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Ursula Lindqvist, PhD, is Thorstensson, McKnight, Nordstrom Endowed Chair and Professor in Scandinavian Studies and a founder of the interdisciplinary minor in Comparative Literature. She is known for her research in Nordic global cinema and in postcolonial studies, commitment to undergraduate teaching and mentorship, and her leadership within the College and in her field. Before coming to Gustavus in 2013, Dr. Lindqvist directed the undergraduate program in Scandinavian Studies and founded the Scandinavian Languages Program at Harvard University. 

A passion for interdisciplinary teaching and research brought her to Gustavus, where she contributes to programs in Gender, Women, & Sexuality Studies; Peace, Justice, & Conflict Studies; African & African Diaspora Studies; Film & Media Studies; Latin American, Latinx & Caribbean Studies; and Comparative Literature. She leads a college-wide grant project, “Storytelling and Sensemaking at a Settler Institution: Walking a Shared Path with Dakota Neighbors,” funded by the Council of Independent Colleges/the Lilly Endowment.

Dr. Lindqvist’s research has focused on Nordic cinema, global literatures, and unsettling colonial narratives. Her first book, Roy Andersson’s Songs from the Second Floor: Contemplating the Art of Existence, was published in the University of Washington Press’ Nordic Film Classics series. She also co-edited two global anthologies: A Companion to Nordic Cinema (Wiley-Blackwell) with Mette Hjort, and New Dimensions of Diversity in Nordic Culture and Society (Cambridge Scholars) with Jenny Björklund. She has published articles in peer-reviewed journals including PMLA, Modernism/Modernity, and African and Black Diaspora. Her most influential work, “The Cultural Archive of the IKEA Store” (Space and Culture, 2009), has been taught at colleges worldwide. Her expertise as a Nordic film scholar has been sought by media outlets such as the New York Times and National Public Radio as well as film festivals and retrospectives. 

In recent years, Dr. Lindqvist’s research has pivoted toward settler history, culture, and decolonization. Her current monograph in progress, Unsettling the Settler Archive, includes a critical examination of the founding story of Gustavus Adolphus College on Dakota lands. She has involved Gustavus students in her research since it began in 2021 and sponsored a student advisee to present at a national scholarly conference in 2023. Dr. Lindqvist recently received external grants to support additional archival work at the Swenson Center for Swedish Immigration Research at Augustana College in Illinois and at the House of Emigrants in Växjö, Sweden, where she gave an invited public lecture in 2024. From this work she developed the college’s first approved Signature Experience (SigX) research course, SCA-290 Unsettling the Archive, to immerse students in archival research and to train them to carry out sensitive, intercultural interviews with Indigenous people, bringing their stories in dialogue with settler archives.

Dr. Lindqvist spent five years as news writer and investigative reporter in the Arabian Gulf, India, and Florida prior to earning her PhD. Her roots are in Finland’s Swedish-speaking minority, and she is bilingual in Swedish and English.
 

Jon Grinnell is the Francis Morey Uhler Chair in Biology. He spent his youth roaming the hills of coastal California watching the hawks and admiring alligator lizards and rattlesnakes. From the time of his first borrowed binoculars he has been fascinated with wild creatures and places, and now is excited to share those with students. 

As an undergraduate he worked with the last wild California Condors before they were taken into captive breeding programs, and as a graduate student he studied the social and communication behavior of African lions in Tanzania. For years, he worked on lions in South Africa before transitioning to American bison in South Dakota. In each of these projects he eagerly involved research students, as one of his great loves is taking students out into the field to get hands-on experience with animals and ecosystems. 

Recently his attention has shifted to the plight of shallow marine habitats and regularly takes students to study the Mesoamerican coral reef in Belize. Jon feels privileged to have the chance to teach animal behavior, aquatic biology, vertebrate zoology, and other field-based courses at Gustavus, as well as the many travel courses he has led throughout South and Central America and the Caribbean.

Jon is an avid cyclist, scuba diver, hiker, animal watcher, and bow hunter.