthew Tuggle – History – Presentation titled: Gandhi and Swadeshi, 1901-1909
Joselyn Zainos – Africana Studies – Presentation titled: Colonial Legacies and Contemporary Realities: Economic and Demographic Change in Puerto Rico(2000-2026)”
Sabrina Zami – History – Presentation titled: Disability Representation in Children’s Literature and Its Relationship to Society
OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE PRESENTATION
Ollie Calabretta, Sara Jane Mahoney and Kenneth Tanachion – History – Performing Medieval Asceticism
Brent Thomas Whiteside – English – Memory, a Resonant Tableau
2025 Winners
Outstanding Academic Presentation
Modern Languages & Literatures
Kellyse Chen Zheng—“Protest by The Mothers of the Plaza in Argentina”
English
Dylan Villaverde-Martinez—“Rebels with (and without) a cause”
Classics
Julia Fernandez—“Triskeles: A Sicilian Symbol on Roman Coins”
Africana Studies
Harmonie Heath—“Black migrants and communities in 20th Century France—Interrogating Racism, Exclusion and Marginalization”
Maciel Rosario—“Disruption and Displacement in Sanchez Ramirez —Mining in the Dominican Republic”
Philosophy
Carmine Tepedino—Philosophy: “The Ethics of Moral Enhancement”
History
Sydney Gdański—“The Russo-Ukrainian War and Implications for the Western Balkans”
Julio Vasquez Jimenez—“How Does the Distinction between High and Low Literature Affect How Society Functions?”
Antar Das—“Overconfidence and Optimism in Institutional Investment: Psychological Drivers Behind Housing Market Speculation Leading to the 2008 Financial Crisis”
Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellows Research Program
Ahnaya Charleus—“Interrogations of Afro-Pessimism Through Black Art and the Radical Black Future”
Saisha Wesley—“Anti-Blackness in Artificial Intelligence (AB in AI)”
Communication
Clare Lambe—”Going Underground: Communication Challenges in Subway Emergencies”
Political Science
Meity Hoffman—“The Problem of Hasidic Education: Insularity, Politics, Power, and Corruption”
Puerto Rican and Latinx Studies
Manuel Martinez Valdez—”The Moon Within” by Aida Salazar
Outstanding Performance Presentations-
English
Damien Niesewand—“America, As Always”
Duly Rosenberg—“Back to Ashes”
Outstanding Academic Posters
History
Poster titled “The Journey Starts Here” by Diana Chen Feng, Lucianna Sidel
Sociology
Aniyah Danforth—“Examining the Racial Disparities in New York City Using 311 Data”
Charlie Muller—“Mobilization and Movement Building: A Comparative Analysis of Student Movements in Brazil and Quebec”
Anthro/Museum Studies
Poster titled “A Counter Map of Brooklyn College…in Food” by Nico Berrocal, Ellery Casper, Kayla Moore, Stchaelle Nicholas, Alyssa Puglisi
Poster titled “Counter Map – Indigenous Brooklyn College by Ezra Arregui, Bielka Nina , Nicole Rodriguez, Mahmuda Sultana
2024 Winners
Africana Studies
- Katryna Alexis—“West Indian Gospel Music as Resistance”
- Aaliyah Hinckson—“Black Women in Dancehall: Bodies and Power”
- Dejahre Lettman—“A New Genre of Family and the Caribbean Writer in the Diaspora”
Classics
- Kely Christmas and Victoria Ritchie—“Rare, but Not Unknown! Filling in the Blanks in “Coinage of the Roman Republican Online”
Communication Arts, Sciences, and Disorders
- Jaritza Curet and Ayah Hassan—“Cracking Cognition! How Dynamic Engagement of Cognitive Control Affects Language Processing”
- Aaliyah Sealey—“Addressing DEI in Graduate Programs in Speech-Language Pathology”
English
- Kely Christmas—“Le Lai de l’Ombre: To See, to Dream, to Touch”
