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Law Review Symposium to investigate judicial conduct and misconduct
LAWRENCE – A panel of judicial ethics experts from across the country will discuss “Judicial Conduct & Misconduct: A Review of Judicial Behavior from Sexting to Discrimination” at the 2021 Kansas Law Review Symposium on Nov. 15. The online event is free and open to the public, but registration is required. Register and preview the complete schedule online.
Researcher traces concept of taste in literature to 16th century
LAWRENCE – Turns out we can thank a guy named Bacon for the concept of “taste,” as in properly discerning the relative value of cultural goods. That is what Jonathan Lamb contends in a new article, “What Books Taste Like: Bacon and the Borders of the Book,” in the journal Textual Cultures.
KU aerospace engineering claims top honors in international competitions
LAWRENCE — Aerospace engineering students at the University of Kansas have once again brought home multiple awards in international design competition, continuing a 40-year tradition of excellence. Three KU teams were recognized for their aircraft and missile designs by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). Additionally, a team from KU won an award for the university’s first-ever entry in the Vertical Flight Society’s international student competition.
Full stories below.
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Contact: Sydney Halas, School of Law, 785-864-2338, [email protected], @kulawschool
Law Review Symposium to investigate judicial conduct and misconduct
LAWRENCE – Tasked with resolving all matters before them, judges are perceived to be impartial, fair and just. Their authority, however, has prevented some judges from always seeing the consequences of their actions. A panel of judicial ethics experts from across the country will discuss “Judicial Conduct & Misconduct: A Review of Judicial Behavior from Sexting to Discrimination” at the 2021 Kansas Law Review Symposium on Nov. 15.
The symposium will run from 12:30 to 3:30 p.m. The online event is free and open to the public, but registration is required. Register and preview the complete schedule online.
“We are very excited for this year’s symposium on judicial conduct and misconduct. The impartiality of judges is a cornerstone of our justice system,” said Symposium Editor Rachel Zierden, a third-year law student at the University of Kansas. “Recently, however, judicial misconduct has been appearing more frequently in the news, from judges misusing technology to outwardly expressing bias. We wanted to address this topic with several judicial ethics experts who can review and discuss the current situation and rules regarding judicial conduct.”
Speakers include:
1. Keynote speaker: Justice Caleb Stegall, Kansas Supreme Court
2. Michael Ariens, professor of law, St. Mary’s University School of Law
3. Ross Davis, professor of law, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
4. Susan Saab Fortney, professor of law, Texas A&M University School of Law
5. Adam Hoeflich, partner, Bartlit Beck LLP
6. Michael Hoeflich, John H. & John M. Kane Distinguished Professor of Law, KU School of Law
7. Christopher Joseph, partner, Joseph, Hollander & Craft, LLC
8. Stephen Sheppard, professor of law, St. Mary’s University School of Law
Scholarship associated with the symposium will be published in a spring 2022 issue of the Kansas Law Review.
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Contact: Rick Hellman, KU News Service, 785-864-8852, [email protected], @RickHellman
Researcher traces concept of taste in literature to 16th century
LAWRENCE – Turns out we can thank a guy named Bacon for the concept of “taste,” as in properly discerning the relative value of cultural goods.
That is what Jonathan Lamb contends in a new article, “What Books Taste Like: Bacon and the Borders of the Book” in the journal Textual Cultures.
The University of Kansas associate professor of English argues that a key shift occurred with Francis Bacon’s famous 1597 aphorism about eating books: “Some bookes are to bee tasted, others to bee swallowed, and some few to bee chewed and digested: That is, some bookes are to be read only in partes; others to be read, but cursorily, and some few to be read wholly and with diligence and attention.”
That’s far earlier than the Oxford English Dictionary’s citation for the earliest use of the word “taste” with the meaning of aesthetic discrimination. Indeed, writers for the next century would quote and adapt Bacon’s line, Lamb said, a process that would culminate in a shift from “taste” in the sense of “to sample” to “taste” in the sense of discrimination and distinction.
This sort of tracing of trends in published word usage over time was made possible only recently and, in the case of the Early English Books Online database, with access that KU Libraries affords, Lamb said. The new article is based on research Lamb has been doing over the past two years for a book he has tentatively titled “How the World Became a Book in Shakespeare’s England.”
Lamb said he has been searching Early English Books Online “and finding the language of books anywhere I could. So when Bacon says some books are to be tasted, that’s just one of about 5,000 examples I have collected of language like this. It includes things like ‘the book of nature.’ People needed a way to talk about the natural world, and the book gave them a structured metaphor to do it. Another example is the phrase ‘to turn over a new leaf.’ Most people today think it refers to a leaf on a tree, but it was a popular bookish metaphor in the 17th century.”
Bacon’s remark about tasting books struck a chord with his contemporary readers, Lamb said.
“What makes Bacon’s version special,” Lamb wrote, “is, first, that he crosses the idea of tasting as sample with the idea of eating as comprehension and, second, that dozens of writers repeated his line and used it as a prompt … By rerouting the notion of taste from a quality of books to a faculty of readers … Bacon opens the door for the modern notion of taste as aesthetic discrimination – what you mean when you say you have good ‘taste’ in music.”
Lamb wrote that this led, nearly 75 years later, to the work of John Milton, cited by the Oxford English Dictionary as the first usage of this latter concept of taste.
