#faculty experts

President Barack Obama and the First Lady will travel to Cuba on March 22nd and 23rd. According to the White House press secretary, the president will work further towards normalizing diplomatic relations with Cuba. For insight on U.S.-Cuba relations and trade, journalists on deadline can contact UT Austin faculty experts below. 

Julia Sweig

Senior Research Fellow of Public Affairs

[email protected]

Contact: Susan Binford, [email protected], 512-415-4820.

Sweig’s scholarship and policy innovation on Cuba helped lay the groundwork for President Obama’s current policy initiative. She has authored numerous publications and policy reports on Cuba, U.S.-Cuba relations, Latin America and American foreign policy.

Jorge Piñon

Director of the Latin America and Caribbean Energy Program

Interim Director of the Center for International Energy and Environmental Policy

512-232-4988, 305-926-6910, [email protected]

Piñon is an expert on energy policy and Latin America. He is recognized as an independent analyst of regional energy issues, as well as the geopolitics of oil and natural gas in Latin America.

César Salgado

Associate Professor of Spanish and Portuguese

512-232-4517, [email protected]

Salgado is leading UT Austin’s first study abroad program in Cuba, focusing on key moments in Cuban cultural and political history. Salgado has been training students since the 1990s as specialists in Cuban Studies.

Charles Hale

Director of the Teresa Lozano Long Institute of Latin American Studies

Contact: Susanna Sharpe, [email protected], 512-232-2403.

Internationally respected in his field of activist anthropology, Hale focuses on race and ethnicity, identity politics, and consciousness and resistance, and can also discuss trade issues.

Image: Ray Bodden/Flickr

Even when it’s not Halloween, scholars from the College of Liberal Arts are studying ghostly folklore, the science of superstition and making sense of the unknown. Their expertise comes in handy as the spooky holiday brings up questions about the unexplained and eerie.

Journalists can contact the researchers directly for insight around Halloween.

The Vampire in Slavic Cultures

Thomas Garza, University Distinguished Teaching Associate Professor of Slavic & Eurasian Studies

[email protected], 512-232-9126

Tom Garza researches vampire lore in Slavic culture, the Russian fairytale and the popularity of the vampire in modern America. To him, the vampire’s story is an enduring and endearing text that draws students in to studying Slavic histories, religions, geographies and traditions, while also focusing on the essence of what human beings are truly interested in: What happens after death?

Life and Death in Stone

Kathleen Higgins, Professor of Philosophy

[email protected], 512-471-5564

Whether it’s tombstones, monuments or statues, stone is used to memorialize the dead around the world. Kathleen Higgins’ research on aesthetics lead her to study how different cultures choose stone to preserve, physically replace, commemorate and communicate with lost loved ones.

Superstitious Thinking and the Candy Witch

Jacqueline Woolley, Chair of the Department of Psychology

[email protected], 512-471-5196

Latino Folklore's La Llorna

Domino Perez, Director of the Center for Mexican American Studies and Associate Professor of English

[email protected], 512-232-7853 or 512-471-8358

Domino Perez studies Chicano literature, popular culture and film. Her book, “There was a Woman: La Llorona from Folklore to Popular Culture,” examines cultural representations of the weeping ghost and how it has shaped Mexican cultural identity.

As crews work to contain the Hidden Pines fire in Bastrop County, UT Austin’s Gordon Wells is using satellite data to track the extent of land that has been burned.  

Wells, a research associate at the university’s Center for Space Research, collaborates with the Texas Division of Emergency Management on the operational response to wildfires and released the following satellite images with captions on Oct. 17 to show the burn scar of the Hidden Pines fire.

Both images can be used to reconstruct fire behavior and containment techniques used by the firefighters. 

For other UT Austin experts on wildfire and natural disaster recovery, visit: http://utne.ws/1LcueXI

This image merges visible color bands with the 15-meter panchromatic band to produce the most detailed representation of the burned areas. If you zoom into the image, you can detect roadbeds and the locations of individual structures. Curvilinear firebreaks created by bulldozers can be seen along the southwestern perimeter of the fire. The burn pattern is a typically messy mix of incinerated (ash-colored) and nearly untouched (visible green) patches.

