Susannah L. Smith (she/her) joined the IAS in 2005 as managing director, a position she held until becoming Acting Director in August 2024. She has been central to developing the initial structure and ongoing evolution of IAS programs, particularly Residential Fellows and Research and Creative Collaboratives. From 2008 through 2017, she taught an annual University Honors Program seminar based on IAS programming, “IAS Thursdays: Across the University and Beyond.” Susannah holds a PhD from the University of Minnesota in modern European History, with a specialization in Russian and Soviet social and cultural history. Prior to joining the IAS, she was the managing editor of the Journal of Asian Studies, coordinated administration on the IPUMS-International projects at the Minnesota Population Center, and was assistant director of the Making of the Modern World/Writing Program at Eleanor Roosevelt College, University of California, San Diego. In her free time, she enjoys back-country backpacking, bicycling, and playing Javanese gamelan.

Joanne Richardson is the digital information strategist for the Institute of Advanced Study. Her undergraduate work at the University of Minnesota focused on geology, architecture, computer science and French, and she received a master’s degree in landscape architecture from the College of Design. Having spent many childhood weekends and holidays backpacking through many of the great American landscapes, she developed an early and lasting love of geology that has colored her interests ever since. She has a particular interest in digital media, strategic communications, and responsive design.

Laurie Moberg (she/her) is the editor for Open Rivers: Rethinking Water, Place & Community, an open access, digital journal of public scholarship published at the University of Minnesota by the Institute for Advanced Study and U of M Libraries Publishing. She earned her PhD in anthropology from the U of M in 2018 and her research investigates the material and social effects of recurrent episodes of flooding on rivers in Thailand. In her current work, she approaches public scholarship as a critical strategy for expanding whose stories are heard, for shaping our public conversations, and for forming solutions for our shared ecological challenges.

Juliet Burba works to develop and manage funding opportunities for the IAS. Before coming to the IAS, she served as a curator and program director at the Bakken Museum and as an exhibit developer and paleontological preparator at the Science Museum of Minnesota. Juliet brings to the IAS her experience developing projects to engage the public in trans-disciplinary experiences spanning science, medicine, and the humanities. She holds a Ph.D. from the Program in History of Science and Technology at the University of Minnesota and is an avid generalist by nature. When not at the IAS, she helps to manage a 35-horse boarding barn and rides and competes in dressage.

Abby Travis (she/her) manages communications and content for the IAS. Before coming to the IAS, she served as editor at Milkweed Editions, an independent press based here in Minneapolis. She also taught writing and literature at Gustavus Adolphus College and Emerson College and worked in the Office of the Dean of the School of the Arts at Emerson. Abby brings to the IAS her varied experience in engagement strategy, digital communications, program development, fundraising, and over ten years in literary publishing. She holds an MFA in creative nonfiction from Emerson College and is at work on a book about the sport and art of training horses for competition and the weight of human spectacle, ambition, and intention riding on the equine body. Her writing has been recognized as Notable by Best American Essays. When not at the IAS, you can find her meditating or under the tutelage of horses and trees.

Skyler Dorr (they/them) serves as the IAS program specialist and front desk receptionist. Before working at the IAS, Skyler graduated from the University of Minnesota in 2015 with a BA in both Political Science and German, Scandinavian & Dutch, focusing on German political philosophy. Skyler returned to the University in 2018, working at the Disability Resource Center until moving to the IAS in 2021. Outside of work, most of their time is devoted to community and campus activism as well as creative writing pursuits.

Carolina Maranon-Cobos (she/her) is the programming manager for the Institute of Advanced Study.  Originally from Mexico and a new U.S. citizen, Carolina is passionate about the power of cultural exchange as well as using the arts and education as a tool to develop understanding between communities. Before coming to the IAS, she was the Cultural Attaché at the Consulate of Mexico in Saint Paul, and Public Events Manager at Global Minnesota. Carolina has also served on several advisory committees for different arts organizations in the Twin Cities, including the Ordway and Mixed Blood Theater. She joined the VocalEssence Board of Directors in 2018 after several years of serving on the Advisory Council for Cantaré! and has recently started her new role as Board Chair for the organization. Carolina thrives through collaborative work and genuine community connections. She also loves cooking for her friends, dancing lindy hop, and painting and drawing in her free time.

Bianet Castellanos is an anthropologist, Distinguished McKnight University Professor of American Studies, and director of the Institute for Advanced Study. She is an affiliate faculty in American Indian Studies, Chicano and Latino Studies, Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies, and the Interdisciplinary Center for the Study of Global Change. Her new book, Indigenous Dispossession: Housing and Maya Indebtedness in Mexico (Stanford University Press 2021), analyzes how Maya families make sense of the cultural, political, and legal ramifications of neoliberal housing policies that privilege mortgage finance over land redistribution. It was awarded the Gregory Bateson Book Prize, Arthur Rubel Book Prize, and Edward Bruner Book Prize. Her other works include A Return to Servitude: Maya Migration and the Tourist Trade in Cancún (University of Minnesota Press 2010), Comparative Indigeneities of the Américas: Toward a Hemispheric Approach, which she co-edited with Lourdes Gutiérrez Nájera and Arturo Aldama (University of Arizona Press 2012), and the anthology Detours: Travel and the Ethics of Research in the Global South (University of Arizona Press 2019). She edited a forum on settler colonialism in Latin America for America Quarterly and is a member of the Critical Latinx Indigeneities Working Group. She served for five years as a board member of El Colegio High School in Minneapolis.

Jen Hughes (she/they) is an anthropologist, filmmaker, and managing director of the Institute for Advanced Study. They research the production of whiteness and the role of storytelling and enchantment in political, environmental, and economic crises in Iceland and the Northern Atlantic. Jen has worked as a project manager on digital, curatorial, and video projects for the Smithsonian, Discovery Channel, and Walker Art Center before getting her PhD in cultural and linguistic anthropology from the University of Minnesota. Prior to coming to the IAS, Jen taught at Bates College and served as the Research Fellow and Program Coordinator for the Center for Race, Indigeneity, Disability, Gender, and Sexuality Studies (RIDGS). Jen was a contributing editor for Cultural Anthropology’s Visual and New Media Review from 2016 to 2020 and is the visual essays editor for Anthropology Now. Her documentary film Viking Futures and book project Iceland and Outer Spaces are forthcoming.