2025 WGSS Spring Reception
There was much to celebrate at the WGSS annual spring reception in April! More than 50 faculty, staff, and students joined the celebration. The event kicked off with our first annual undergraduate research symposium, where students enrolled in the WGSS senior capstone in feminist research workshop presented on their research topics. The presentations were followed by a reception program to share departmental accomplishments from the 2024-2025 academic year, recognize our 2025 WGSS award recipients and send off our graduating students. You can learn more about all of these in later sections of the newsletter!
We welcomed lots of new faculty, staff and students into the department last year!
Faculty
Sierra Austin-King
Sierra joined WGSS faculty as an assistant professor of teaching in autumn 2025 following her time as lecturer in the department. She specializes in Black feminist thought, with an emphasis on how social systems, curricula, pedagogy, and educational practices and policy shape the academic experiences of Black girls.
LaVelle Ridley
LaVelle joined WGSS as an assistant professor in autumn 2025 following a postdoctoral experience at the University of California, Berkeley. LaVelle’s research focuses on the intersection of queer and transgender studies, Black feminisms and literary and cultural studies of racialized gender and sexuality.
Octavian Robinson
Octavian joined the department as an associate professor in autumn 2025. Octavian’s research focuses on language attitudes towards signed languages within academia and linguistic protectionism among deaf communities at the intersections of gender, disability, race and sexuality.
Mick Min Hung Kuo, PhD
Home: Taiwan
Mick is interested in how transness and gender nonconformity have been discursively mobilized to define what queerness means in Taiwan.
Zahrah Rizwan, PhD
Home: Colombo, Sri Lanka
Zahrah’s research interests include exploring sex work at the intersections of capitalism, colonialism and contemporary crises, through the lens of intimate labor and leisure economies.
Camilla Santos, PhD
Home: Mirangaba, Bahia, Brazil
Camilla’s research explores the Christian Conservative movement in Brazil and its relationship with women’s reproductive rights, focusing on abortion politics and moral agency.
Nowshin Sharmila, MA
Home: Dhaka, Bangladesh
Sharmila is particularly interested in critical anti-trafficking studies focusing on invisible economy of sex work, gender and migration, and sexual and gender-based violence in the context of South Asia.
Tamar Westphal, PhD
Home: Chicago, IL
Tamar’s research focus is femme theory, embodiment, and eroticism; drawing on media/performance studies and archival femme life writings. She theorizes the femme body, erotics and sex as a site of gender enactment.
Travis York, PhD
Home: Michigan
Travis’ research employs an interdisciplinary approach to theorizing disabled identities throughout modern American history. They specialize in both archival methods and theoretical approaches to queer and disability studies.
Ali Alkhalifa
Education Program Specialist
Ali joined the department in a staff role, after completing both his BA and MA in WGSS. He is responsible for course and classroom scheduling, curriculum management, recruitment and programmatic liaison work for the department.
Coty Carroll
Financial Operations Senior Coordinator
Coty brings with him many years of fiscal experience in other sectors. In his current role, Coty helps facilitate Workday processing of travel requests, reimbursements and purchase orders for WGSS, as well as Philosophy, CEHV and Design.
Laurel Clarkson
Senior Academic Program Services Specialist
With over 10 years of experience in student services at Ohio State, Laurel is now serving as WGSS’ new graduate program coordinator. In this role, she oversees the recruitment and admissions processes, as well as general program management.
Meg Downing
Undergraduate Academic Advisor
Meg joined our department last year as an undergraduate academic advisor and boasts 14 years of advising experience at the university.
Jackie McCuskey
Financial Operations Senior Analyst
Joining the department from another fiscal role in ASC, Jackie now manages fiscal coordination, including the budget and fiscal policies, for WGSS, Philosophy and CEHV.