Cennydd Bowles is a philosopher of technology. In 2024 he was a Fulbright Visiting Scholar at Elon University, NC.

I’ll admit I feel academically outclassed to begin with. Coming originally from industry I don’t yet have my PhD nor much of a publication history, while my Visiting Scholar peers are accomplished and expansive, hailing from ophthalmology, fine art, glaciology, linguistics. Fortunately we easily find common ground, a shared passion for experiencing, and learning from, new cultures. There’s something undeniably ambassadorial about the Fulbright programme: yes, academic excellence is welcomed, but you also bear the mantle of minor cultural emissary, advancing shared ideals and mutual understanding across borders.

Which makes Elon University, North Carolina a perfect host. My tech career took me to the US often, but only to major coastal cities. The town of Elon has just 11,000 residents and even its neighbour Burlington NC, technically a city, in truth comprises a couple of downtown blocks and restaurants that close at like 4pm on Sundays. Manhattan this ain’t. No hiding in the crowd here.

Elon’s faculty and staff are deeply competent and welcoming. When there’s a minor accommodation snag, another professor – a man I’ve never met – puts me up in his elegant home for a fortnight. My faculty head is deliberate and temperate, astutely handling his staff’s occasional gripes. The admin-faculty antagonism sometimes seen in UK academia seems more tempered here. Everyone tells me Elon is an easy place to be busy, but I set out spongelike anyway, attending workshops at the conjunction-heavy Center for Advancement of Teaching and Learning and the relaunch of Elon’s Imagining the Digital Future Center. But the non-denominational gatherings charm me most. Elon’s Strawberry Festival features plant donations and queues for nitrogen-frozen ice-cream, while students at the Maker Fair show off ingenious textiles, stickers, and robots. The physics department hosts a viewing of the only mildly disappointing solar eclipse, showcasing technology both advanced (refracting telescopes) and primitive (colanders). 

I balance research – can methods from futures thinking help us anticipate the ethical aspects of emerging technology? – with teaching. My students call me Professor Cennydd, and I let them – something that wouldn’t fly in the UK, given my inadequate credentials – but I assiduously use colleagues’ proper honourifics in front of students. Most of the class make noticeable progress, demonstrating clearer thinking and ably connecting ethical concepts to real-world scenarios. One turns a 2/10 start into a 9/10 performance six weeks later, while one or two who drift turn things around after a mild warning/pep talk.

Less impressive is the UK geography pop quiz I throw in our first lecture. The class correctly points out England, London, and Scotland at a push, but our other countries and capitals remain a mystery. My one British student, banned from shouting out answers, flares her nostrils in exasperation.

With work clearly to do, around St. David’s Day I wrap up early to foist hwyl cymraeg on my class. Local supermarkets lack some ingredients key to a good Bara Brith, but with improvisation and a stroke of luck in sourcing Welsh butter I make do. With a Welsh flag tablecloth and a YouTube rendition of Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau as choral backdrop, I cut and slather in the name of US–Welsh relations. My students are game for it, bless them, and I’m touched when they ask when our next cookery date will be. I decide we’ll flip the roles for our final day together: it’ll be their turn to make and share food that’s culturally important to them. And boy do they understand the assignment. These young Americans may not know where Cardiff is but they sure can cook: fragrant rice and peas, lavish blueberry granola squares, a gingery lemonade, and banana pudding whose vanilla sweetness still lingers in my memory.

Even a year later, people ask me how my Fulbright experience was. Tough question. Maybe it’s easier to talk about how it changed me.

While I love the overflow of London life, part of me still yearns for North Carolina. I walk into Sainsbury’s and am disappointed it’s not Harris Teeter. I miss Biscuitville’s butter-flaked pastry and the sucrotic overload of Cheerwine soda. I’ve not seen the sun in weeks, and I worry who’s feeding the cardinals that frequented my back yard.

I feel more rounded, better equipped to discuss my work with people who aren’t philosophers or technologists. I know more about how a mathematician or a sociologist might think about morality and emerging technology, and I can identify mutual foundations we can assemble.

I feel more confident. To live overseas is to suffer a hundred daily microembarrassments: you stand in the wrong line, you mishear an accent, you don’t get the joke. Self-consciousness will eat you alive in this sort of environment, so you might as well outgrow cringing. I’ve learned to simply take control of confusing or awkward situations rather than muddle through in the British style. I’m sorry, I forgot your name. I’m sorry, I don’t understand. I’m sorry, I’m not sorry.

But more than anything I feel older. On my return it felt like I’d leapt half a decade ahead in my life story. Don’t worry: this is better news than it sounds. The ubiquitous friction of a new country and new job wears your cells out, yes, but there’s more to it. Any prestigious role comes with some pressure to live up to it. I doubt I’ll ever make the impact more notable Fulbrighters have and will, but the expectations the award implies still induced me to wring each day dry. An opportunity like this should not be squandered.

My time as a Fulbrighter was profound and I recommend it gladly, but permit me a final word of advice. Getting involved in something bigger than yourself is noble and rewarding, but be clear: it’s difficult too. The cultural jolts can be severe. You’ll face tricky moments with people with whom you fundamentally disagree. You’ll realise you have volunteered to be an advocate for the values you cherish, the places and people you love. But a year after the event, I can’t help feeling our world needs more of that.