Chigozie Obioma, assistant professor of English at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln and celebrated author, received a great deal of media attention for the release of his second novel, “An Orchestra of Minorities,” in January. Articles and reviews on the book led the 80-plus national news stories featuring Husker faculty, staff, students and programs during the month.
“An Orchestra of Minorities,” released Jan. 8, tells the story of Chinonso, a young Nigerian poultry farmer who goes to great lengths to prove he is worthy of the woman he loves and finds himself in difficult circumstances. Drawing from Igbo cosmology, the novel is narrated by the protagonist’s chi, or guardian spirit. Described as a modern take on Homer’s “Odyssey,” the book has gained much positive press.
Obioma was interviewed for The New York Times’ By the Book feature on Jan. 3. Among other things, the Nigeria native discussed the last great book he read (Jean-Dominique Bauby’s “The Divining Bell and the Butterfly”), a classic novel that he recently read for the first time (Kazuo Ishiguro’s “The Remains of the Day”), what moves him most in a work of literature (language), which genres he enjoys reading (a wide variety) and which he tends to avoid (fictional works “in which plot isn’t a function of character but the reverse”).
Obioma talked about the concept of chi, Chinonso’s transformation and writing from a spirit’s perspective Jan. 5 on NPR’s “Weekend Edition.” He told of his obsession with fate, the fellow Nigerian student he met in Cyprus who inspired his new novel, and the Igbo worldview in a Time magazine article on Jan. 10. He also discussed the book and its origins in The Guardian, the Houston Chronicle and the Los Angeles Review of Books.
Reviews of “An Orchestra of Minorities” have appeared in The Atlantic, The Boston Globe, The Economist, Financial Times, The Guardian, HuffPost India, The Irish Times, the London Evening Standard, The National, The New York Times, Newsday, the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Saturday Paper, The Scotsman, The Spectator, the Seattle Times, the Toronto Star and The Wall Street Journal.
The novel has been featured on recommended-reading lists by Amazon Book Review, Business Day, Bustle, The Daily Vox, GQ Australia, Image, Locus Online, the London Evening Standard, The New York Times, Nylon, Pulse Nigeria, the San Antonio Express-News, Scribd, Time, Vanity Fair and The Washington Post.
Obioma teaches literature and creative writing at the university. His debut novel, “The Fishermen,” made the 2015 Man Booker Prize shortlist.
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Popular Mechanics published an article Jan. 9 on a hole-drilling drone created by the Nebraska Intelligent Mobile Unmanned Systems (NIMBUS) Lab at Nebraska. Carrick Detweiler, computer science and engineering, and lab co-director, said the drone could be used to conduct scientific research in areas with moist soil, such as wetlands. The drones could also find military uses. The story was picked up by Tech Xplore.
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The University of Nebraska has partnered with the U.S. Department of Defense to develop drug therapies to treat people who are exposed to dangerous levels of radiation. The project — a collaboration between researchers led by David Berkowitz in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, University of Nebraska Medical Center, National Strategic Research Institute and private pharmaceutical consultants — could receive nearly $11 million in federal funding over the next five years. Stories on the project appeared on KOLN/KGIN, the Nebraska Radio Network, NET News, Radiology Business, Space Daily and other media outlets.
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Researchers with the Subglacial Antarctic Lakes Scientific Access expedition recently found the carcasses of tiny crustaceans and a tardigrade preserved under the ice of Subglacial Lake Mercer near the South Pole. David Harwood, Earth and atmospheric sciences, and a lead scientist on the project, was interviewed about the discovery for articles in Ancient Origins, Business Insider, CTV News, the Daily Mail, Fox News, Geek, Gizmodo, The Guardian, Metro, Motherboard, Nature, New Scientist, Science News, Scientific American, Smithsonian.com and more than a dozen other media outlets.
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Patrice McMahon, political science, and director of the University Honors Program, was interviewed for a Jan. 22 New Arab article on whether Bosnia’s interfaith, post-war approach to environmentalism can be replicated in the Middle East.
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Philip Schwadel, sociology, and Erik Johnson, associate professor of sociology at Washington State University, recently co-authored a study showing that support for environmental spending plummeted during the administrations of Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. Phys.org ran an article on the study Jan. 22.
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Tim Gay, physics and astronomy, was featured in a Nova segment on the physics of kicking a field goal.
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Christopher Fielding and Tracy Frank, Earth and atmospheric sciences, recently led a research team that discovered evidence that Earth’s largest extinction may have extinguished plant life nearly 400,000 years before marine animal species disappeared. The team’s study suggests that a byproduct of volcanic eruptions in modern-day Siberia — nickel — may have driven much of the plant life in Australia to extinction. Similar spikes in nickel have been recorded in other parts of the world. Stories on the study appeared in Nature, Discover Magazine, the Daily Mail, IFL Science, Metro, Phys.org, Science Daily and more than 70 other media outlets.
