The Center for Global Inquiry and Innovation closes out the 2024-2025 academic year during what can only be described as a season of consequence and challenge. In the most important ways, this grant cycle has been enormously successful.

Professor Len Schoppa has been awarded The Order of the Rising Sun by the Emperor of Japan. The Order of the Rising Sun is one of Japan's highest honors, awarded for distinguished service to Japan and its people in various fields. Schoppa, who has taught in the Department of Politics at the University of Virginia since 1990, specializes in the politics and political economy of Japan. He spoke to UVA Global about his work between Japan and the U.S. and his advice for students interested in Japan.

This summer, four University of Virginia student scholars will travel to Tanzania to continue their work with post-doctoral fellows at the Kibong’oto Infectious Diseases Hospital (KIDH), at the foot of Mt. Kilimanjaro. The opportunity is the result of a 2023 National Institutes of Health (NIH) and Fogarty International Center grant awarded to Dr. Scott Heysell, director of UVA’s Center for Global Health Equity (CGHE), and Dr.

University leadership has been monitoring reports of heightened immigration enforcement activity across U.S. campuses in recent weeks, including the cancellation of student visas and the detention and threatened deportation of international students and faculty. We recognize and sympathize with the alarm and anxiety that many of you experience when witnessing the sudden detention and threatened deportation of international students, scholars, and faculty.

Pierre-Christian Fink joined the Global Studies faculty in Fall 2024 and is currently teaching in the Global Commerce in Culture & Society track. His research explores how financial elites create markets that are hidden from the public but powerfully influence citizens’ economic opportunities across the globe.

Ambassador Steve Mull, Vice Provost for Global Affairs, celebrates UVA’s international community of nearly 2500 students and scholars and hundreds more in our faculty and staff. This community stands as a remarkable source of strength and vibrancy in our student life, research progress, and community service.

Anna Chekhovich of Alexei Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation discusses the use of cryptocurrency as a tool to fund global activist movements with Professor Ian Appel of the Darden School of Business.

Phoebe Crisman (Global Studies, Architecture) has received an award for Excellence in Education Abroad. Elizabeth Wittner (CAELC), Bonnie Gordon (Music), Fern Hauck (Family Medicine) have received an award for Collaborative Excellence in Public Service for work with local refugee communities.

Ambassador Steve Mull, Vice Provost for Global Affairs, affirms UVA's commitment to global experiences, despite a rapid cascade of executive orders and other policy changes from the federal government over the past several weeks.

Professor Sylvia Tidey (Anthropology, Global Studies) discusses her research on aging transgender women in Indonesia, funded by a CGII center grant. She found that transgender women often fall into a care void as they age, lacking family support and state services. She compared care models in Jakarta, Java, and Bali, focusing on the evolving needs and possibilities for older LGBTQIIA individuals in Indonesia.

In this time of intense global and domestic competition, Mara Rudman joined University of Virginia Miller Center colleagues Harry Harding, Syaru Shirley Lin, Scott Miller, and Mimi Riley in Shanghai in early January, for a conference at Fudan University, Navigating Turbulent Times: US-China Relations in the Next Four Years. The conference was co-sponsored by Fudan’s Center for American Studies, the University of Virginia’s Miller Center, and the Center for Asia Pacific Resilience and Innovation USA Foundation (CAPRI USA), led by Lin.

Andreja Siliunas joined the Global Studies program this fall as joint faculty with the Engagements program. A qualitative researcher, Siliunas uses archival, interview-based, and ethnographic methods to study inequality, memory politics, and nationalism in a globalizing world. In 2023, she earned her PhD in Sociology and Social Policy from Harvard University and, following that, taught in UVA’s Sociology department during the 2023-24 academic year.

In Fall 2024, the Center for Global Inquiry + Innovation awarded its latest round of grants to support impactful global research endeavors led by faculty and graduate students. The grants awarded included 24 Graduate Global Research (GGR) grants, seven Center Grants for individual faculty research, and three Global Programs of Distinction (GPOD) grants.

Join Professor Tyler Jo Smith, director of UVA's Interdisciplinary Archaeology Program, as she explores the fascinating intersections of art, religion, and culture in the production and consumption of alcohol across ancient civilizations. From the symposia of ancient Greece to the bronze vessels of China, this conversation delves into how alcohol shaped rituals, beliefs, and artistic traditions throughout history.

The Center for Global Inquiry + Innovation (CGII) was founded in the fall of 2013 by Jeff Legro, then Vice Provost for Global Affairs, to support global, interdisciplinary, and collaborative research. The center awarded its first grants that winter. Now, over a decade later, UVA Global reflects on CGII’s impact.

Discover how UVA professors Allison Bigelow and Rafael Alvarado are partnering with Mayan scholars and communities to preserve and revitalize K’iche and Yukatek languages. Through innovative digital tools, including text encoding and hand-drawn animations, their project bridges a centuries-old narrative with modern technology. Learn about the principles of data sovereignty, the challenges of cultural preservation, and how community-led efforts are shaping the future of Mesoamerican language and literature.

UVA’s Center for Global Health Equity has announced the recipients of the 2024 Dick & Nancy Guerrant Global Health Equity Professor Award. Professors Michaela DuBay, CCC-SLP, Ph.D. and Christopher C.