2022-23 Award Winner
Unintended Protection Factor: Fallout Shelters and their Influence on the Public Perception of Nuclear Weapon Tests – Russell Heibel
Heibel’s paper investigates the Office of Civil and Defense Mobilization (OCDM) during the Cold War and its proliferation of American fears of nuclear threat from the Soviet Union through its controversial Fallout Shelter Program. Heibel argues that information on fallout shelters made the dangers of nuclear armament more explicit, thereby reinforcing the public’s distrust of the government’s nuclear program. In doing so, Heibel draws attention to how a federally funded program can be taken up by the public in unintended and surprising ways. His thesis was advised by postdoctoral researcher Ben Goossen.
Honorable Mentions
“Behind the measure of all things”: Exploring the Case of a Psychometric Test to Measure Sexual Orientation in India – Shruti Krishnan
Krishnan’s paper is a study of a novel psychometric scale developed in India that claims to measure sexual orientation. In fact, as Krishnan shows, the test created a strait jacket for sexual identities by relying on a “politics of willful hermeneutical ignorance.” She suggests a re-evaluation of the ethical responsibilities of scientists in their development of instruments targeted at particularly vulnerable groups. Krishnan’s thesis was advised by Postdoctoral Researcher Melanie Jeske.
The Covenantal Contract: A Cultural Psychological Analysis of the Formation of Western & Arabo-Islamic Moral and Legal Obligation – Bilal Abdelhady
Abdelhady focused his research on the foundations for moral and legal obligation between Westen and Arabo-Islamic cultures. Abdelhady was interested in determining the degree to which an Arabo-Islamic covenantal contract provides a reliable and sustainable foundation upon which moral and legal reasoning rests and whether similar foundations in Western cultures exists. He concluded that in Arabo-Islamic cultures, morality and legality are appropriately conflated into one system, and that this is less so the case in Western traditions. Abdelhady’s thesis was advised by Professor Richard Shweder.
Bilal Abdelhady is a recent graduate of the MAPSS program who wishes to pursue further graduate studies in cultural psychology.
Russell Heibel is a MAPSS 2023 graduate with concentrations in the formation of knowledge and history. Prior to attending the University of Chicago Russell also studied history at Northern Illinois University along with minors in anthropology and political science. He is interested in qualitative research on the intersection between micro and macro level communities and how their interactions shaped one another during the turn of the twentieth century.
Shruti Krishnan is a recent graduate of the MAPSS program in the IFK concentration and aspires to be a queer-feminist STS scholar. With an academic background in sociology and anthropology, she takes a qualitative approach to understanding how scientific knowledge about queerness is produced and legitimized in psychiatric research and practice. She is also interested in medical pluralism and the role of alternative healing systems in the treatment and care of mental illnesses. She is currently a part of the research team at the Chicago Center for the Elimination of HIV.