2025 SIAH Cohort

Major: Law, Societies & Justice; Math

Tali Braester is a community organizer, animal lover, and rising sophomore at the University of Washington studying Math and Law, Society and Justice. They are a life-long Seattleite, where they organize for Palestinian liberation with Jewish Voice for Peace. In participating in this year’s summer institute, they hope to study how descriptions of the natural world, specifically in fractals, provide frameworks for understanding anti-colonial diasporic experience.

Major: English; Law, Societies & Justice (intended)

Daphne is a rising sophomore studying English and Law, Societies, and Justice. She also writes for The Daily and produces concerts for student musicians with Husky Jam. This summer, at SIAH, she wants to explore how we use legal systems to characterize the Earth and how property law affects our relationship with the land, using the University of Washington campus as a primary fieldsite. This summer, when not at SIAH, she’ll be cooking, playing board games, looking for vintage glassware, and listening to the Cranberries.

Major: English; Cinema & Media Studies

Alexis is a senior at the University of Washington, double majoring in English and Cinema & Media Studies. Her SIAH research interests lie at the intersections of Black culture, environmental change, and urban planning, namely the impacts of gentrification in Seattle’s Central District. Through the SIAH program, she is excited to explore Black feminist ecological theory and experiment with hybrid methodologies by melding text, photography, and community engagement to document and imagine new possibilities for historically Black neighborhoods. Her research aims to archive the remnants of gentrification while highlighting how Black communities are actively authoring their own potentialities. Outside of academics, Alexis enjoys going to concerts and watching the latest films at the movie theater. After graduating from UW, she intends to move on to graduate school to continue studying and creating work at the intersection of culture, media, and creative writing.

Major: English

Priya Devanesan is an English major entering her third year of study at UW. She is interested in historic fiction, poetry, and women writers. During SIAH, she plans to explore the power of storytelling as a force for change. She loves watercolors, used bookstores, and the tree outside her bedroom window. Currently listening to: “At Last” by Etta James.

Major: Philosophy; Comparative History of Ideas
Minor: Middle Eastern Languages and Culture

Griffin is a rising senior at UW with majors in Philosophy and CHID, as well as a MELC minor. Griffin is deeply interested in how we think, argue, conceptualize the world. This stands out in his work leading UW’s debate team, conducting oral history research, learning about and teaching philosophical logic, and advocacy for a cleaner environment. Ultimately, Griffin wants to attend law school, and pursue a career as a litigator. He is a proud owner of two kittens (Matcha & Rocky) and an avid fan of hiking, skiing, chess, videogames, and much more.

Major: Global Literature

Emily is a rising senior Global Literary Studies major with a focus on feminism, queer theory, and horror. This summer they hope to study ecological horror as it relates to whaling narratives. In their freetime, they enjoy reading and watching the water at Alki Beach. After graduation, they intend to pursue a masters degree in comparative literature.

Major: Earth and Space Sciences: Physics

Annika Johnson is a rising second-year student at the University of Washington, majoring in Earth and Space Sciences with a focus in geophysics. She is deeply interested in planetary science, astrobiology, and the ways geological processes shape both Earth and other worlds. Annika hopes to pursue a career in research, where she can explore questions about planetary environments and the potential for life beyond Earth. Through the SIAH program, she is excited to engage with the environmental humanities and consider how storytelling, ethics, and art can deepen our understanding of science. Outside of class, Annika enjoys playing viola, hiking, exploring, and stargazing with friends and family.

Major: English: Creative Writing
Minor: American Indian Studies

Evie is a rising junior at the University of Washington with a major in English: Creative Writing. They are interested in the form, function, and fun of language and how it can be used to enliven vital connections. They are the co-president of the UW Poetry Club. In their free time, Evie enjoys writing, exploring jargons and etymologies, and cooking.

Major: Political Science; International Studies
Minor: Data Science; Law, Societies & Justice

Being the first in her family to attend college in the United States, Zaara is forging her own path as a scholar in legal studies and international relations. Her academic interests lie at the intersection of political economy and development, with a focus on how global systems of trade, aid, and governance shape the lives of everyday people. She is especially drawn to the material realities of policy, how decisions made in boardrooms and courtrooms ripple through communities, land, and labor. Growing up in a household where food was central to care, memory, and meaning, Zaara also explores the cultural and political power of food. She is interested in how food can foster belonging and solidarity, but also reinforce borders, exclusion, and nationalist identity. Her work often returns to questions of sustainability and justice, asking how communities might reimagine food systems in ways that resist dependency and honor autonomy. This summer, as a member of the 2025 SIAH cohort, Zaara is beginning a research project that explores these themes through interdisciplinary inquiry.

Major: International Studies
Minor: English; Japanese

Melanie is majoring International Studies with minors in English and Japanese. Born and raised in Vietnam before moving alone to the U.S. for high school, she is drawn to questions of memory, displacement, and the quiet politics of translation. At UW, her Third Culture Dispatch columns in The Daily straddle the line between personal essay and international commentary, tracing how language shapes belonging across borders. Her research considers how people construct homes, identities, and meaning in the context of migration and climate upheaval. Through SIAH, she hopes to explore how displaced people preserve meaning—sometimes in letters, sometimes in silence. She drinks her coffee strong and slow, believes in the spaces where belonging and identity slip through, and is learning to see research as a form of storytelling.

