2023-24 New Faculty at CoLART
The College of Liberal Arts welcomed new faculty for the 2023-24 academic year. We are pleased to have such a talented group and we know students, colleagues, and the El Paso community will benefit from the expertise these individuals bring to the college.
¡Bienvenidos a UTEP!
Sylvia Aguilar Zéleny
Assistant Professor, Department of Creative Writing
Ms. Aguilar Zéleny has earned a tenure-track position after serving as an associate professor of instruction in the UTEP Department of Creative Writing and director of the UTEP Online Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing program. Her research interests include women’s writing; Chicano, US Latino/a, and Latin American literature; works in translation, LGBTQ+ narratives; and creative writing pedagogy. Ms. Aguilar Zéleny completed a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from UTEP, a master’s in historiography from the Instituto Tecnológico de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey (ITESM), and a bachelor’s in Latin American Literature from the University of Sonora. She is the author of the novels Trash (Deep Vellum, 2023), Basura (Tránsito, 2022), El Libro de Aisha (Random House, 2021), The Everything I Have Lost (Cinco Puntos, 2020), as well as the young adult series Coming Out (Epic Press, 2016). Her novels Basura and El Libro de Aisha are being translated into French and Italian respectively.
Michael Ball-Blakely
Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy
Dr. Ball-Blakely joins UTEP from the McCoy Family Center for Ethics in Society at Stanford University, where he completed a postdoctoral fellowship. His research background is in immigration justice, particularly as it intersects with global justice, economic justice, and social equality. His work focuses on how high-income countries that exercise discretionary control over immigration facilitate a variety of domestic and global injustices including exploitation, climate change, and status harms. Dr. Ball-Blakely earned a doctoral degree and a master’s degree in philosophy from the University of Washington (UW). He is an active member of prestigious organizations such as the American Philosophical Association, the Society for Philosophy in the Contemporary World, and the North American Society for Social Philosophy. He has served on the executive committee for the Society for Philosophy in the Contemporary World (SPCW) and has held the role of Co-Moderator for the SPCW Pacific division. His most recent publications have been featured in the Journal of Social Philosophy, Essays in Philosophy, and Philosophy in the Contemporary World. Dr. Ball-Blakely's dedication and excellence in teaching have been recognized through several awards. He is the 2021 recipient of the UW Graduate Teaching Award, the Joff Hanauer Excellence in Western Civilization Graduate Fellowship (2020-2021), the University of Tennessee Graduate Teaching Award (2018), and the 2018 Prados Summer Dissertation Award. Beyond academia, Dr. Ball-Blakely enjoys biking, live music, music festivals, basketball (pick-up games and fantasy), and D&D (dungeons and dragons). He and his partner, Christine, have two "children," Dunkel (dachshund) and Tolstoy (cat).
Diana Bolsinger
Assistant Professor, Department of Criminal Justice and Security Studies
Dr. Diana I. Bolsinger begins a tenure-track position in the Department of Criminal Justice and Security Studies after having served as director of the Intelligence and National Security Studies (INSS) graduate program at UTEP. Her research examines how Washington’s clandestine security relationships historically have impacted U.S. policymaking. Dr. Bolsinger’s current project, Dependence and Defiance: How Intelligence Ties Broke the U.S.-Pakistani Relationship, examines how Washington’s secret programs in Pakistan shaped the overall bilateral relationship. She most recently published in The International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence and The Texas National Security Review. Dr. Bolsinger is co-director of the Texas Intelligence Academy. She won the 2020 Bobby Inman Award for best student paper on an intelligence topic and serves on the Board of Directors for the North American Society for Intelligence History (NASIH). She holds a doctoral degree in public policy from the University of Texas at Austin, a master’s in government from New Mexico State University, a master’s in education from Marymount University, a master’s in international relations from George Washington University, and a bachelor’s in international relations from Reed College. Before joining UTEP, Dr. Bolsinger served in multiple leadership positions in the ODNI, CIA, and Department of State, including assignments in South Asia, the Balkans, Northeast Asia, and Washington, DC.
