Society, Culture, and Thought (SCT) Senior Thesis Presentations: Spring 2026
On the evening of Monday, May 18, more than 100 Bennington students and faculty packed the CAPA Symposium to hear 13 seniors present their Advanced Work in Society, Culture, and Thought (SCT).
The event, hosted by faculty member in SCT Audrey DeVost, PhD, offered insights into how SCT students at Bennington College challenge notions of both the past and contemporary culture, infiltrate insular groups, examine religion’s impact on society, and interrogate how people have come to believe what they do.
The presentations showcased the breadth and depth of Advanced Work in SCT. They included:
“The Coloniality of Caste: Hindutva Appropriations of Post-Colonial Critique” by Mrinal Arun ’26.
“The Pantry Paradox: The institutionalization of Food Charity in the United States” by Nora Beer ’26.
“Negotiating Power: Self-Directed Women in Late Renaissance Venice” by Juliet Byrne ’26.
“Recalibrating the Dissonance of Cultural Heritage: Examining the Process of Folkorization in Peru” by Ursula Caille Pinto ’25.
“Turning Point Internet” by Isabella Clark ’26, which sought to find the current relationship between online politics and that of the in person environments.
“Environmental Nihilism, American Pastoralism, and the Future of Utopian Thought: A Retrospective on Communes of the 60s and 70s” by Cypress Fernandez Downs ’26.
“Machine Consciousness and the Limits of Subjectivity” by Andy Farrell ’26.
“Examining the Role of LGBTQ+ Identity and Social Norms in Substance Use Behaviors of College Students: A Mixed Method Analysis of Nitrite Inhalant (‘Poppers’) Use” by Rozlynn Lage ’26.
“Recollections of a Terrorist: Examining the Memoires de Bertrand Barere” by Blu Mehari ’26.
“The Essential Paradox: On the Church as Mediating Structure for Divine Excess” by Maisy Paaswell ’26.
“Feminity, Freedom, and Fear: The Freebirth Movement and Alternative Medicine on Pinterest” by Erin Racklin ’26.
“A Well Regulated Household: Regulation and Resistance in Antebellum New Orleans” by Callisto Tonnes-Priddy ’26.
“The Gospel of Discipline: Protestantism and the History of the American Prison” by Luca Van Der Velde ’26.