Spark Conversations, Spark Change! A Humanities and Social Sciences Research Symposium

Silvia Saccardo

Topic: Sleep – Educational Impact and Habit Formation

Silvia Saccardo is a professor of Social and Decision Sciences at Carnegie Mellon University. As a behavioral economist, she studies how financial and psychological motives shape beliefs, information-seeking and decision-making, with implications for organizational design and public policy. Her work leverages lab, online and field experiments to provide both theoretical and practical insights in areas such as moral behavior, health, education and gender equity in the workplace. Recently, she has focused on developing a nuanced understanding of the factors that favor or hinder the scalability of behavioral science findings. Her work has been published in leading journals such as American Economic Review, Journal of Political Economy, Nature, PNAS, Nature Human Behavior, Management Science and JAMA, and has been funded by both federal agencies and private foundations. Silvia serves as an associate editor at Management Science, has organized leading behavioral economics and behavioral science conferences, and has advised several organizations on leveraging behavioral insights.

Olga Klimova

Topic: Visualizing the Invisible – Street Art, Murals, and the Construction of Chornobyl's Nuclear Memory

Olga is a visiting associate teaching professor of Russian Studies in the Department of Languages, Cultures and Applied Linguistics. Her interdisciplinary teaching and research bring together Russian, East European and Eurasian cultural studies, visual and popular culture, protest art and cultural activism, environmental humanities, cultural memory, and second-language pedagogy.

Her research examines late-Soviet and post-Soviet cinema, visual culture and popular media, with particular interests in censorship, protest and resistance, and Russian, Belarusian, and Central Asian cultural production. Her current monograph project, "Aesthetics of Resistance: Protest Art and Cultural Activism Across the Post-Soviet Cultural Landscape," examines artistic practices of dissent, cultural activism and the intersections of art and political resistance. Another research project, "Visualizing the Invisible: Constructing the Memory of Chornobyl in Literature, Film, and Popular Culture," explores how artistic and cultural representations of the nuclear disaster shape collective memory and reinterpret its historical, cultural, and environmental significance.

Klimova's research in language education focuses on learner-centered and inclusive pedagogies, technology-enhanced instruction, generative AI, project- and community-based learning, and alternative assessment. She serves as President of the American Council of Teachers of Russian (ACTR) and a member of the Board of Trustees of American Councils for International Education.

Nynke Niezink

Topic: From Connections to Consequences – Advancing the Tools of Network Analysis

Nynke Niezink is an associate professor in the Department of Statistics & Data Science, an affiliated faculty member of the Heinz College of Information Systems and Public Policy, and the associate director of the Institute for Complex Social Dynamics at Carnegie Mellon University. Her research focuses on statistical methods for social network analysis and broader issues in social science methodology, with applications across areas such as criminology, organizational behavior and statistics education. Her research has received support from several grants, including an NWO Research Talent Grant, an NSF SBE Award and a Russell Sage Foundation Small Grant. She currently serves as vice president of INSNA, the professional association for researchers interested in social network analysis. Before joining CMU, she earned her Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Groningen.

Javier Grillo-Maxuach

Topic: Fractured – The Life of a Film and Television Writer in Today's Media Landscape

Javier "Javi" Grillo-Marxuach is a prolific writer of television, movies, comic books, essays and interactive media. Best known as one of the Emmy Award-winning producers of Lost (Outstanding Drama Series, 2005) and Jim Henson'sThe Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance (Outstanding Children's Program, 2020) and as creator of the comic book and ABC Family television series The Middleman. Javi’s recent credits include executive-producing Barbaric, and The Witcher, co-executive-producing Cowboy Bebop, and consulting on Raising Dion (all for Netflix) as well as writing and producing for the first season of Blood and Treasure at CBS and From at Epix/MGM+.

Javi is also co-host and co-creator of theChildren of Tendu podcast, an educational series which aims to teach newcomers how to navigate the entertainment industry with decency and integrity. Javi has participated in the WGA's Mentor program, as well as an independent program to mentor pre-WGA writers. He also taught (with Jose Molina) a monthly seminar for mid-level writers at the Writers Guild, and has offered scholarships for writing students at the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts, and Carnegie Mellon University.

Javi was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico and his name is pronounced "HA-VEE-AIR GREE-JOE MARKS-WATCH".