History
- Bianca Alvarez, Ahami Chaney-Smith, Yahia Elhag, Lina Mazioui, and Bianca Alexis Rolston—“Oral History Ethics: Problems, Solutions, and Practice”
- Rivkah Bryski—“A Jewish Homeland, With Socialism Too: Birobidzhan in the Jewish Communist Imagination
- Gurveen Dhallu—“The Paradox of Tragic Art”
- Joseph Edelheit—“The Astronaut, Man of Today’s Tomorrow: The American Dream in Space”
Philosophy
- Sarah Dagmy—“Plato’s Allegory of the Cave”
Puerto Rican and Latinx Studies
- Miguel Figueroa—“The Rebels of Wallmapu: Environmentalism, Land, and Legitimacy”
Urban Sustainability
- Sofia Mariyamis—“Adapting to Rising Tides: Understanding the Impact of Sea Level Rise on Crab Meadow and Coastal Wetlands in the Long Island Sound Estuary”
2023 Winners
Africana Studies
- Kimberly Felix—“El Amor Porhibido: The Lives of Black Lesbian Women in the Dominican Republic”
- Iemoni Moses—“Mirror of the Great Migration”
American Studies
- Rhema Mills and Xiaoen Liang—“Asian American Student Activism History at Hunter College”
Communication Arts, Sciences, and Disorders
- Katelyn Baudille and Daniel Grace—“A Preliminary Investigation of a Method for Classifying Conversational Breakdowns in Language Samples From Preschool Children”
- Isabella Crawford—“Ethical Obligations in Anonymous Communication across Social Networking Services”
- Rawan Hanini, Pheobe Law, Lynn Stetson, and EngieToson—“Models and Expectations for Clinical Supervision in Speech-Language Pathology Graduate Programs: A Systematic Review”
- Leann Senat and Madeleine Campbell—“Audiology: A Rewarding Healthcare Field”
English
- Athena Fernandez—“Shakespeare’s Sonnet 20 and the Transgender Body”
- Yitzchak Friedman—“Herge and I”
- Finley Miller—“How Writing Composition Theory Informed My Visual Arts Practice”
- Stephanie Soltanova—“The Informal Lens: How Creative Writing Has Strengthened My Approach to Academic Writing”
History
- Rivkah Bryski—“Jewish Graffiti: A Broad History”
- Rachel Khmeknitsky—“Spoken and Silent Veteran Homecomings: The Differences and Similarities Between Understandings of Twentieth-Century Men Veterans and Contemporary Women Veterans”
- Micah Sander—“They’re Americans and They Like Me, Rufo!: U.S. Imagination of Fidel Castro During His 1959 and 1960 U.S. Trips”
History and Classics
- Fatima Arif, Lisa Fils, Vera Madey, Micah Sander, and Rivkah Bryski—“Magisterial Feminae: How Women Who Studied the Ancient World Innovated Brooklyn College, the Latin Greek Institute, and Beyond”
Philosophy
- Andre Howell—“Responding to Povinelli and Vonk: A Theory of Mind in Chimpanzees?”
- Chaim Janani—“Standing In the Light of Death: Terminal Illness, Hope, and the Clinical Encounter”
- Rayan Mamoon—“Analyzing the limitations of Karl Popper’s Answer to the Demarcation Problem”
Political Science
- Melanie Baum—“Riding the Waves: How American Politicians Propagate Anti-Migrant Feelings”
Urban Sustainability
- Christopher Arias—“Resilience or Resistance: Post-Disaster Recovery in the Rockaways”
- Jamelle Tucker—“Green Energy: Can Offshore Wind Become an Environmental Powerhouse?”
2022 Winners
- Aida Atherley
- Emily Beregovich
- Jean Chen
- Maya Darwish
- Caroline Dougherty
- Maria Farag
- Rawan Hanini
- Annie Ho
- Niara Johnson
- Pheobe Law
- Joshua Leonard
- Wendy Martinez
- Deborah Oratokhai
- Nicholas Philpott
- Alexander Radu
- Mariyah Juzer Rajshahiwala
- Jason Richter
- Bridget Robshaw
- Levi Satter
- Bridget Squitire
- Kinga Szalchcic
- Cindy Zhang