Five Questions With…

Michelle Bright is assistant to the chair of the Department of Sociology. “I’ve called myself a social secretary, yes,” she says.

1. How long have you worked at UW–Madison?

I quit my job at Isthmus on Sept. 11, 2001; thank goodness there was other news that day.

2. What made you want to work at UW–Madison?

Being able to contribute to both 403(b) AND 457 retirement plans!

3. What has made you want to continue working at UW–Madison? What do you like about your job?

Originally trained in acting, what I like best is observation. I’m a secret ethnographer.

4. What is your favorite memory of UW–Madison?

In 2002, Jonathan Miller was in residence at UW–Madison at the Institute for the Humanities; I thought he had the biggest brain in the world. Not only did he co-author and appear in the 1960 review “Beyond the Fringe,” but the man is a director, producer, curator, art critic and a neurologist.

5. If a friend or family member who had never been to campus before was coming for a visit, where would you take them and why?

This January, I was working with a photojournalist, and I took him to the Sewell Conference Room in my building. The room has floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Lake Mendota, and the blue from the lake floods the room. When I looked at the proofs, I saw it was the same blue from Marc Chagall’s America Windows.