Welcome to the blog of the 2012 Kenan Summer Fellows! These are seven curious and creative Duke University undergraduates who answered the Kenan Institute for Ethics’ call for proposals in the spring of 2012 seeking students who wanted to explore what it means to live an ethical life. We at the Kenan Institute for Ethics left it for the students to determine the issues they wanted to explore and the approaches they would use to explore them. With guidance from a faculty mentor of their choosing, each student will spend eight weeks this summer investigating a question of their own design.
The seven projects selected are exciting in their individual depth and their collective breadth: Grappling with the challenges of humanitarian aid in Egypt. Trying to define a Christian ethics of personal computing in the US. Developing an appreciation for a grandfather’s complex character in WWII Germany. Finding out what it means to be South Sudanese AND American. Identifying “radical hope” in action in Uganda. Researching layers of ethics in the American pharmaceutical industry. Uncovering the connections between religion, community, and policy for resettled refugees in the US.
The Summer Fellows will be taking us with them in their exploration of these topics by posting to this blog throughout the summer. Some will start not long after May 15; others will join in later in the summer. Look out for weekly reflections on research projects, process, and what it means to live an ethical life.
Here’s the lineup for 2012:
Sadhna Gupta (’13): Politics and Religion in Refugee Resettlement in the US
Mark Herzog (’15): Ethical Duties in the Pharmaceutical Industry
Gautam Joseph (’13): Ethics of Humanitarian Aid in Cairo, Egypt
David Mayer (’14): Grandfather’s Diary: Documenting a Life’s Search for Meaning
John McLean (’13): Personal Computing and Christian Ethics
Rosaria Nowhitney (’15): Discovering Radical Hope at Kagoma Gate, Uganda
Nyuol Tong (’14): Leading an Ethical Life: The Moral Dilemmas of
South Sudanese Americans
Read here for more information about the Kenan Summer Fellows program.