Iran and six major world powers reached a nuclear deal on Tuesday after nearly two years of negotiations. Experts from UT Austin offer their views on the agreement’s impact on international security and trade.

Note: the views below represent the opinions of the authors, not of UT Austin.

Stephen Slick

Director of the Intelligence Studies Project at UT Austin and Clinical Professor of Public Affairs

512-471-0814, [email protected]

“The agreement reached in Vienna is a significant milepost in efforts by the international community to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon or reaching an equally dangerous perch on the threshold of a weapon,” Slick said. 

“It was an important and necessary step to test Iran’s nuclear intentions through sincere diplomatic engagement. This agreement, however, is unlikely to resolve for the long term America’s security concerns linked to Iran’s nuclear ambitions – or Iran’s continued development and export of long-range missiles, state sponsorship of terrorism and destabilizing influence in the Middle East…none of which were addressed during these talks,” he noted.

Read Slick’s full commentary. 

Fred Beach

Assistant Director for Policy Studies at UT Austin’s Energy Institute and Lecturer of Management  

512-475-8057, [email protected]

“The lifting of the US/EU sanctions could mean the fairly rapid reintroduction of approximately 1 million barrels per day of Iranian oil and condensates into the roughly 90 million barrels per day global market,” Beach explains.

“Perhaps of longer term interest than oil exports is the potential for Iran to become a major exporter of natural gas. Iran has 34 trillion cubic meters of proved gas reserves accounting for over 18% of global reserves. Most all of Iran’s 172 billion cubic meters of annual gas production is presently consumed domestically,” he said.

Read Beach’s full commentary. 

In a recent op-ed, UT Austin Professor Lisa Moore argued that putting women’s portraits on money is the right move for the U.S. Treasury Department. Journalists can contact her directly to discuss the future of the $10 bill and U.S. currency decisions. 

“The history we choose to represent on our most widely seen government publication — our currency — says a lot about what we think the United States stands for. Secretary of the Treasury Jacob Lew, who is ultimately responsible for how our money looks, should update these national portraits to include women.”

Lisa Moore, professor of English and Women’s and Gender Studies

[email protected]

512-471-499; 512-471-1837 

In a recent interview with KXAN, photojournalism faculty expert Mary Bock offered insight on video depictions of police officers using force.

“I think that cameras are allowing citizens to hold police accountable in ways they never could before,” Bock said. “People have the right to film police, and I believe they need to film police.”

A researcher of the sociology of photographic practice, the rhetorical relationship between words and images, and digital media, Bock said she is interested in how justice, fairness and crime appear to people.

Mary Bock, assistant professor of Journalism

[email protected]

512-471-0673

For a Texas perspective on former Gov. Rick Perry’s presidential run, journalists can contact UT Austin experts on Texas politics and national elections who offer their analyses. 

Reach out to the experts below, call University Media Relations (512-471-3151) for assistance or visit our UT Experts guide for sources on other topics. 

Texas Politics / U.S. Elections

Sherri Greenberg, clinical professor in Public Policy Practice

[email protected]

512-471-8324

Relevant Expertise: Texas government; campaigns and elections.

Jim Henson, lecturer of Government, director of the Texas Politics Project

[email protected]

512-468-4113

"There was more preparation for this run, pretty clearly," Henson said in an analysis on KVUE News. Unlike Perry's first attempt in 2012, "He's started raising money earlier. He started visiting Iowa earlier. He's had meetings with experts and counselors and advisors to try to be a little more prepared for getting into the race."

Relevant Expertise: Texas politics; presidential elections; Internet and politics; political campaigns.

William Minutaglio, clinical professor of Journalism

[email protected]

512-471-9050

Relevant Expertise: Presidential politics, Texas politics, journalism.

Sean Theriault, associate professor of Government

[email protected]

Relevant Expertise: American political institutions; Political party polarization; elections; voters.

Presidency

H. W. Brands, professor of History

[email protected]

512-471-3261

Relevant Expertise: American presidents.

Bruce Buchanan, professor of Government

[email protected]

512-232-7212