{"id":6601,"date":"2026-05-15T14:20:53","date_gmt":"2026-05-15T18:20:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.trincoll.edu\/reporter\/?page_id=6601"},"modified":"2026-05-15T14:20:53","modified_gmt":"2026-05-15T18:20:53","slug":"a-love-of-learning","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.trincoll.edu\/reporter\/fall-2022\/features\/a-love-of-learning\/","title":{"rendered":"A Love of Learning"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Mary Howard<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"
\u201cI have a curious mind, and I absolutely love research. It\u2019s like a game or a sport to me.\u201d \u2013 Leslie Desmangles, Professor of Religious Studies and International Studies, Emeritus<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cI haven\u2019t been bored a single moment,\u201d says Leslie Desmangles, professor of religious studies and international studies, emeritus. Though retired since 2018, he continues his research and writing. And he is not alone. The Trinity Reporter<\/em> recently checked in with Desmangles and five other retired faculty members who are busier than ever and engaging their passion for learning every day.<\/p>\n

Desmangles, who specializes in the anthropology of religion, recently finished writing two long chapters\u2014one on Rastafari and another on Judaism\u2014for a book on the religions of the Caribbean that will be released by Oxford University Press later this year.<\/p>\n

He also is enjoying a newfound interest in Christopher Columbus. \u201cI am fascinated by what led him to travel to the other side of the world,\u201d says Desmangles, who is studying the explorer\u2019s journals and those of others who accompanied him.<\/p>\n

Desmangles says he found a sense of community among Trinity faculty members, in his own and in other departments. \u201cI had frequent scholarly discussions with my colleagues, which enriched my ongoing research and publication,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

When not writing or researching, Desmangles teaches a course in Caribbean studies at the University of Hartford.<\/p>\n

\"\"
\u201cDo things you love. If you don\u2019t love your job, find another one. What is life if you don\u2019t have something to keep your mind active, something that excites you?\u201d \u2013 Craig Schneider, Charles A. Dana Professor of Biology, Emeritus<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Craig Schneider, Charles A. Dana Professor of Biology, Emeritus, says he\u2019s \u201cpublishing like crazy.\u201d As a specialist in the phylogenetics of marine algae, Schneider continues to identify new species, placing them on the tree of life, a branching diagram that illustrates the evolutionary relationships among various biological species based on their gene sequences. He estimates that he has identified between 70 to 80 new species of algae during his career.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love my work. I love looking for new species. I remain curious about all that we don\u2019t know,\u201d he says. Since retiring from Trinity in 2020, he spends every weekday and many Saturday mornings in his at-home lab. \u201cIf my wife asks me to do something on a Saturday, I usually acquiesce,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

While these professors were at Trinity, they were conducting their research while teaching a full course load, says Takunari Miyazaki, associate dean for faculty development and associate professor of computer science. \u201cNow they can devote all their time to their passion for scholarship and research,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Milla Riggio, James J. Goodwin Professor of English, Emerita, echoes this. \u201cThe only thing we retire from is teaching,\u201d she says. When she left Trinity in 2018, she made commitments to write seven essays for various publications, including scholarly articles on the film versions of Shakespeare\u2019s The Taming of the Shrew<\/em> and several articles on the Trinidad and Tobago Carnival. She also is working on two books, a study of the Abraham legend and Compensatory Masquerade: The Healing Spirit of Trinidad Carnival<\/em>, co-written with German scholar Patricia Alleyne-Dettmers.<\/p>\n

\"\"
\u201cWhen I look back, I never regretted my time in the classroom. Teaching was my calling.\u201d \u2013 Milla Riggio, James J. Goodwin Professor of English, Emerita<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cIf we have active research interests, we have more time to pursue those in retirement,\u201d says Riggio, who became interested in the historical and cultural significance of the Trinidad and Tobago Carnival in the \u201990s. \u201cShakespeare and my carnival are kindred spirits,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Miyazaki notes, \u201cThese distinguished scholars chose a career in academia because they have a passion for learning,\u201d adding that the support they received from Trinity over the years fostered this passion. \u201cIt is a natural progression for them to continue their research after retirement,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Schneider says that Trinity gave him the resources to carry on a very active program of research while teaching. These resources included institutional leaves and funding for fieldwork during his first decades at the college. \u201cYes, it all took a drive from within, and that\u2019s always been present,\u201d he says, \u201cbut the college truly nurtured my success over the years.\u201d Schneider adds that, due to his track record of publications written while he was at Trinity, he secured funding from the National Science Foundation that fostered his research later in his career and into retirement.<\/p>\n

The support received by these professors was not only in the form of funding, says Riggio. They also were given the freedom to follow their own research interests. \u201cWhere else would I be allowed to turn like a whirling dervish in so many different directions? I wasn\u2019t forced to be the Shakespearean. I was allowed to find my own passions,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\"\"
\u201cI had the good fortune of having senior colleagues in the Philosophy Department during my early years who allowed and even encouraged me to go intellectually wherever my interests happened to be. And they happened to be all over the place.\u201d \u2013 Maurice Wade, Professor of Philosophy, Emeritus<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