Nicole Breault
Assistant Professor, Department of History
Dr. Breault joins UTEP from Roanoke College where she completed a postdoctoral fellowship in the Department of History. Her research and teaching interests revolve around early American legal and social history with an emphasis on urban governance, institutions, gender, and material culture. Her book manuscript-in-progress, titled “Set the Watch: Policing and Governance in Revolutionary Boston”, draws on a neglected collection of night constables’ reports to examine the work of the watch alongside key events of the 1750s to 1790s. Her work reframes the history of the imperial crisis and revolution through the discourse of local authority and police powers, situating quotidian experiences in the larger transatlantic dialogue on law, empire, and subjecthood. Dr. Breault completed her PhD at the University of Connecticut, an MA at the University of Massachusetts Boston, and a BA from the University of Vermont. She is an active member of the American Society for Legal History. Her research has been supported by fellowships from the American Historical Association, American Philosophical Society, Boston Athenæum, Huntington Library, Massachusetts Historical Society, Roanoke College, and UConn Humanities Institute.
Leticia M. Delgado
Assistant Professor, Department of Theatre and Dance
Mrs. Delgado, costume designer and educator, joins UTEP from Lubbock Christian University where she served on the faculty. Her research and creative work is focused on Chicanx dress and Latiné textiles, and their connection to identity, social justice, and equity. Mrs. Delgado earned an MFA in Costume Design and Technology from Illinois State University and a BA in Theatre Arts from UTEP. She has served on numerous art education and social justice panels, participating in the Annual Statewide Summit on Mexican American Studies in Texas Schools and the Southeastern Theatre Conference’s Forum on Race and Representation in Theatre Design & Technology. Mrs. Delgado is also an active member of the Latinx, Indigenous and the Americas Focus Group of the Association for Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE), the United States Institute for Theatre Technology (USITT), and was a member of the inaugural artEquity BIPOC Leadership Circle (2020). She is the co-author of the design textbook entitled, The Art and Practice of Costume Design. Her costumes have appeared on stages across the country, from the Illinois Shakespeare Festival to the Santa Barbara Theatre Group. One of Mrs. Delgado's design specialties is large scale custom dancewear, having designed for Ballet Lubbock for eight years. Her work has been showcased with the Santa Barbara Dance Theatre at international tours in China and Ireland. Her work was included in The Director’s Vision: Play Direction from Analysis to Production. During her downtime, she enjoys music, drawing, painting, visiting museums, and studying historical and regional dress.
Saniya Lee Ghanoui
Assistant Professor, Department of History
Dr. Ghanoui joins UTEP with a research background in public and digital history, the history of gender and sexuality, and transnational/Borderlands history. She earned a Ph.D. in History from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC); an MA in Media, Culture, and Communication from New York University; an MA in Broadcast Journalism from Emerson College; and a BA in Communication and Media Arts from Marymount Manhattan College. Most recently, she served as program director of Our Bodies Ourselves Today, an online platform that enables the unique contributions, approaches, and functions of the feminist health and sexuality book Our Bodies, Ourselves. Dr. Ghanoui is producing a feature-length documentary film about the thalidomide scandal of the 1960s, and how one woman unknowingly entered a global pharmaceutical crisis and media storm for seeking an abortion. She is the Senior Producer for Sexing History, a podcast that examines how the history of sexuality shapes our present. While at UIUC, Dr. Ghanoui co-created SourceLab, a digital humanities research collective that produces a peer-reviewed series of student-authored digital documentary work. Her research has been supported by the Mellon Foundation, the American Historical Association, the Swedish Institute, and the American-Scandinavian Foundation. She is a research affiliate at the Swedish Institute for North American Studies (SINAS) at Uppsala University and a Board Member of the Society for Menstrual Cycle Research. In her free time, she is a marathon runner and enjoys exploring new cities through running.
