Two new faculty members to join the department for 2020-21
May 28, 2020
Jessica Trisko Darden, Ph.D., will join the VCU Political Science faculty as a tenure-eligible assistant professor in January 2021. Trisko Darden is currently a non-resident fellow at the George Washington University's Program on Extremism and was an inaugural Jeane Kirkpatrick Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute from 2017-19. Previously, she was an assistant professor at American University’s School of International Service, and a visiting scholar with Yale University's Program on Order, Conflict and Violence. She earned a Ph.D. and a B.A. from McGill University in Montreal, and an M.A. from the Center for Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies at the University of Texas, Austin.
Trisko Darden's research focuses on the relationship between international development and conflict. She is the author of "Aiding and Abetting: U.S. Foreign Assistance and State Violence" (Stanford, 2019), and co-author of "Insurgent Women: Female Combatants in Civil Wars" (Georgetown, 2019). Her third book, "Women as War Criminals: Gender, Agency, Justice" is under contract with Stanford University Press.
Trisko Darden (@triskodarden) has contributed op-eds and commentary on international politics and conflict to The Baltimore Sun, The Conversation, The Economist, The Huffington Post, The Guardian, Newsweek, The New York Times, US News and World Report and The Washington Post. She’s been interviewed by BBC World Service, CNN, NPR, The Globe and Mail, NBC’s The Today Show and The Wall Street Journal, and featured on the Cato Institute's Power Problems podcast and AEI's Banter podcast. You can listen to her latest NPR On Point interview about what to do with the women and children of the Islamic State here.
Beginning in the spring 2021 semester, Trisko Darden will teach POLI courses on international relations, including those about international development and conflict.
Jatia Wrighten, Ph.D., is a graduate of the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University (GMU). In 2011, she earned an M.A. in government and politics from the University of Maryland, College Park, and, in 2006 – we are proud to say – a B.A. in political science from VCU.
Wrighten's expertise is in the area of American politics, with a particular focus on black women, state legislatures and leadership. During the fall 2020 semester at VCU, she will teach U.S. Government (POLI 103), and African American Politics (POLI 345). She will come to VCU with many years of teaching experience as an instructor at James Madison University, GMU and Northern Virginia Community College.