Major: Comparative History of Ideas

Ava is an aspiring writer interested in narrative and theoretical writing. Her favorite authors include: Octavia E. Butler, Simone de Beauvoir, and Silvia Federici. During her free time, she loves walking her two rescue dogs while listening to Joni Mitchell, and eating buttered popcorn in movie theatres.

Major: English; Spanish

Imogen is a rising junior at the University of Washington with majors in English and Spanish. She is passionate about literature and language and hopes to bring a thoughtful humanities perspective to every aspect of life. Through SIAH, Imogen intends to approach the Victorian poetry of Gerard Manley Hopkins with an interdisciplinary lens, using non-traditionally-dominant theory and modes of thinking to understand how Hopkins created Earthworlds through his poetry–and how his vision of his more-than-human neighbors might live on through us today. When she doesn’t have her nose in a book, Imogen captains the women’s ultimate frisbee B-team at UW, participates in the UW Philharmonic orchestra, collects CDs, works at a restaurant, swims in the lake, and explores her native Seattle.

Major: Environmental Science & Resource Management; Applied Math

Nicole is a rising sophomore at the University of Washington intending to double major in Environmental Science and Applied Math. She is passionate about computational sustainability and using math to create models of environmental systems, with a particular focus on climate change mitigation and monitoring, sustainable agriculture, and wildlife conservation. Through this work, she is interested in addressing the health and economic impacts of pollution on marginalized groups. Within SIAH, Nicole is looking to further explore interdisciplinary environmental issues through narrative storytelling and literary critique. She is excited to examine how relationships between the human and non-human inform our understanding of our place and role within the natural world. Nicole is thrilled to have the opportunity to participate in a multimodal research program and collaborate with a group of dedicated peers!

Major: English; Environmental Studies

Riley is a rising-senior pursuing a double major in English and Environmental Studies at the University of Washington. She hopes to extrapolate the intersection between her seemingly unrelated majors, going beyond the Environmental Humanities to create new niches. Within coursework for their English major, Riley is especially intrigued by Victorian literature and Transcendentalism works that bend genres, especially ones that examine the role of humanity in the world.Environmentally, they are passionate about sustainability issues and development, as well as environmental injustices. Growing up right by the beach in San Francisco, Riley feels a special connection and obligation to water health, sparking a specific interest in ways to combat ocean acidification and poor water quality. They hope to focus on this during their time at SIAH, combining humanities and science-based research to examine how humans interact with and view their relationships with water. In her free time, Riley loves spending time with friends, exploring Seattle, reading, listening to live music, and thrifting.

Major: English
Minor: History; Textual Studies and Digital Humanities

Talulla is a junior and lifelong Seattleite especially interested in Modernism, medieval history, folkloristics, and theology in literature. She hopes that this summer can be an avenue to explore unconventional and layered research methods and collaborative scholarship. This summer, she is researching portrayals of divine love in industrial literature as tools to connect with the earth, exploring mixed media literary criticism and book arts. Outside of class, you might find her playing outside, perusing used CDs, on a picnic blanket with her cat, or drawing pictures of historical figures.

Major: Comparative History of Ideas
Minor: Gender, Women & Sexuality Studies

I am a rising senior majoring in CHID and minoring in GWSS. Through my studies I have become interested in cross cultural connections, impacts of war on society and human and animal interactions. I love engaging in deep thought provoking conversations that push boundaries and stereotypes and societal norms. As someone who loves all of these topics, CHID and GWSS have been perfect places for me. After taking a CHID study abroad to Vietnam last summer I have become even more interested in getting out of my comfort zone and trying new things. When I found out about this SIAH program I knew it would be a perfect fit for me so I am so excited to be able to take part in this program this summer! I’m looking forward to creating a project about human and animal interactions in regard to captivity as this has been my primary interest of late. When i’m not hard at work I love to journal, hike, and listen to old music. As a girl who has spent most of my life in Atlanta GA I am constantly looking for connecting factors between myself and others and I am excited to apply this to SIAH!

Major: Earth & Space Sciences (Environmental); Art

Mica Wass de Czege is a rising Junior following their passion for earth science and the arts by exhuming all the red lines buried between them. Their mission is to combat the exclusionary Western standard of modern earth science communication by painting parallels between geology and the human experience. Their work aims to make geology accessible to those across disciplines, fostering much-needed conversations about why You should care about our living Planet. Themes in their art revolve around imagined realism, visual storytelling, and geomythology. Mica has been working in natural science labs since arriving at the University of Washington, initially researching the evolutionary history of PACMAD grasses with the Strömberg lab. More recently, they have joined the Structural Petrology of the Lithosphere lab, where their research involves unearthing the pressure-temperature story of rocks that have undergone subduction and metamorphism. Mica has never participated in humanities-based research, so they are excited to explore what that looks like in SIAH. In their free time, they still enjoy art, as well as spending time with friends, cooking while listening to music, and taking walks. Email: jewelwassuw@gmail.com