Peruse this list to get a sense of the range and depth of literary and language-related projects that Hendrix-Murphy underwrites. Most of these carry Odyssey credit; all are supervised by members of the Hendrix faculty.

*Harry Lance
+Language and Art in Mexico City

Project supervisor: José Vilahomat, Spanish

Harry will travel to Mexico City, Mexico, over winter break to increase his Spanish language proficiency through private instruction at the Lengua y Cultura Mexico City Language Center and to broaden his pre-existing interest in Mexican Renaissance art with a specific focus on the work of Frida Kahlo.  

+Carries Odyssey GA (Global Awareness) credit  

Cierra Daniels
+Global Healthcare Immersion through Physician Shadowing in Lisbon, Portugal

Project supervisor: J.J. Whitney, Career Services

Cierra will travel to Lisbon, Portugal, to participate in the Atlantis Medical Shadowing Program. Hendrix-Murphy is supporting Cierra’s travel and fellowship expenses as well as a pre-trip intensive Portuguese course.

+Odyssey GA (Global Awareness) credit

*Sable Alysse Robinson
“The Adventures of Z and Uncle T.” — Afrofuturism Research and Creative Writing in Chicago” 

Project supervisor: Margo Kolenda-Mason, English

Sable Alysse traveled to Chicago, Illinois, to conduct literary research at the Alton Abraham Collection of Sun Ra, investigating how people of the African Diaspora imagine futures of Black liberation through literature, language arts, and science. This research has informed the creation of a digital and interactive zine consisting of site-specific, ekphrastic, and flash-fiction pieces that further develops their literary work-in-progress, “The Adventures of Z and Uncle T.” — an extension of their capstone project in English-Creative Writin

*Cade England
+^Costa Rica Conservation Internship and Language Immersion

Project supervisor: Ruth Yuste-Alonso, Murphy Fellow in Spanish

While working at Children’s Eternal Rainforest or Bosque Eterno de los Niños (BEN), a private nature reserve in Costa Rica, Cade will be totally immersed in the Spanish language—living with a host family, speaking Spanish with co-workers, attending weekly Spanish classes, and at the end presenting in Spanish about his work.

+Odyssey PL (Professional Leadership) credit
^Jointly funded with Odyssey

*Tillie Lefforge
+ Experiencing and Demystifying Magazine Submissions

Project supervisor: Tyrone Jaeger, English

This summer Tillie will spend at least 30 hours researching literary magazines, identifying publications suited to her work, and submitting her writing to them. This project will allow her to formally explore the submission experience—waiting, inevitable rejection, the potential payout of an acceptance—and gain insights to guide future writing with the goal of publication.

+Carries Odyssey SP (Special Projects) credit 

*Kimber Hageman
Spanish Language Film Series

Project supervisor: Ruth Yuste-Alonso, Murphy Fellow in Spanish

Kimber hosted a spring Spanish-language film series on campus to encourage an immersive yet accessible Spanish-learning experience.

Natalie Vailes
Online Course in American Sign Language

Project supervisor: Sarah Engeler-Young, Hendrix-Murphy Foundation

Natalie will take an online, self-guided American Sign Language (ASL) course at Gallaudet University that teaches foundational ASL skills in cultural etiquette, simple conversation, fingerspelling, and basic grammatical structure. This project will help Natalie take her first steps toward the long-term goal of becoming a certified court interpreter.  

*Elliot Jackson
+Writing Poetry in Costa Rica

Project supervisor: Hope Coulter, English and Hendrix-Murphy Foundation

While participating in the Hendrix-in-Costa Rica program, Elliot will work through a self-designed poetry writing course that will culminate next fall in a chapbook.

+Odyssey AC (Artistic Creativity) credit

Grace Capooth
+Language and Professional Development at the 2023 Animayo Animation Festival

Project supervisor: Ruth Yuste-Alonso, Languages, Murphy Fellow in Spanish

In April, Grace will attend the 2023 Animayo Animation Festival in Gran Canaria, Canary Islands, Spain. This interdisciplinary project will enhance Grace’s Spanish language skills through total immersion, and she will also expand her cultural awareness and language proficiency in relation to a conference and an industry that is marked by its uniquely global community.

+Carries Odyssey SP (Special Project) credit  

Andrea Ortega
+Exploration of Book Publishing through an Editorial Internship

Project supervisor: Hope Coulter, English and Hendrix-Murphy Foundation

Andrea will intern at the Oxford American magazine, a journal of Southern literature and culture, developing editorial skills and learning about the publishing field. Her internship is being supported as a cocurricular project alongside two other internships at this magazine that are set aside for Hendrix students and regularly funded by the Hendrix-Murphy Foundation.

