LAS News Archive

2025-01-23 - A new book takes readers on a guided tour of Maya history as narrated by an anthropologist who has spent more than 35 years salvaging and exploring the remains of ancient Maya cities, farms, and sacred spaces. “...

2025-01-23 - Rana B. Khoury is a professor of political science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign who studies comparative and international politics, with a focus on the Middle East. Khoury, also an affiliate of the ...

2025-01-15 - University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign history professor Robert Morrissey traveled to a Paris museum in November to see four ceremonial robes created more than 300...

2025-01-15 - University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign history professor Kristin Hoganson has been awarded a 2024 National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship. “An NEH fellowship is a prestigious and highly competitive award that recognizes stellar scholarly...

2025-01-14 - While physical neglect is understudied compared to physical, sexual, or emotional abuse, neglect is just as damaging to children’s social development, a new study indicates. More than 9,150 individuals, nearly 41% of whom retrospectively reported some form of maltreatment before age 12 or reaching...

2025-01-13 - A story 60 years in the making ended recently with a peculiar occurrence at the College of LAS winter convocation in December: The final bachelor’s degree recipient to cross the stage was bestowed with a bachelor’s degree in zoology, which hadn’t happened since the 1970s when the Department of...

2025-01-06 - A large crane is parked on the north side of Altgeld Hall on this sunny and mild mid-December morning. As I watch from near the Alma Mater statue, the arm of the crane that extends far above the scaffolding surrounding Altgeld’s bell...

2024-12-19 - The Center for Advanced Study at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign has appointed seven new members to its permanent faculty. CAS professors are selected based on their outstanding...

2024-12-16 - The Midwest played a central role in the growth of Black freedom movements in the 20th century. It was a key site for incubating and expanding the ideas of political activist Marcus Garvey, not only in the U.S., but globally, said professor of African American...

2024-12-12 - Emily Van Duyn, a professor of communication, studies the effects of social, geographic, and political polarization on human relationships and is the author of the book “Democracy Lives in Darkness: How and Why People Keep Their Politics a Secret.”...

2024-12-11 - Researchers from the University of Illinois have reported complementary discoveries that will improve scientists’ understanding of immune systems in bacteria and equip clinicians with more effective options for treating antibiotic-resistant infections. Antibiotic-resistant bacteria known as...

2024-12-11 - One of the most momentous events in the history of life involved endosymbiosis — a process by which one organism engulfed another and, instead of ingesting it, incorporated its DNA and functions into itself. Scientific consensus is that this happened twice over the course of evolution, resulting in...

2024-12-11 - The teenage girl's plight is often portrayed in popular media as screaming matches with parents, sneaking out of the house late at night and crying over the latest crush. Adolescent girls experience significant cognitive growth during these pivotal years, but dealing with new circumstances at...

2024-12-06 - A new greenhouse custom-designed to support research at the Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation (CABBI) is now open at the University of Illinois Research Park. The Plant Biology Innovation Greenhouse (PBIG) features unique cutting-edge...

2024-12-05 - The Econometrics Data Lab in David Kinley Hall is building on a win-win concept for everyone: Give students data from ongoing research and let them crunch the numbers. The result is an experiential learning opportunity that’s allowing...

2024-12-05 - The College of Liberal Arts & Sciences is recognizing seven staff members and academic professionals for their outstanding professional contributions. Heather Gillett, Nicolas Morphew, and Billy Vermillion have been selected to receive the LAS Academic Professional Award, which provides a cash...

2024-12-04 - As an oral historian, Illinois history professor Yuridia “Yuri” Ramírez records the stories of people who have never been written about in history books. “These people have, in some ways, made the most impactful legacies in their communities, and people...

2024-12-04 - Brilliant characters often play key roles in movies and TV shows. However, when these characters are played by women and people of color, some audience members dismiss them as unrealistic, even if they portray real people and events, a recent study found. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign...

2024-12-04 - When Monica Turchyn was completing her undergraduate degree in community health at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, she took an online course on drug use and misuse. The course had an open access textbook written by the course instructor,...

2024-11-22 - A University of Illinois student is helping migrant families in her Chicago hometown by harnessing her academic interests and passion for public health. Hannah McGee, a junior pre-med student in the School of Molecular & Cellular Biology, has teamed up...

2024-11-22 - Brian Gaines is a professor of political science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and the Honorable W. Russell Arrington Professor in State Politics at the U of I System’s Institute of Government...

2024-11-22 - Many students in LAS move on to careers in politics, legislation, and other roles in government. A common stepping stone for such students is an internship in an elected official’s office. We asked a few current students about their experiences as interns for various offices and positions—from...

2024-11-20 - Three researchers in the College of LAS have been named to the 2024 Clarivate Analytics Highly Cited Researchers list. The list recognizes researchers and social scientists who have demonstrated exceptional influence, as reflected through their publication of multiple papers frequently cited by...

2024-11-15 - Powerful hurricanes, the COVID-19 pandemic, spiraling public debt, and political corruption triggered humanitarian, economic, and environmental crises in Puerto Rico. However, a new book suggests that the Puerto Rican and U.S. governments made these multilayered crises catastrophic through the...

2024-11-08 - When professor Leslie J. Reagan entered her graduate program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison she and the other students in her cohort were told they would never get a job. The field of women's history was virtually nonexistent at the time.   “I thought, that's okay, I’ll work in a...