Students Awarded for Excellence in Writing, Research and Activism

The Center for Gender in Global Context is excited to recognize our 2025 Paper and Activism awardees, who demonstrated excellence in women's- and gender-related writing, research, and activism.

Tracy Dobson Award

The Tracy Dobson Award goes to an undergraduate student who has distinguished themself through exemplary local, national, or international activism on behalf of gender equity and social justice. This year the award goes to Nupur Huria, a 2024 MSU graduate of Lyman Briggs College, for her many activist and advocacy efforts, especially as co-organizer of the 2024 and 2025 HEAL Sexual Health conferences at MSU, which she directed with Harsna Chahal (Master of Public Health, 2024). 

"It was easy to recommend [Nupur] for the 2025 Dobson Award for Undergraduate Activism, whose racial justice and sexual health advocacy and community service work has been featured everywhere from the Detroit Free Press to NPR," said nominator and GenCen Assistant Director Pat Arnold. "But what particularly stood out about Nupur for this award is how she brings communities together to accomplish these goals, from her work across the state running the Youth Racial Equity council for the Michigan Organization on Adolescent Sexual Health, to the team of two dozen student volunteers she mobilized to pull off a successful major conference two years in a row."

Rita S. Gallin 

The Rita Gallin Award goes to a graduate student who writes an excellent paper on women and gender in a global context. This year’s winners are:  

Farzaneh Ebrahimzadeh Holasu, for “Unveiling the Everyday: Female Subjectivity and Subversive Agency in Shirin Neshat’s Women Without Men (2009) and Mahdokht (2004).” 

Lucy Cai, for “'You Must Be a Patriot Before You Can Be a Feminist': The Anti-Feminist Discursive Strategies of Cyber-Nationalists in Chinese Social Media.” 

Mary Anderson 

The Mary Anderson Award goes to an undergraduate student who does excellent research on women and gender in a global context. This year’s awards go to: 

Khushi Gooroochurn, for “An Unrecognized Genocide: Israel’s Obstruction of Reproduction in Gaza.” 

Emma Ayers, for “Women’s Health and Social-Sexual Politics in the Afro-Surinamese Diaspora: A Case Study on Dutch Tolerance.” 

Research Consortium on Gender-based Violence Award

Finally, the RCGV, or Research Consortium on Gender-based Violence, Award goes to an undergraduate student for the best undergraduate paper related to gender-based violence. This year’s awards go to: 

Madeline Strauss, for “The Illusion of Care: Maternalism and the Stolen Generations” 

Ceco Maples, for “Preventions for Obstetric Violence against the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas: A Thematic Synthesis”