Mariah Pena teaches various English classes. Her mug comes from a recent visit to Miami, when, as she walked by a street market, she noticed the stand of an art and clothing company called Hija de tu Madre. Their purpose as a brand is to honor “the beautiful mess that is being Latina and Latinx” and, per their website, “celebrates the complexities of being a product of more than one culture.” Pena has been moved by their work and is proud every day to have some of their work and knowing that she has supported their mission.
Tokumbo Bodunde is also an English teacher, and her mug of choice comes courtesy of a simple pleasure – her love of warm colors. This mug specifically is “Cafe Bustelo yellow”.
Miriam Emery is yet another English teacher, teaching courses from freshman English to junior year AP Lang. She is also soon to be chair of the department! Her mug was a gift from yet another department chair – Marianna Van Brummelen, who heads mathematics. Following a Harkness pedagogy workshop done together, Van Brummelen surprised Emery – a huge Shakespeare fan, which of course comes in handy in her line of work – with this mug gift.
English teacher (noticing a common discipline motif here?) Michaela Pembroke is pictured with a mug straight from her department’s inner sanctum. The cup is at the center of the Commons Harkness table, and features faux-vintage feather pens which were once cast as props in the department Halloween video.
Rounding out our featured stars from the English department (but don’t go yet! There’s more teachers from other ones below), it’s Lisa Green! Her Writing Center mug comes from her desire to create sendoff merchandise for departing Writing Center seniors. The final round was between making branded water bottles and mugs, but given coffee and tea’s strong aesthetic associations with proliferation of fine writing, Green landed on mugs.
Ian Mook is a math teacher, currently teaching various courses in the fields of precalc, calculus, and linear algebra. A man of many passions who loves learning, Mook doesn’t just love math, but also is an avid birdwatcher. Mook describes birdwatching as “sort of like playing Pokémon Go, but in real life”. These bird mugs commemorate his passion, and are a gift courtesy of his younger brother.
Hank Kim teaches math as well – in subfields as various as geometry to statistics. This “best teacher ever” (he is certainly in that top rung, per this journalist and ex-freshman year geometry pupil of his) mug comes as a gift from his sister.
This journalist’s last ever mugshot as a student here is, appropriately, Ellen Cowhey, an extremely-multi-talented, irreplaceable fixture of who we are as a community. Her myriad sublimeness is best represented in some ways by “The Triple Cowhey” – a period in my sophomore year here where I had Ms. Cowhey for advisory, intro to journalism, and for eastern religions. All three instances show a completely unique aspect of what makes Ellen Cowhey so phenomenal. There is far more too than even all this – just ask the denizens of Cole Dorm. This journalist is eternally grateful to have had her as a mentor on so many fronts, and to have her as a true friend.