Mitchell Kirwan
Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology
Dr. Kirwan comes to UTEP from Arizona State University where he completed his postdoctoral research at the Edson College of Nursing and Health Innovation. His research focuses on the ways that sexual violence is associated with emotion regulation, alcohol intoxication, hostile masculine attitudes, minority stress, LGBTQ+ identification, and impulsivity. He recently published his research demonstrating that specific profiles of in-the-moment emotion regulation were predictive of an individual’s intentions to perpetrate (or not perpetrate) sexual violence. Dr. Kirwan earned a Ph.D. and Master of Science in Psychology from Oakland University and a Bachelor of Science from the University of Michigan. He is a member of the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality, the Research Society on Alcoholism, and the Association for Psychological Science. Dr. Kirwan has provided guidance to more than 20 undergraduate and graduate students, supporting them in publishing their research findings and engaging in professional presentations. Dr. Kirwan has published in numerous high-impact journals, including Health Psychology; Archives of Sexual Behavior; Psychology of Addictive Behaviors; Psychology of Violence; AIDS and Behavior; and Personality and Individual Differences. Outside of academia, Dr. Kirwan enjoys movies, sports, and board games.
Charles A. Larratt-Smith
Assistant Professor, Department of Criminal Justice
Dr. Larratt-Smith comes to UTEP from the Tecnológico de Monterrey in Querétaro, México, where he was an assistant professor in the School of Social Sciences and Government. Prior to that, he was a visiting researcher at the Centro de Investigación y Educación Popular (CINEP) in Bogotá, Colombia; and a visiting professor at the Universidad de Los Andes (ULA) in Mérida, Venezuela. His research focuses on human security and transnational migration with a regional focus on Latin America. Dr. Larratt-Smith is currently working on a research project that examines how state and non-state actors assume functions related to migrant incorporation in the Colombian and Mexican borderlands. His research has received funding from the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, the Puentes Consortium, and the International Development Research Centre of Canada. Dr. Larratt-Smith earned a PhD from the University of Toronto in Political Science, an MA from The City College of New York (CUNY) in International Relations, and a BA from Brooklyn College (CUNY) in Puerto Rican & Latino Studies. His scholarly contributions have been featured in the Journal of International Relations and Development, International Migration, and Latin American Politics and Society. Beyond academia, Dr. Larratt-Smith reveals a passion for football (soccer) and admits to dedicating a significant amount of time to following his favorite club.
Melissa Melpignano
Assistant Professor, Department of Theatre and Dance
Dr. Melpignano earned a tenure-track position after serving as an assistant professor of instruction and director of dance in the UTEP Department of Theatre and Dance. Her research–scholarly and creative–is committed to unhinging the colonial origins and mechanisms in choreography and dance practice. Her area of focus explores border choreographies in collaboration with global scholars, artists, and activists to study how artists rethink borders for sustainable living amid immigration and security policies focusing on U.S.-Mexico, Middle East, and Mediterranean borders. She supports many choreographers in their creative endeavors and has led an international group of Jewish artists in the project Choreographing Piyyutim, moving through the boundaries of liturgical practices and texts to foster international solidarity around anticolonialism and collective responsibility. She is a member of the DSA (Dance Studies Association), AJS (Association for Jewish Studies), and MESA (Middle Eastern Studies Association). Dr. Melpignano is a first-generation graduate immigrant (high school and college). She earned her doctoral degree in culture and performance from UCLA; a master’s in Italian and European studies from Università della Svizzera Italiana in Lugano Switzerland; a bachelor’s in performance studies from Università Ca' Foscari in Venezia, Italy; and a bachelor’s in contemporary dance from London Contemporary Dance School. Dr. Melpignano is a UTEP Edge fellow and an inaugural board member of the International Dance Studies Association. She is a recipient of the Selma Jeanne Cohen Award for dance research, a Mellon Dance Studies Fellow, and a University of California Regents Fellow. In Fall 2023, Dr. Melpignano will choreograph the play Metamorphoses directed by Jay Stratton, UTEP associate professor of theatre and dance. She is a translator of frontera and Latinx/é performance writing into Italian and is currently translating for poet Gris Muñoz and playwright Georgina Escobar. Outside of academia, she enjoys attending summer performance festivals, caring for her plants, reading novels and non-fiction books, and having long conversations with her dance friends around the world.
