This year’s theme is \u201cBreaking the Silo: A Celebration of Interdisciplinary Scholarship and Cross-Departmental Conversations.\u201d<\/strong> The process of knowledge production is often isolating and can relegate us to particular silos of thought. \u201cBreaking the Silo\u201d is the intentional effort to provide graduate students the opportunity to share their intellectual and methodological strengths as scholars with colleagues from across the hall. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Registration for the Keynote Speaker Event: <\/strong>https:\/\/buffalo.campuslabs.com\/engage\/event\/12259072<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Registration for the Graduate Panel Series: <\/strong>https:\/\/buffalo.campuslabs.com\/engage\/event\/12259073<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n There are two registration links for this event. If you would like to attend both days, you may either register twice OR register for one event and send an email to Alyssa Martin (ajm223@buffalo.edu) to state that you’d like your single registration to count for both days.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Same-day registration is available for both conference days. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Please note that registering in advance guarantees meals ordered. For those registering same-day, food is first come, first serve. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Day 1 of the conference is our keynote speaker and reception. <\/strong>The Graduate History Association is proud to welcome Dr. Susan Burch as our keynote speaker. Dr. Burch is a professor of American Studies at Middlebury College in Vermont. Her research and teaching interests focus on histories of deaf, disability, Mad, race, ethnicity, Indigeneity, and gender and sexuality. Material culture, oral history, and inclusive design play an important role in her work. Burch has received numerous grants and awards for her work, including an American Council of Learned Societies Fellowship, National Archives regional residency fellowship, National Endowment for the Humanities and Mellon Foundation grants, and a Fulbright Scholars award. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Day 2 is a day-long series of moderated panels featuring UB graduate student speakers representing ten different departments at UB, <\/strong>including history, English, gender studies, Africana and American studies and more! Panels will focus on a wide range of themes, including but not limited to theoretical interventions in current scholarship, sovereignty and statehood, writing as praxis, resistances in film and visual archives, and local studies of Western New York’s past and present. Breakfast and lunch will be provided.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All participants must review the <\/em>GSA’s Safety Acknowledgement and Participant Disclaimer<\/a><\/em> before attending. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n UB North Campus Davis Hall, Rm 101<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Alyssa Martin<\/strong> (History)<\/em> “A (Re)Introduction to the Plesur Conference & Introducing Dr. Burch” <\/p>\n\n\n\n Dr. Susan Burch (Dept. of American Studies, Middlebury College)<\/em> “Edge work: reflections on learning, unlearning, and reimagining”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Discussion facilitated by Alyssa Martin.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n UB North Campus Natural Sciences Complex<\/em> Panelists consider new approaches to method of study in their respective fields as well as how we communicate our scholarly endeavors not only with colleagues but with the broader public.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Moderated by Dr. Cari Casteel (Dept of History).<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Teya Juarez<\/strong> (Theater & Performance)<\/em> \u201cModes of Dissemination: The Dramaturgical Zine”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Isaac Kolding<\/strong> (English)<\/em> \u201cAsking Big Questions in Humanities Scholarship Outreach\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Rachael Ojeleye<\/strong> (Linguistics)<\/em> \u201cDiscourse, Fragment Answers, and Focus Marking In Yor\u00f9b\u00e1\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hawa Saleh<\/strong> (English) <\/em>\u201cThe Desire to Be Right in Perpetuity: Detecting the Hidden Insecurities in Said\u2019s Orientalism\u201d <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Tiffany Nhan<\/strong> (School of Social Work)<\/em>\u201c\u2018Where Are You From?…\u2019 A Qualitative Study on Asian Americans\u2019 Perspectives of Discrimination & Oppression”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Panelists discuss various themes and modes of resistance through visual analysis, film theory, and material & visual archives. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Moderated by Dr. Robin Mitchell (Dept. of History).<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Damilola Fagite<\/strong> (History)<\/em> \u201cOut in the Darkness:<\/em> Postpartum Depression and Motherhood in Colonial Nigeria\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Sam King-Shaw<\/strong> (Global Gender & Sexuality Studies)<\/em> \u201cClaiming and Creating Ancestors: Black Queer Archives and Cross-Temporal Desire in The Watermelon Woman<\/em> and Looking for Langston<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Molly Dunfield<\/strong> (Indigenous Studies) <\/em>\u201cBeyond Picasso: Eurocentric Modernism and Indigenous Collage\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jessica Sullivan<\/strong> (History)<\/em> “The Question of Agency: The Spatial Creation of Inclusion and Exclusion in Zion City”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Panelists discuss the tensions between citizens and subjects as state actors define and (re)define the boundaries of personhood through methods of waste disposal and environmental regulation, state policies on caregiving, and defining citizenship through state-drawn borders. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Moderated by Dr. Robert Caldwell (Dept. of Indigenous Studies).