Dr. Ellen Litwicki of the Department of History is serving as a Fulbright Scholar in Hungary from August to January 2016 during her sabbatical. She is teaching two courses for the American Studies Department at the University of Szeged, one an undergraduate course on American Holidays, the other a graduate seminar on Material Culture.
In addition to teaching, Dr. Litwicki has been invited to give a variety of presentations at schools and universities. She has already or will be giving presentations on her research on gift giving at the University of Pécs, the University of Szeged and the JFK Institute for North American Studies at the Free University of Berlin. Litwicki will also be giving an address on American Thanksgiving and Christmas for students of Pázmany Péter Catholic University in Budapest and giving the keynote address on the history of Thanksgiving at a conference on The American Family in Transition at the University of Regensburg in Germany.
Litwicki has presented talks to students at the University of Szeged and the University of Pécs about the history of the American border controls, and gave a presentation on Halloween and Day of the Dead to high school students at the Csányi Foundation, which provides supplemental academic instruction and opportunities to students from disadvantaged backgrounds. She will also be talking about American holiday to middle and high school students at a local school in Szeged.
In addition to teaching and presenting, Litwicki has been working on an article, which has been submitted to the electronic journal, Americana, published by the University of Szeged American Studies Department. She has also been doing some informal research on holidays and gift giving in Hungary, keeping a blog about her experiences, getting together regularly with other Fulbright folks in Hungary, and investigating opportunities for international exchanges and collaborations between the University of Szeged and Fredonia, such as the Erasmus program and study abroad programs.