Louisiana Tech University Research and Learning Symposium

So, your girl can yap…and she can do it academically. I had the honor of presenting at Louisiana Tech’s 2026 Research and Learning Symposium. I had the even bigger honor of being one of five in the Oral Research presentation category to be selected to present at the University of Louisiana Systems academic summit in a month. Somehow, though, I still can’t write a hook.

(Smiling for the camera with my award and my fabulous sweater vest)

I will start by saying plainly: research can be unforgiving, but sometimes it is not. My work here, “Robert Buist’s The Family Kitchen Gardener: Democratizing Gardening Through Domestic Practice and Practical Guidance,” is a year old now, and it was not always a labor of love, per se. But what is this work? Important. That is what kept me going. That motivation got me to the very best part, where I get to share it all!

Sometimes, especially when placed on a podium shared by very talented STEM students, I have this nagging voice that claws at my cranium, whispering that humanities research is less than. But the truth? I wouldn’t have been selected had my work been unimportant. So what I have to do is lean into that feeling, recognize that I am articulating social structures and real, relevant history that means something today. My work is capable of explaining how our written and visual culture shapes the physical world around us. Art is a science, and I am its researcher.

Winning was validating to me because it reinforced the confidence I had built and continue to reinforce in myself. It was an external reminder that people care about what I do, that I do it well, and that others want me to share with even larger audiences.

Besides, I think I totally rock business casual.

So with that, I am on to the summit, and much to the joy of my research advisor, I will be cleaning up those PowerPoint slides.

(Rocking the aformentioned business casual)