Alessandra Narváez Varela
Assistant Professor of Instruction, Department of Creative Writing
Ms. Narváez Varela joins the faculty of her alma mater, previously serving as a lecturer in the Department of Creative Writing. She is a poet and teacher, born and raised in Ciudad Juárez, México. She has published her poetry in Poets.org, Huizache, Acentos Review, and The Normal School. She was featured in “Seeking a Voice, Via a Bilingual M.F.A., in Writing and in Life,” an article in the New York Times Education Life section, where she spoke of her experience as a bilingual poet who writes mostly in English, instead of Spanish, her native tongue. Her, a chapbook, was published in 2018 by the University of Houston, the Department of Hispanic Studies. Her first book, Thirty Talks Weird Love, a young-adult novel in verse, was published in 2021 by Cinco Puntos Press, an imprint of Lee and Low Books; Treinta me habla de amor, the Spanish edition, was published by VR Editoras in 2022. Ms. Narváez Varela earned a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing, a Bachelor of Arts in Creative Writing, and a Bachelor of Science in Biological Sciences, all of which were earned at UTEP.
Samantha Michelle Nava
Assistant Professor of Instruction, Department of Theatre and Dance
Samantha Michelle Nava is an El Paso native and the first to receive a B.F.A in Theatre Performance from UTEP. She continued her education and received an M.F.A from East 15 Acting School, a branch of the University of Essex located in London, England UK. While part of East 15, she performed at Shakespeare’s Globe and completed a one-month residence at The Russian University of Theatre Arts (GITIS) in Moscow. Professional credits include the UK premiere of Lanford Wilson’s Book of Days, Macbeth, Widows, Taking Care of Baby, and The Woman in the Wall. Once stateside, stage and film credits include Much Ado About Nothing, Hamlet, Romeo and Julieta, Chicago’s premier of The Kid Thing, Robin Hood and Maiden Marian, Future of Helium Uncertain (Ripped: The Living Newspaper Festival) The Box and The Law of Men. During her downtime, Samantha enjoys spending quality time with her husband and three senior rescue pups, cooking, and traveling. Her goal is to help build the theatre arts community through representation, collaboration, and exposure.
Lisa Novak
Assistant Professor, Department of Art Education
Dr. Novak joins UTEP from the University of Georgia (UGA), where she completed her doctoral degree in art education. Originally from Vienna, Austria, Dr. Novak’s research and teaching interests focus on youth-led arts and community programming, emergent pedagogies, art education in social movements of the 20th century, and working and collaborating closely with students to reimagine art education. In 2015, she founded the School of Collaboration and Invention, a program that facilitates spaces for youth to engage in art and design through collaboration, community engagement, radical pedagogy, material interventions, and other site-specific activisms and media. She recently co-authored a chapter with a former student in an upcoming anthology titled Cultivating Critical Conversations in Art Education: Honoring Student Voice, Identity, and Agency, and in previous roles worked closely with youth to develop exhibitions, public programs, and a small community art garden. While at UGA, Dr. Novak taught teacher preparation courses and redesigned a Cultural Diversity in American Art online course, expanding content to include lessons on the interrelations of art museums and colonialism, art education and assimilation, contemporary Indigenous artists, disability and impairment as a creative force, and LGBTQ+ cinema. She obtained a master's in interdisciplinary design from the Emily Carr University of Art + Design in Vancouver, Canada; and a bachelor’s in graphic arts + design from Leeds Metropolitan University in the UK. Dr. Novak is a member of the National Art Education Association and the College Art Association. While at UGA, she received the Robert Nix Award for Excellence in Art Education and the Wilson Center Public Impact Grant which provided the opportunity to collaborate with two senior faculty members to develop new art education programs at the University of Georgia's contemporary art gallery, the Athenaeum.
Celina Osuna
Assistant Professor, Department of English
Dr. Osuna joins UTEP from Arizona State University (ASU) where she was the inaugural Postdoctoral Research Scholar for the Social Transformation Lab. With an emphasis on Latinx and Indigenous environmentalisms, her research explores the aesthetics of desert places in literature, art, and film and their impacts on cultural imagination and geopolitical relationships to land. Dr. Osuna earned a doctoral degree in English Literature from ASU; a master’s in literature, culture, and place from the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland; and a bachelor’s in English and linguistics from UTEP. Her monograph, entitled Desert Distortion is forthcoming from Texas Tech University Press and she is co-editing a volume titled Storied Deserts: Re-Imagining Global Arid Lands due out from Routledge in 2024. She is an executive council member of the Western Literature Association (WLA), and an active member of the Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment (ASLE) and the Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts (SLSA). While at ASU, Dr. Osuna received a seed grant to organize the Ecologies of Justice symposium that brought together an international and interdisciplinary group of scholars from all ranks. She was a guest for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's radio show, Ideas, and recently published an op-ed in Scientific American about the film Dune.