Lamb wrote: “The OED calls this kind of taste ‘a sense of what is appropriate, harmonious, or beautiful’, specifically ‘the faculty of perceiving and enjoying what is excellent in art, literature, and the like.’ The OED dates this notion of taste to 1671, in Mil¬ton’s ‘Paradise Regained,’ which refers to ‘Sion’s songs, to all true tasts excel¬ling, Where God is prais’d aright.’”
Lamb said that Bacon deserves as least inspirational credit for the modern meaning of taste as refined sensibility.
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Contact: Cody Howard, School of Engineering, 785-864-2936, [email protected], @kuengineering
KU aerospace engineering claims top honors in international competitions
LAWRENCE — Aerospace engineering students at the University of Kansas have once again brought home multiple awards in international design competition, continuing a 40-year tradition of excellence.
Three KU teams were recognized for their aircraft and missile designs by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). Additionally, a team from KU won an award for the university’s first-ever entry in the Vertical Flight Society’s international student competition.
“The AIAA sponsors the world’s premier aircraft design competition,” said Ron Barrett-Gonzalez, professor of aerospace engineering. And KU is at the pinnacle of that competition. Over the last four decades, KU students have won more first-, second- and third-place aerospace design awards in the AIAA competition than any other university in the world.
In addition to that overall success, Barrett-Gonzalez said that since 2010, 24 women and underrepresented minorities have been among the university’s winning individuals and teams.
“In many, many ways, diversity powers our teams, which is really great,” Barrett-Gonzalez said.
The design competitions challenge students to participate in a simulated real-world design process, allowing them to gain experience and receive feedback from technical experts who serve as judges. The KU student teams won the following awards:
AIAA Graduate Team Aircraft Design, first place
The 10-person team designed the “Skyblazer,” a regional jet intended to be more profitable and more environmentally friendly than most current 50-seat models. The KU students designed an aircraft with wings and engines across the top of the fuselage — instead of the traditional below-the-fuselage models — making it possible to load and unload luggage more quickly, which in turn would increase the potential number of flights per day for the aircraft. Team members were Matthew Griebe, Lendon Jackson, Skyler Jacob, Bhawantha Nilaweera, Raghav Parikh, Renaldo Rivera, Olivia Scharf, Ethan Seiler, Krishna Sitaula and Brennan Wheatley.
Jackson — who led the team, graduated in May and now works at Boeing — said he benefited at KU from his participation in the National Society of Black Engineers, the IHAWKe diversity program and as a member of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity, a historically Black fraternity. “The reason why I decided to go to KU was because when I visited, I felt welcomed,” he said.
“I just hope that I inspire others to take on the challenge,” Jackson said. “It could be intimidating. But if it’s something that you are passionate about or even interested in. I definitely challenge those others that are interested in it to go for it, especially at KU.”
AIAA Graduate Team Missile Design, second place
The six-person team was recognized for its “RHI*NO” drone, a small reusable unmanned aircraft designed to hunt down and disable enemy drones using nets fired from shotgun shells. Team members were Jack Barkei, Bobby Bowes, Christopher Eavenson, Samantha Friess, Brian Von Holtz and Alex Welicky.
AIAA Graduate Team Missile Design, third place
The three-person team also designed an ultra-small drone to hunt down enemy drones. The “Valkyrie” was designed to be fired from a hand-held grenade launcher before unfolding its wings and starting its mission. Team members were Joe Coldiron, Austin Dooley and Nathan Wolf.
Wolf, now a graduate student, said the design process solidified his decision to continue his education in aerospace engineering and to pursue design as his emphasis because it brings together all the various aspects of building an aircraft. “This is what I want to do, because you get to have a hand in everything,” he said. “You get to do the first step analysis on the stability, you do the aerodynamics, the propulsion, everything. And that was really cool.”
Vertical Flight Society, best new undergraduate entrant
KU was recognized for its “Asklepios” drone. It was designed to take off vertically, then tilt and fly laterally like a traditional aircraft to deliver medical equipment to hospitals and emergency locations. Team members were Micaela Crispin, Mason Denneler and Zack Schwab.
Denneler, now a graduate student, said it was exciting to win the VFS honor and break new ground for KU’s already storied aerospace program. “KU is not known as a helicopter school, but we made it work,” he said. “I think that this is the kind of thing that you’ll see more of in the future. Not necessarily this design explicitly, but you’ll see a lot of delivery drones and people movers. I think in 10 to 15 years there’s going to be a lot more of these innovative ways to move people and things.”
Barrett-Gonzalez said one reason for KU’s success in student aircraft design competitions is that the teams bring in help from other departments across the university and alumni.
“We regularly work with students and faculty members in paleontology, history, visual art, business, law, architecture and design,” he said. “Our aircraft perform as well as those coming from ‘tech’ schools like CalTech, MIT and Purdue; however, our business plans are very solid, the aircraft cost less to operate, have lower carbon footprints, are safe, certifiable and frankly look a lot better. Additionally, our alumni mentor and advise the teams, keeping them up on the latest technologies and trends. In short, we harness the power of KU.”
With nearly 30,000 individual members from 91 countries, and 95 corporate members, AIAA is the world’s largest technical society dedicated to the global aerospace profession. The Vertical Flight Society is the world’s premier vertical flight technical society, providing leadership for scientific, technical, educational and legislative initiatives that advance the state of the art of vertical flight.
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