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OSU English Major Wins Fulbright Grant, Heads for Hong Kong

As the winner of one of this year's prestigious Fulbright Program teaching grants, graduating OSU English major Ladaea Melton will spend the next year in Hong Kong working with an English education program and meeting local people. The Fulbright Program, run by the U.S. State Department, sponsors academic exchanges that send Americans to other countries to conduct research and teach while bringing citizens of other countries here to do the same in the U.S. Now in its 63rd year, the Fulbright Program offers two types of study-abroad grants: research grants which fund research that must be conducted on location abroad and teaching grants (like Melton's) which combine English instruction with intercultural immersion contact.

Although she had travelled extensively beforehand and always been interested in living and working abroad, Melton explains that her interest in China began in 2006 when her family hosted a visiting plant biologist from China and her and daughter. During her time as a student at OSU, Melton, an Honors student, went on several of study abroad programs sponsored by the University, including the Honors Program's London program and the English Department's Literary Locations: Ireland program. She also traveled in the summer of 2008 to India, where she visited Bhopal, Mumbai, and Delhi and spent some time working in orphanages.

During the three years she spent at OSU (she's graduating early), Melton credits a History of Art course in Buddhist art with providing her first academic exposure to Asia and shaping the Honors Thesis she went on to write about Western translations of Chinese poet Han-shan's "cold mountain" poems, specifically beat poet Gary Snyder's verse translations and Brice Marden's series of paintings based on Han-shan's work. Her thesis is a theoretical treatment of the extent to which translations say more about the translator's cultural perceptions than they do about the text's original context.

The interest in intercultural communication, interpretation, and exchange that Melton cultivated in her Honors thesis will serve her well during her Fulbright year, where she will organize extracurricular cultural and language-enhancing activities for students at the Hong Kong Institute of Education in the form of dance parties, photography outings, an English book club, cooking exchange, and game nights. As per Fulbright requirements, Melton also plans to share her experiences in Hong Kong with others. She plans to work on a collection of short stories about her time in Hong Kong, which she will publish on her blog and possibly also in print. Beyond her Fulbright year, Melton also hopes to use the personal and professional connections she'll be about to make during her Fulbright year to stay on in Asia, teaching English as well as creating strong transnational relationships that transcend cultural barriers.

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