Sara Renner
Assistant Professor of Instruction, Department of Music
Dr. Renner joined the faculty in 2023, where she serves as Assistant Professor of Instruction for Applied Oboe and teaches courses in music literature. An accomplished oboist with a multifaceted career, Dr. Renner is an active performer, educator, and recording artist. She has taught at the University of Nebraska-Omaha, the University of Alabama, Washburn University, and most recently the Omaha Conservatory of Music. An active performer, Dr. Renner’s orchestral experience has spanned numerous orchestras in the Midwest including the Springfield (MO) Symphony, Omaha Symphony, Sioux City Symphony, and South Dakota Symphony. In her orchestral experience, she has shared the stage with a variety of artists, including Baritenor Michael Spyres, Dame Evelyn Glennie, Amy Grant, Michael W. Smith, and Celtic Woman. Dr. Renner holds both a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Performance from the University of Nebraska-Omaha and the Columbus State University Schwob School of Music, respectively. She received her Doctorate of Musical Arts in 2019 from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, where her secondary discipline was Musicology with an emphasis in Early Music. Her teachers include Dr. Mark Ostoich, Dwight Parry, Christopher Philpotts, and Dr. Susan Hatch Tomkiewicz.
Glenn “Boomer” Trujillo
Assistant Professor of Instruction, Department of Philosophy
Dr. Trujillo joined the UTEP faculty in a full-time role as an assistant professor of instruction, previously serving as visiting assistant professor in the Department of Philosophy. His research investigates what it means to live a good life and be a good person. To do this, he applies ancient Greek and Hellenistic philosophers to contemporary problems. For example, he has written on why Aristotle might be okay with us using biotechnologies that improve our thinking and has recently written articles about ancient Cynicism, a school of philosophy that challenges authority and champions simple living. He tries to get historical figures to weigh in on contemporary ethical issues, and he hopes that his work is rigorous yet accessible. Dr. Trujillo earned his doctoral degree from Vanderbilt University, a master’s from the University of Houston, and a bachelor’s from St. Edward’s University. He is a Fulbright scholarship recipient and studied in Bochum, Germany. Dr. Trujillo served on the Diversity Committee at the University of Louisville (UofL) Department of Philosophy where he led a workshop on diversifying logic curricula and connected the Department to a local organization that helps Hispanic students get into college and graduate. Dr. Trujillo is a member-at-large of the Southwestern Philosophical Society and a member of the American Philosophical Association. He won the Southwestern Philosophical Society Presidential Prize Award for the article, “Possessed: The Cynics on Wealth and Pleasure”. The article was a two-time Faculty Favorite Nominee at UofL. In his free time, Dr. Trujillo enjoys playing hardcore and metalcore guitar; doing free, public live streams about philosophy; and reading and writing speculative diction short stories. He is originally from Dumas, Texas, a small town near Amarillo. Dr. Trujillo was the first in his immediate family to graduate college. He is excited to work with UTEP students, faculty, and staff to build an intellectual community.
Christopher Tschumi
Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology
Dr. Tschumi comes to UTEP from the University of Washington (UW) where he was a postdoctoral scholar in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. His research involves studies on how midbrain dopamine neurons play central psychological roles in reward learning and motivated behavior. Dr. Tschumi earned a doctoral degree in pharmacology from the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio (UTHSCSA) and a bachelor’s in psychology from California State University Long Beach. His research has been recognized at the annual UTHSCSA Physiology Student Symposium and the Translation Research in Addiction Conference, and has been published in the Journal of Neuroscience and the European Neuropsychopharmacology. He is a member of the American Aging Association, the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, Psi Chi Honor Society in Psychology, and the Society for Neuroscience.
For details, please visit: https://www.utep.edu/provost/faculty/new-faculty-profiles-2023-2024.html