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This past spring, a group of Lafayette students uncovered a lost city of sorts in the College’s backyard. By mapping changes in the city of Easton over time, they identified an entire Lebanese community that disappeared in the 1960s, when urban renewal programs demolished its homes and other buildings.
Begun as an initiative under the Community of Scholars program led by Andrea Smith, assistant professor of anthropology and sociology, the work is continuing this summer. Marvin Snipes ’07 (Philadelphia, Pa.) is working with Smith to discover more about the roots of Easton’s Lebanese residents.
They are collaborating through Lafayette’s distinctive EXCEL Scholars program, in which students conduct research with faculty while earning a stipend. The program has helped to make Lafayette a national leader in undergraduate research. Many of the more than 160 students who participate each year share their work through articles in academic journals and/or conference presentations.
Community of Scholars, which is supported by College funding and a $200,000 grant from the Andrew M. Mellon Foundation, is part of the EXCEL program. The three-year initiatives allow faculty members from a variety of disciplines to work with students in small group settings.
Snipes is using Geographic Information System (GIS) technology to map the city before and after the urban renewal. He also is conducting library research and will interview residents to record their feelings and memories of their city.
“What I find most fascinating about my project [titled A GIS interpretation of urban renewal and its effects in historic Easton] is that I’m uncovering this vast history of Easton,” says the anthropology and sociology major. “With this project, I’m gaining a better appreciation of Easton and its residents.”
The research is helping Snipes connect his anthropology and sociology studies to a real-world situation and is preparing him for graduate studies after Lafayette. It is an excellent opportunity for him to learn scholarly research techniques, including GIS mapping and using U.S. Census information. He also is developing an annotated bibliography using Skillman Library’s new database software program Refworks.
“Lafayette is a prime environment for my research,” he says. “All of the academic tools I need are at my fingertips. The GIS software I’m using is found on computers in Skillman, along with other invaluable research tools.”
Smith applauds Snipes’ initiative in pursuing intense academic research.
“He asked me a full year ahead if I would have any EXCEL research for him this summer and has been eagerly awaiting the chance to work on faculty research since,” she says. “[The EXCEL] program offers a great chance for faculty members to incorporate students into their research when appropriate. It is important to capitalize on the synchronicity of student interests and skills and faculty research when it occurs.”
Snipes values the opportunity to work closely with a faculty mentor while gaining research experience.
“Working with Professor Smith has been a blessing,” he says. “She had been aware for awhile of my aspirations to work with her, and she made that goal a reality.”
Smith has shared her research through book chapters, academic journal articles, and many conference presentations, including several in France and Tunisia. She is a recipient of grants from the Guggenheim Foundation, Social Science Research Council, American Institute for Maghrebi Studies, and Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. Her articles and papers have won top prizes from the Association for Political and Legal Anthropology, Social and Behavioral Sciences Research Institute, University of Arizona, and Columbia University’s Institute on Western Europe.
She received a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship to complete work on a book about the social memory of “pieds-noirs,” former settlers or colonists of Algeria who moved to France in 1962, focusing on those of Maltese origin. She has conducted archival and ethnographic research on the personal meaning of Malta to Maltese pieds-noirs in France, Tunisia, Malta, and the United Kingdom since 1995. She also has served as a postdoctoral fellow at the Institute of French Studies and New York University, and a faculty mentor for the Undergraduate Research Experience in Native American Archaeology and Heritage Preservation at University of Arizona.
Snipes is co-captain of Lafayette’s football team and was a first-team All-Patriot League selection at defensive end last season. He also is a member of Brothers of Lafayette and Association of Black Collegians. He is a graduate of John Bartram Motivation Center.
As a national leader in undergraduate research, Lafayette sends one of the largest contingents to the National Conference on Undergraduate Research each year. Forty students were accepted to present their research at this year’s conference.