Search Gustavus

Gustavus is driving sustainability forward with zero-waste goals, solar power initiatives, and a robust campus composting program.

Explore perks for Gustavus employees, including employee discounts (bookstore, events, dining), free fitness access, wellness programs, educational courses, and more.

Lisa Heldke teaches in the philosophy department and the gender, women and sexuality studies program, of which she was a founding faculty member. Among her favorite courses to teach are modern philosophy (which, believe it or not, focuses on the eighteenth century); aesthetics; and gender, knowledge and reality. But her real passion is the philosophy of food, which she holds in the teaching kitchen of the Nobel Hall of Science, where students can cook together each week.

The philosophy of food is not only a teaching passion, it has also been a focus of much of her service work on campus. She is the co-founder of the Kitchen Cabinet, an advisory committee to the Gustavus Dining Service that works to enhance the ways it serves the mission of the College. The committee includes representation from all the campus constituencies, including students.

Food is also the focus of Heldke’s scholarly research; she is one of the first contemporary philosophers to treat food as a serious philosophical topic. She is the author or editor of a number of books in the field, including Philosophers at Table: On Food and Being Human; Exotic Appetites: Ruminations of a Food Adventurer; Cooking, Eating Thinking: Transformative Philosophies of Food; and (most recently) Parasitic Personhood and the Ontology of Eating. Her research has led to her being invited to teach each year in a master’s program at the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Pollenzo, Italy, a kind of “liberal arts college of food” founded by the Slow Food founder Carlo Petrini. Her scholarly work has also garnered her awards from the Agriculture, Food and Human Values Society and the John Dewey Society.

For ten years, she served as director of Gustavus’s Nobel Conference, a role she described as being the “chief learner” for this science-and-ethics extravaganza which is a highlight of the Gustavus academic year, and has brought more than 100 Nobel laureates to campus.

Her newest book project bears the working title “Yurtitude is Experience”; it’s a philosophical exploration of her summertime life in a yurt on the coast of Maine where she lives (mostly) off the grid with her Siberian husky, writing, baking bread in a wood-fired brick oven, and kayaking and sailing in Eggemoggin Reach. Winter finds her and her husky skijoring in the Gustavus Arboretum whenever the snow cover allows. 
 

Kjerstin Moody (PhD) is an associate professor and chair of the Department of Scandinavian Studies. She teaches courses in English on contemporary Nordic society, politics, cultures, literature, film, and art, as well as beginning through advanced courses in Swedish. Her published scholarship and current research includes: 20th century and contemporary Nordic poetry, literatures of migration and the environment, women’s writing, and Nordic film. Service at the national level includes the Modern Language Association's CLCS Nordic Forum, Fulbright National Selection Committee, and American Literary Translators Association, as well as peer reviewer for numerous international and national scholarly journals. Affiliate faculty in Comparative Literature, Environmental Studies, and Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies at Gustavus. Her work has been supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities, Fulbright, American Scandinavian Foundation, and U.S. Department of Education.

Christopher P. Gilbert is a Professor of Political Science and director of the Social Studies Teaching major. From 2026 through 2029 he serves as the Dr. James McPherson Endowed Professor of American History. His scholarly and teaching interests center on religion in US politics, elections and political behavior, research methods, constitutional law, and US state and local politics. In 1991 Gilbert won the American Political Science Association’s E.E. Schattschneider Award for best dissertation in the field of American government. He has published four books and multiple scholarly articles and book chapters. At Gustavus he is the recipient of the Edgar M. Carlson Award for Distinguished Teaching, the Swenson-Bunn Award for Teaching Excellence, the Faculty Scholarly Achievement Award, and the Faculty Service Award. Gilbert’s classrooms are student-centered and discussion-oriented, working with students to understand the US political system and students’ roles and responsibilities as citizens.

Explore a list of national and international fellowships, including opportunities in research, service, study, and leadership.

Get involved in worship services, faith-related student clubs, and interfaith programs through the Gustavus Chaplains’ Office.