Marina Peterson

The final speakers for Denison’s McGregor Connections Initiative will speak about public space and neighborhood design. Marina Peterson and erin d. mcclellan will give a presentation and host a Q&A session at 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 11, in the Barney-Davis Hall Board Room (200 West Loop). Later that evening Karl Sandin and Al Berthold will present “Sustainable Urban Landscape: East Main Street, Newark, Ohio Redesign and Reconstruction” at 7 p.m. in room 110 of Barney-Davis. The talks are free and open to the public.

erin d. mcclellan, a visiting assistant professor in the Department of Communication at Denison, focuses her research on the rhetoric of public squares and the way that such spaces help reveal our sense of community.

Marina Peterson, assistant professor of performance studies in the School of Interdisciplinary Arts at Ohio University, researches performance and the city. Her current book project is “Sounding the City: Civic Performance in Downtown Los Angeles,” an exploration of an urban renewal process through which a diverse city is “sounded” at downtown civic performances.

Karl Sandin is an associate professor of art history at Denison. He focuses his research on the history of the city and contemporary urbanism. Sandin works in urban design facilitation and design research in Newark, Ohio, and he coordinates the East Main Street Urban Visioning Project, a collaborative long-term process dedicated to reconstructing walkable, equitable and sustainable streetscapes in Newark’s east side.

Al Berthold is the executive director of the Neighborhood Design Council (NDC), a non-profit organization dedicated to “improving the physical appearance, livability and economic performance of urban neighborhood and integral elements of the city.” Through his work at NDC he is able to work closely with Denison faculty and students as well as the city of Newark on designing and implementing new streetscape improvements in downtown Newark.

This year’s McGregor Connections theme is “Urbanscapes,” during which the campus community will explore the relationship between people and the urban environment. For more information call 740-587-6206.

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