+Odyssey PL (Professional Leadership) credit

Anna Price and *Kimber Hageman
+Spanish Language Immersion at Madrid Pride 2023

Project supervisor: Gabby Vidal-Torreira, Spanish

Anna and Kimber, having studied the history and literature of Spain’s LGBTQ+ movement, will attend Pride week in Madrid. While there they will improve their Spanish language proficiency through private Spanish lessons and complete immersion outside of class.

+Odyssey GA (Global Awareness) credit

*Sydney Austen ’25 
+A Tale of Two Cities: Investigating Museum Language and Repatriation in Paris and London 

Project supervisor: Hope Coulter, English and Hendrix-Murphy Foundation 

In January 2025 Sydney will travel to Paris, France, and London, England, to study the current state of museum repatriations and take an intensive French language course. This research will inform Sydney’s senior thesis project as well as improve her French language skills, which will prove valuable in her chosen profession in the museum field. 

+Carries Odyssey GA (Global Awareness) credit 

Adriana Rabell Lopez
+Spanish Translator for “The Interplay of Well-Being and Nature in Costa Rica”

Project supervisor: Ruth Yuste-Alonso, Murphy Fellow in Spanish

Adriana will serve as student translator and intercultural mediator on her group trip to Costa Rica, an Odyssey-funded trip led by Dr. Jennifer Penner that will explore how wellness and connectivity relate in this biodiverse environment.

+Odyssey GA (Global Awareness) credit

*Michelle Johnston ’26
+Poetry and Society in Indonesia

Project supervisor: Zachary Brandner, Murphy Fellow in Spanish

While living in Indonesia for the summer, Michelle will study the evolution of Indonesian poetry through independent research and consultation with professors from the University of Indonesia and the State University of Malang. She will also do an individual study with poet and actor Jose Rizal Manua and join a creative writing workshop offered by B/NDL Studios in Jakarta. Through this project, Michelle will learn more about how the Indonesian language has developed in literature and how literature and society influence one another.

+Carries Odyssey GA (Global Awareness) credit  

*Corissa Ross
+Intensive German Study in Mannheim

Project supervisor: Sarah Engeler-Young, Hendrix-Murphy Foundation

Longtime German-language learner Corissa Ross will travel to Mannheim, Germany, to take a 15-day intensive language course at the Goethe-Institut with the goal of moving toward German fluency.

+Odyssey GA (Global Awareness) credit

*Lily Ryall
+“Lily devient Québécoise!”--Language Immersion in Québec

Project supervisor: Cathy Jellenik, French

Lily will immerse herself in Canadian French by studying French for 13 days at Bouchereau Lingua International in Québec. 

Chloe Stevenson
+Culturally Immersive Medical Shadowing Experience in Spain

Project supervisor: Jennifer Dearolf, Biology

Chloe will build her proficiency in Spanish and gain professional experience while shadowing doctors in Barcelona, Spain, through the Atlantis Medical Shadowing Program.

+Odyssey GA (Global Awareness) credit

Josiah Vallone
+A German Immersion: Investigating Language and Culture at Goethe-Institut Berlin

Project supervisor: Hope Coulter, English and Hendrix-Murphy

Josiah’s intensive study of German will begin with remote instruction at home, followed by two weeks at the Goethe-Institut in Berlin, Germany.

+Odyssey GA (Global Awareness) credit

*Keeley Ausburn
A Novel Idea: Learning about Others through Literature

Project supervisor: Hope Coulter, English

Keeley will conduct interviews at libraries in Central Arkansas and explore the question of what can be learned about someone from their relationship with literature. She will explore what makes a book resonate with someone, identify commonalities between the interviewees’ stories, and analyze overlap in the data. Through this research project, she hopes to explore the significance of literature in people’s lives.  

*Makenzie Henderson
+Intensive Study of Work-Life Balance & Language through Cultural Immersion

Project supervisor: Carmen Merrick, Psychology

Over winter break Makenzie will travel to Genoa, Italy, where she will shadow physicians for 20 hours a week via participation in the Atlantis Medical Shadowing Program. Makenzie will take an intensive Italian course before her trip, and immersion in the culture of Italy will allow her to practice Italian and increase her proficiency in the language. Building on observations from her Summer 2022 Atlantis shadowing experience in Spain, she will investigate work-life balance in Italy, using methods such as talking to physicians and observing the societal structure of Genoa.

