Staff

Email: sbarbas@buffalo.edu

Samantha Barbas is the director of The Baldy Center. Barbas researches and teaches in the areas of legal history, First Amendment law and mass communications law. Her work focuses on the intersection of law, culture, media and technology in United States history. Her recent research has explored the history of the law of privacy and defamation.

Learn more about The Baldy Center director.

Email: baldycenter@buffalo.edu

Caroline Funk is the Associate Director of The Baldy Center. She is responsible for activating the agenda and decisions of the Director, and she manages all activities in the center. Previously, she served as The Baldy Center Research Associate, assisting Baldy-affiliated faculty to develop funding proposals.

Funk holds a PhD in Anthropology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, with a specialization in Arctic Archaeology. She has a Research Assistant Professor appointment in UB’s Department of Anthropology, and her work has been profiled in UB’s alumni magazine At Buffalo. She has worked in multidisciplinary and multinational teams in Russia, Portugal, and Alaska to research the intersection of cultural and environmental histories. Dr. Funk currently leads and collaborates in federally funded multidisciplinary research which focuses on the history of human-environmental dynamics in the Aleutian Islands, Alaska. Her published works and academic history can be viewed on her C.V.

Email: baldycenter@buffalo.edu

Laura Wirth is the Assistant Director of The Baldy Center. She holds a masters degree in Interdisciplinary Social Sciences from the State University of New York at Buffalo. She collaborates with The Baldy Center staff to develop and support projects, fellows, research, and conferences.