Georgetown College
Faculty
Stephen T. Mergner, PhD • Assistant Professor, Department Chair
Office Location: Cooke Memorial Bldg, Room 105
Phone: (502) 863.8083
Email: stephen_mergner@georgetowncollege.edu
Education: MA and PhD from the University of Cincinnati, 2006.
Stephen T. Mergner joined the faculty of Georgetown College in the fall of 2007. Dr. Mergner’s major fields of study are American politics, political theory and constitutionalism. He is particularly interested in the intellectual origins of liberal democracy, American political thought and governance. His dissertation is entitled, “The Implementation of the Conciliated Model of Municipal Governance in Cincinnati, Ohio. Testing the Effectiveness of ‘Hybrid Mayor’ Charter Reforms.” Dr. Mergner’s research currently focuses upon sovereign debt and its use in local public services.
Courses Taught:
- American Government
- State and Local Government
- Urban Government
- U.S. Congress
- American Presidency
- Political Parties and Elections
- Social Policy
- Issues in American Politics
- American Constitutional Law, Civil Liberties
- Democratic Theory
- Political Theory of the Nation State
- Public Administration
- American Political Thought
- Ancient and Medieval Political Theory
- Modern Political Theory
- Senior Seminar
- Introduction to Sociology
Melissa Scheier, PhD • Associate Professor
Office Location: Cooke Memorial Bldg, Room 110
Phone: (502) 863.7040
Email: mscheie0@georgetowncollege.edu
Guilherme A. Silva, PhD • Assistant Professor
Office Location: Cooke Memorial Bldg, Room 107
Phone: (502) 863.7040
Email: Guilherme_Silva@georgetowncollege.edu
Education: MA (Political History and International Relations) from the State University of Rio de Janeiro. MA & PhD (International Relations) from the University of Southern California.
Dr. Silva is Assistant Professor in Political Science at Georgetown College as well as consultant for the college’s Brazil Initiatives. He worked for several years as an attorney-at-law in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Before joining Georgetown College, Dr. Silva was Visiting Assistant Professor in International Relations at Northern Illinois University Department of Political Science.
His teaching interests include theory, history and introduction to International Relations, philosophy of science, sociology of knowledge, US-Latin America Relations, globalization, global civil society, global governance, global security and international negotiations.
His research interests include matters related to the development of global levels of human socialization with implications to international relations, broadly defined. He is currently working on the development of interdisciplinary methodological tools for assessing discourse and data analysis, by combining conceptual analysis, cognitive modeling, and visual modes of representation. He is also working on a book applying the above-mentioned methodology on global relations issues. In addition, Dr. Silva has begun a new research project related to the historic evolution of human rights as cornerstone to the development of global governance and, by extension, global society.
Publications:
Book entitled Dicionário de Relações Internacionais (Dictionary of International Relations); co-authored with Dr. Williams da Silva Gonçalves, published by Editora Manole, São Paulo, Brazil. Currently in the second enlarged edition (2009).
Paper published in the magazine of IFCH (UERJ), Dia-Logos, entitled The Contribution from Hermeneutics for the Understanding of Human Sciences. (1997).
Paper published in the ANPHU magazine, from the Brazilian National Association of History, entitled The Issue Encompassing the Process of Forming Concepts in International Relations. (1997).
Kali Wright-Smith, PhD • Assistant Professor
Office Location: Cooke Memorial Bldg, Room 106
Phone: (502) 863.8073
Email: Kali_Wright-Smith@georgetowncollege.edu
Education: Ph.D., Purdue University (2011); M.A., Loyola University Chicago (2006); B.A.,Westminster College (2004).
Kali Wright-Smith joined the faculty of Georgetown College in 2011. Dr. Wright-Smith’s primary fields of study are International Relations, Comparative Politics, and American Politics. Her teaching interests include human rights, world politics, comparative politics, American politics, international law & organizations, politics of the developing world, European politics, women and politics, and public opinion. She also directs the Model United Nations program. Her research focuses on compliance with the judgments of regional and international courts, the effect of human rights norms on the behavior of states, the dynamics of state discourse, the operation of international courts, and the impact of regional human rights organizations.