+Carries Odyssey UR (Undergraduate Research) credit 

*Trevion Williams
Teaching English in Korea

Project supervisor: Colleen Mayo, Murphy Fellow in English

During this month-long winter break project, Trevion will travel to Seoul, Korea, to tutor a homestay family for 15 hours a week in English while increasing his Korean language proficiency through cultural immersion. This project builds on Trevion’s scaffolding of past Murphy Scholar projects and is a culmination of his Korean learning experiences at Hendrix.



*Murphy Scholar in Literature and Language

 Colleen Mayo, Murphy Fellow in English
The Mockingbird Word

The Mockingbird Word is a radio collaboration with Hendrix’s station KHDX that highlights and celebrates creative voices across Central Arkansas. Through this project students and community members can enjoy a shared sense of celebration and identity while enhancing our vibrant literary landscape. 

Margo Kolenda-Mason, English
Galatea Reading Group

John Lyly’s Galatea (1588) is a play that features female homoeroticism, virgin sacrifices, sea monsters, shipwrecks, alchemy, and more. While he is little studied today, Lyly was one of the most popular playwrights of his time and was highly influential (including for Shakespeare). Galatea stands out as one of the most explicitly queer plays of the time, and one of the few to endorse same-sex desire. It is a fascinating glimpse into literary history even as it shows us the surprising ways that Renaissance theater engages with issues still important to us today. This reading group will meet twice, reading the play aloud together and discussing it in anticipation of this year’s Drake Lecture on Transgender Natural Spaces in Renaissance Theater, to be delivered on campus in April by Dr. Colby Gordon of Bryn Mawr College. 

Kristi McKim, English
Nourishing Our Classroom Community: Dinner and Literary Discussion

Students in “Literary Analysis,” the gateway course to the English major, will enjoy guided literary discussion over a shared meal. 

Rebecca Resinski, Classics
+Ancient Language, New Contexts

Junior Classics majors will attend an online summer school to learn Latin epigraphical practices and expand their experience of Latin through such activities as spoken Latin podcasts and workshops, listening/reading sessions, and reverse translation.

+Odyssey SP (Special Project) credit

Julia Kolchinsky Dasbach, English, Murphy Fellow in Poetry
Dear Ukraine: A Global Community Poem 

“Dear Ukraine: A Global Community Poem” offers an inclusive, participatory, and empathetic way to bear witness from our varying degrees of distance and relation to the war against Ukraine through the imaginative language of poetry. Participants read the model poem by Dr. Dasbach and then follow prompts to submit their own responses, which can be submitted and translated into English, Ukrainian, Russian, and Polish in order to be read by those in war-torn regions. Bringing a “Dear Ukraine” installation to Hendrix and housing it in the Windgate Museum surrounded by an exhibit of art by poets from Ukraine will engage Hendrix students to respond through language as well as open this response 

Hope Coulter, English
Tyrone Jaeger, English
+The Lore of the Emerald Isle: Exploring Irish Literature in Context 

Students who have taken either the Murphy Scholar tutorial course Irish Short Stories or another relevant literature or creative writing course will travel to Ireland to investigate how the literary arts have shaped, and been shaped by Irish culture and tradition. This overview of Irish literature will start in Dublin, where the participants will see the Book of Kells, visit museums on Oscar Wilde, James Joyce, and Irish literature, and see a play at the iconic Abbey Theatre, home to the Irish Literary Revival. The group will then travel to Bantry, in County Cork, to attend the West Cork Literary Festival. There students will take creative writing workshops and hear readings and panels by contemporary Irish writers, whose work they will have read at Hendrix.

+Carries Odyssey SP (Special Project) credit 

Lavinia Roberts, Murphy Fellow in Theatre
+Hendrix-Murphy Playwriting Intensive at St. Mary’s University, London

Eight students will travel to London, England, to participate in playwriting workshops, study with produced playwrights and professional actors, and attend plays—culminating in the staging of their own ten-minute plays written over the course of the week.

+Odyssey AC (Artistic Creativity) credit

Margo Kolenda-Mason, English
+ Renaissance Theater on Stage and Page

Building on this spring’s reading group and Drake Lecture on John Lyly’s 1588 play, Galatea, this project will investigate that play and other works of Renaissance drama in their historical theatrical context by visiting museums, theaters, and archives in London, Brighton, and Stratford, England.

+Odyssey SP (Special Project) credit

Dorian Stuber, English
+ A Berlin without Jews? Reading Literature and Place

Four students will spend a week with Dr. Stuber in Berlin, Germany, visiting Holocaust remembrance sites and attempting to excavate the landscape of Jewish Berlin as depicted in texts they have studied in preparation for the trip: memoirs by four Jewish women that serve as documents of resistance to persecution.

+Odyssey UR (Undergraduate Research) credit