<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Kailey McDonald<\/strong> (Global Gender & Sexuality Studies)<\/em> \u201cClear the Land: Wastelands, Land Use, and Relationality in Narratives of Colonial Nation-Building\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Oluwafisayo Ogundoro<\/strong> (Africana & American Studies)<\/em> \u201cWorking Mothers and Unsustainable Childcare Policy in the Time of Crisis: A Social History of COVID-19 in NY and Georgia\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Delaney O\u2019Connell<\/strong> (Indigenous Studies)<\/em> \u201c\u2018Former\u2019 to Future: Reinscribing Indian Territory on the Map of Oklahoma\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Alyssa Warrior<\/strong> (Indigenous Studies) <\/em>\u201cAn Analysis of the Cattaraugus Creek\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Juan Basallo<\/strong> (Romance Languages & Literatures) <\/em>\u201c\u2018Las voces del estrecho\u2019 a graveyard in the sea\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Panelists consider the historical impacts and current social significance of the stories, people, and places of the Greater Buffalo Area and Western New York. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Moderated by Dr. Sarah Handley-Cousins (Dept. of History).<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Josh Allen<\/strong> (Global Gender and Sexuality Studies<\/em>) “Racial empires of sensation: Sense and sentimentality at the 1901 Pan-American Expo in Buffalo, New York”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Kyle Weinsheimer<\/strong> (History)<\/em> \u201cNobody Dead, Everybody Dying: A Critical Retelling of the Buffalo Uprising of 1967\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jonas Adams<\/strong> (Sociology & Criminology)<\/em> <\/strong>\u201cFuture Projections of City and Nature in the Making of a Rust Belt Road\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Rachel Pitonyak<\/strong> (Africana & American Studies)<\/em> “Film Distribution and Exhibition: How the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenged Small and Independent Theatres in the Buffalo-Niagara Region”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Panelists discuss the varying uses of writing as a form of praxis in academic scholarship. Topics include exploring identity-making through interpersonal relationships, the production of liminal spaces and identities through writing, and understanding the texts which define a collective international\/transnational trauma. Moderated by Dr. Michael Rembis (Dept. of History).<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Gagne<\/strong> (English)<\/em> \u201cGal Pals: Romantic Friendship, Best of Friends, and Lesbianism in Twentieth-Century United States\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Hannah Gordon<\/strong> (Global Gender & Sexuality Studies) <\/em>\u201cTidal Spills: Trauma, Temporality, and the Sticky Matter of Intra-Activity\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Kamla Persaud<\/strong> (English)<\/em> \u201cTruth-telling in Foucauldian Genealogy as Psychoanalytic Cure\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Chijioke Ngobili<\/strong> (History)<\/em> \u201cOf African Pains: A Critical Review of the Study of African Traumas from Mid-Twentieth Century to Present\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" About the Conference The 2026 Milton Plesur Graduate Conference is a forum for graduate students to share their scholarship with their colleagues, faculty, and interested members of the public. This … Continue reading The 2026 Milton Plesur Graduate Conference<\/span> Registration Information<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
The Plesur Conference is a two-day event: <\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Her latest book, Committed: Native Families, Institutionalization, and Remembering
(UNCP, 2021) centers on peoples\u2019 lived experiences inside and outside the Canton
Asylum, a federal psychiatric institution created specifically to detain
American Indians
Dr. Burch will present her talk titled “Edge work: reflections on learning, unlearning, and reimagining,” in which she discusses the importance of interdisciplinary scholarship and cross-departmental collaboration as it relates to her own work. <\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"The](\"https:\/\/ubwp.buffalo.edu\/ubgha\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/122\/2026\/03\/Jensen-Quilt-1-785x1024.jpg\")
If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Alyssa Martin at ajm223@buffalo.edu<\/a>.<\/h6>\n\n\n\n
Milton Plesur Graduate Conference Schedule<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Friday, March 27th, 2026<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
3:00-3:30 PM<\/em><\/strong> <\/em> Registration & Welcome <\/h4>\n\n\n\n
3:30-4:00 PM<\/em><\/strong> <\/em> Opening Remarks <\/h4>\n\n\n\n
4:00 PM-5:30 PM <\/em><\/strong> Keynote Speech & Moderated Discussion<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
5:30-7:30 PM<\/em><\/strong> Reception<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Saturday, March 28th, 2026<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Panel A Series: NSC, Rm. 218<\/em>
Panel B Series: NSC, Rm. 222<\/em>
Breakfast\/Lunch: NSC, Rm. 228<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n9:00-10:00 AM<\/em><\/strong> Registration Check-In & Continental Breakfast<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
10:00-11:15 AM<\/em><\/strong> Panels 1A & 1B<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Panel 1A<\/strong> \u201cDisciplinary Interventions: New Approaches to Academic Pedagogy and Method\u201d<\/h5>\n\n\n\n
Panelists<\/strong><\/h6>\n\n\n\n
Panel 1B<\/strong> \u201cResistances and Resonances: Approaching the Past, Present, and Future through Visual Analysis\u201d<\/h5>\n\n\n\n
Panelists:<\/strong><\/h6>\n\n\n\n
11:30 AM-12:45 PM<\/em><\/strong> Panels 2A & 2B<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Panel 2A <\/strong>\u201cSovereignty and Statehood: Imperialism and the Boundaries of Personhood\u201d<\/h5>\n\n\n\n
Panelists<\/strong><\/h6>\n\n\n\n
Panel 2B <\/strong>\u201cLocal Studies, Local Impacts: Interdisciplinary Approaches to the History and Culture of Western New York\u201d<\/h5>\n\n\n\n
Panelists<\/strong><\/h6>\n\n\n\n
1:00-2:00 PM<\/em><\/strong> Catered Lunch<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
2:15-3:30 PM<\/em><\/strong> Panel 3A<\/h4>\n\n\n\n
Panel 3A<\/strong> \u201cWriting as Praxis: Exploring Trauma, Relationship Building, and Identity Making through Narrative\u201d<\/h5>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\nPanelists<\/strong><\/h6>\n\n\n\n