Perry, Salahi Named North Star Collective Faculty Fellows
Professors Ashlie Perry and Lara Salahi have been named North Star Collective Faculty Fellows for 2024.
1/10/2024
Associate Professor of Security Studies Ashlie Perry and Distinguished Professor of Broadcast and Digital Journalism Lara Salahi have been named North Star Collective Faculty Fellows for 2024. A semester-long fellowship created by and for Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC) faculty in New England, the North Star Collective Faculty Fellowship is grounded in tenets of reparative justice and promotes racial trauma healing by providing a nourishing community of care, mentorship, and professional development for BIPOC faculty in all fields. Now in its third year, the North Star Collective awarded fellowships to 31 BIPOC faculty from across 18 member institutions.
Fellows each receive a $1,500 grant for research, publication, and ongoing professional development and workshops, including an intensive three-day mentored writing retreat on Cape Cod.
Drs. Annabelle Estera and Adilia James were named inaugural North Star Collective Faculty Fellows in 2021.
“I am grateful for the space and support this fellowship will provide as I work on my upcoming book examining solutions to sustain local news,” said Salahi, one of Endicott’s newest Distinguished Professors. She was part of The Boston Globe newsroom awarded the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for their tenacious coverage of the Boston Marathon Bombing. In 2018, she and computational geneticist Pardis Sabeti co-authored Outbreak Culture: The Ebola Crisis and the Next Epidemic.
“I’m excited to engage with other faculty across the region through our retreats, meetings, and writing groups. For centuries, people of MENA [Middle Eastern and North African] descent have significantly contributed to the U.S. workforce and American society, progress and discovery, yet are not accurately captured in demographic data,” Salahi continued, noting that those statistics could hopefully soon change. “This fellowship holds tremendous value for those of us who identify with communities that have historically been, and continue to be, underrepresented in academia.”
During her fellowship, Perry plans to work on three textbook chapters “highlighting areas of the world that are not often discussed in textbooks throughout the United States, including Sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia, and expand on lesser-known groups in the Middle East and Africa,” as well as a paper on human trafficking.
“The research on human trafficking fills a gap in the North Shore for research about survivorship of violent crimes, especially sexual violence and trafficking,” said Perry.
For both scholars, the opportunity to focus exclusively on their work for a while is invaluable—and validating.
“The ability to engage in writing-centered workshops and meetings allows me to nurture research and ideas that sometimes get put on the back burner with everyday life expectations,” said Perry. “The accountability that this fellowship brings gives the drive, and validation, to my personal research agenda.”
Learn more about this year’s fellows.