Still in her early 20s, Emily Walz, a graduate of RVHS, has done and experienced more than some do in their entire lifetime.
She is still adding to that experiential list, too.
Walz is currently in China studying Mandarin Chinese.
Her hope one day is to work in the area of diplomacy, and a couple of recent experiences could certainly aid her in reaching that goal.
In early May, Walz was part of a 20-member U.S. youth delegation who took part in the 18th United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development.
The opportunity was provided through SustainUS, which provides opportunities for youth to participate in international summits and other grassroots activities.
Walz, who is currently a student at the U of M, spent five days in New York.
As part of her experience, Walz was able to hear a variety of speakers addressing important global issues.
One of the issues she found very pertinent was the mining of uranium.
“I learned a lot about where uranium comes from and how it is mined,” Walz said, adding she also heard the impact uranium mining has on the communities near the mines, as well as the environmental impact.
Walz said people die from cancer related to the mining of uranium, while others are killed by radiation poisoning.
Discussions also focused on the future of nuclear energy as a source of power.
“Nuclear energy is not the silver bullet,” Walz said, adding the problems of nuclear waste on top of the impact uranium mining is having on people and the environment certainly ap-pear to make it an energy source not worth pursuing.
In addition to hearing discussions about uranium mining, Walz took part in discussions regarding the 10-year framework on programs for sustainable consumption and production worldwide.
“I received an ocean of information,” said Walz, adding the value in participating in these kinds of programs (this is actually the second U.N. program she has been involved with in recent years) is helping to disseminate data to the next generation of leaders.
“The future of today’s youth will be directly affected by the outcomes of this conference,” said Walz, “and I think it’s important to add our voices to the dialogue of how to implement sustainable development.”
Walz’s U.N. involvement followed another experience she had in Chicago.
That experience was at the Midwest Political Science Association annual conference.
There she presented her undergraduate thesis “The Politics of Art: Repression and the Resistance Art it Engenders,” which studied the art work in Chile under the Pino-chet regime and in Chi-na from 1949-1980s.
In both nations, the people were not allowed to speak out against their government for fear of arrest or even death.
So, historically, people have used art as a way to express their point of view.
Of course, as Walz has discovered, governing authorities also use art as its way of sharing the message.
When those in power recognize the power art can have in sharing points of view, that also can be repressed, which Walz said then leads to more subtlety in the art work.
“I have been looking to publish my paper,” said Walz, who said many responded very well to her presentation.
Walz admitted some of the challenge is in the reality that much of the art work deemed underground is more difficult to observe and to study.
Walz said her interest in art as a form of speech began when she first started college at Carleton.
“We would go to poetry slams,” Walz said, adding one of her political science professors also focused much of her own studies on social movements.
Walz said she took some art and art history classes to help build her theory.
She admitted she has a new appreciation for art because of her research.
Walz left this past week to spend the rest of her summer at East China Normal Univer-sity where she is doing a fellowship in studying Mandarin Chinese.
Walz said this is what is known as an immersion program where she is essentially going to be studying the language by hearing it on a consistent basis.
She said just a few hours before she left for Shanghai, she hoped to stay with a host family or to at least room with a Chinese speaking student, as she felt that would best help her become a better Mandarin speaker.
Walz, who has been studying Mandarin at the U of M said it is unlike any other language she has studied in the past.
“It is a tonal system with a pictorial element,” Walz explained, adding there is no alphabet making it so different than the English and Latin based romance languages she has studied. Walz is also hoping to extend her stay in China in the fall as she continues to pursue fluency.
That, said Walz, would likely be attractive in the foreign service field she hopes to get into once she is finished with schooling.