During his career, Maurice Wade, professor of philosophy, emeritus, has studied and taught environmental philosophy, philosophy of the body, African philosophy, ethics and public policy, race theory, and Latin American and Caribbean philosophy.\u00a0\u201cWhen I became interested in something, I developed a new course,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Retired since July 2021, Wade is devoting much of his time to reviewing the unpublished personal notebooks of the Trinidadian intellectual and activist Lloyd Algernon Best. He plans to publish on the philosophical foundations of Best\u2019s thoughts. \u201cI believe he is a figure whose thinking should be better known,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Wade also is developing a model course on colonialism and anti-colonialism in the Caribbean. This digital course will use story-mapping tools to provide a historical narrative of text, images, and maps of the Caribbean.<\/p>\n

\"\"
\u201cThe most important thing to consider for retirement is to have a plan. The daily structure and the activities one is used to are gone, and quickly, when retirement begins. It helps to have other activities lined up\u2014research, writing, volunteering\u2014so the shift is not so drastic.\u201d \u2013 Joan Morrison, Professor of Biology Emerita<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Joan Morrison, professor of biology, emerita, retired in 2017. \u201cAt Trinity, we could study what we wanted to study,\u201d she says. A conservation biologist, she helped launch the college\u2019s Environmental Science Program in 2002 and served as its director from 2004 to 2008. She also conducted a well-publicized study of red-tailed hawks living in downtown Hartford.<\/p>\n

But her main passion for the last 30 years has been monitoring a population of crested caracaras at the Archbold Biological Station in Florida. She says these threatened raptors are losing their habitat to rapid development in the area. Morrison notes that she is the only biologist studying these birds, which she has done since she was a University of Florida graduate student. And she has no intention of stopping. \u201cWhen you spend this much of your life studying and being humbled by an animal, you want to know what\u2019s happening to it,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

For Judy Dworin \u201970, professor of theater and dance, emerita, \u201cTrinity was a fertile and active environment that inspired me to go beyond myself.\u201d During her 43 years at Trinity, Dworin established the college\u2019s dance program, co-founded the Trinity\/La MaMa Performing Arts Program in New York City, and was instrumental in creating the Department of Theater and Dance, which she chaired for many years.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat drive I experienced at Trinity led me to create something on my own,\u201d says Dworin. In 1989, she founded the Judy Dworin Performance Project (JDPP), now called the Justice Dance Performance Project, which examines social issues through dance-theater performance and engagement with the arts. She also established a performance residency for women incarcerated at the York Correctional Institution, Connecticut\u2019s only state prison for women.<\/p>\n

\"\"
\u201cThe arts are so important to our development and to our humanity. Trinity gave me the opportunity to expose students to the art of movement, especially those students who didn\u2019t see themselves as dancers. And they became dancers\u2014each in their own way.\u201d \u2013 Judy Dworin, Professor of Theater and Dance, Emerita<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cRetirement never felt real to me,\u201d says Dworin. \u201cI have never worked harder in my life.\u201d She continues to lead the JDPP, and\u2014despite COVID-19 restrictions\u2014her company has been performing regularly, including a commissioned piece staged at the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center in Hartford. Though retired from the college since 2015, she teaches a field study in a course offered through Trinity\u2019s Human Rights Program that examines the intersections of the arts, prison, and human rights by involving students in a performance project with returned citizens.<\/p>\n

For Dworin and the others, their involvements extend beyond academics. Wade runs a reading group on works by and about writer James Baldwin that includes retired and current members of the Trinity faculty. Morrison gives bird-banding demonstrations to students in her community near Albuquerque, New Mexico. And, through their church, Desmangles and his wife, Gertrude, work with refugees from the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Haiti, helping them acculturate to the United States.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an interesting life,\u201d says Desmangles. He says his 40 years at Trinity were good to him. \u201cI had the opportunity to teach some very fine students. I learned from them; they enriched my life.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked if he foresees a time when he will stop writing and research, Desmangles seems to speak for himself and his colleagues when he says, \u201cI don\u2019t think of it. For now, it\u2019s full speed ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Mary Howard \u201cI haven\u2019t been bored a single moment,\u201d says Leslie Desmangles, professor of religious studies and international studies, emeritus. Though retired since 2018, he continues his research and writing. And he is not alone. The Trinity Reporter recently checked in with Desmangles and five other retired faculty members who are busier than ever […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":0,"parent":6571,"menu_order":2,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-6601","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nA Love of Learning - The Trinity Reporter<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.trincoll.edu\/reporter\/fall-2022\/features\/a-love-of-learning\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A Love of Learning\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Mary Howard \u201cI haven\u2019t been bored a single moment,\u201d says Leslie Desmangles, professor of religious studies and international studies, emeritus. 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