LOOP

The CLC's annual creative multimedia project, the Loop, was completed near the end of the semester. Now that the blog is going strong, I figured I should mention it again.

This past year's theme was "faking it." So we have a number of projects to suit this theme: Fakebook, by Emily Watson; Monongazon, by John Shumate and Matt Buchanan; Doll Baby Soul Angels, by Beth Staley; and a mysterious film featuring the song-and-dance stylings of Rick Astley...

These projects were arranged and designed with the help of CLC denizens Jeremy Justus, Nick Hales, Sandy Baldwin, and Jon Harvey.

Click on the link below to go directly to Fakebook and browse the other projects via the “banner ads” to the right:

http://www.as.wvu.edu/english/loop/loop08/monongazon/fakebook_profile%20-%20John.html

Or check out our own Myspace page which acts as a homepage for all the projects:

http://www.myspace.com/fakeloop

Have a great summer!

Doctoral Conference Presentations, Part 5

Possibly the last entry in this year's series, but hardly the least:

Erin Johns Speese, “Raping Prejudice: Mary Hays’s The Victim of Prejudice, Gender, and Rape,” The 2008 International Conference on Romanticism, Rochester, MI, Oct. 16-19, 2008.

Make Way for Ducklings

For more proof that English grad students are worthy every penny we pay them---and more!---just read this duck-saving experience, as narrated by Charity Gingerich:

Danielle Ryle and I were ambling up University Ave., our destination being the Starbucks/bookstore, our reason for ambling the pile of grading back at the library. Imagine our delight when a momma duck quite literally popped out of the bushes with her brood of twelve--still wobbly on the legs! What struck me was momma duck's nonchalance. She seemed unconcerned that her kiddos couldn't hop the curbs with her as she foraged for food. Many a little guy would try to make the leap and then tumble down on his still surely-sticky backside with nary a quack of solace. I kept saying "they look like giant bumblebees!" And I'm sure those around me thought me quite nuts. Danielle and I were so worried they'd try to cross the street... which they did, several times! We kept following them around, ready to protect and defend. Others felt the calling as well. I was rather touched and relieved to see the responses of other pedestrians, though momma duck wasn't. She showed one guy her bill in no uncertain terms (much as one would give "the finger") when he tried to get too helpful.  And then a cop showed up! Danielle and I thought surely he had more important matters to attend to, though we meant to bring the ducks to his attention.  Imagine our surprise when he seemed to be having a conversation with someone else about "the family at large." After this we felt it safe and morally Ok to move on, buy coffee, and get back to grading. 

Good work!  Now, finish reading those 101 portfolios...

Ph.D. Graduates, Spring, 2009 Part IV

Having successfully defended her dissertation, "Mapping Subjectivities: The Cultural Poetics of Mobility and Identity in South Asian Diasporic Literature," Aparajita De will graduate in May. Her dissertation was directed by Gwen Bergner, with Jonathan Burton, Lisa Weihman, Ann Oberhauser (Department of Geography), and Dennis Allen as members of the committee.

The Infinite Promise of May, Part II

Sir Cedric Hardwicke and two Assistant Professors celebrate the end of the semester.

Recent Achievements in English: May 2009

JOHN ERNEST's proposal for the Oxford Handbook of the African American Slave Narrative has been approved. The Handbook will feature roughly thirty original essays from both emerging and leading scholars in the field covering a range of historical, literary, theoretical, and methodological approaches to African American slave narratives.

JOHN ERNEST and Joycelyn K. Moody, the Sue E. Denman Distinguished Chair in American Literature at the University of Texas at San Antonio, will co-edit a book series for WVU Press titled "Regenerations: African American Literature and Culture." The series will produce informative editions of nineteenth-century and early-twentieth-century African American texts that either are out of print or are unavailable in good editions.
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The Literature of the Scottish Reformation has just appeared from Ashgate Publishers with a contribution by RUDY ALMASY: "John Knox and A Godly Letter: Fashioning and refashioning the exilic 'I' "
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JAMES HARMS' second book, The Joy Addict, has just been redesigned and reissued in the Carnegie Mellon Classic Contemporary Series.
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In April JONATHAN BURTON ran a seminar entitled "High School Shakespeare," attended by academics, high school teachers, and professional development consultants at the annual meeting of the Shakespeare Association of America. He also gave a talk entitled "Found in Translation" at the University of Pennsylvania's one-day symposium on "Transnational Pasts."
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JASON KAPCALA has had three poems ("Fishing with My Father: Promised Land Lake in December," "Fishing with My Father: The Delaware in April," and "Fishing with My Father: Bay of Quinte in August") accepted to the Fall 2009 issue of Yale Angler's Journal.
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TERESA PERSHING presented a paper titled "Lesbian (Out)Skirts:
A Consideration of Lesbian Representation via Pop Culture Figures" at the Popular Culture
Association/American Culture Association joint national conference in New Orleans, LA from April 8-11.
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MARY ANN SAMYN published two poems, "There's No Time Like the Present" and "Loud and Clear," in Center: A Journal of the Literary Arts (University of Missouri), and two poems, "Oceanic" and "Something about Vulnerability," in FIELD.
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LORI D'ANGELO's poem "April in Iraq" was published in The New Verse News and her poem "Visions of Sugarplums" will be published there at the end of April.
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NATALIE SYPOLT and RENEE K. NICHOLSON presented their paper "The Writing's On The Web: Technology In The Creative Writing Classroom" at the recent WVACET conference at Glenville State College.
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KIRSTEN BEACHY, who graduated from our MFA program in 2007 has an essay in the newest edition of Shenandoah called "Selling the Farm".
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SCOTT WIBLE published "Composing Alternatives to a National Security Language Policy" in the May 2009 issue of College English.
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Former MA student Sarah Hamilton and KIRK HAZEN published "Dialect Research in Appalachia: A Family Case Study" in the Spring 2009 issue of West Virginia History (3.1: 81-107).

WVU Outstanding Senior Sarah Vacovsky and Kirk made three trips to Glenville State College this spring semester to train GSC students in sociolinguistics fieldwork. Sarah and Kirk guest lectured in an upper division English class for future teachers, expounding on English linguistics, American dialectology, and sociolinguistic interviewing/transcribing skills. The West Virginia Dialect Project loaned out recording equipment and 17 interviews were conducted and transcribed.

Kirk gave two talks on May 1 to social workers at the WV chapter of the National Association of Social Workers in Charleston, WV. The first lecture, "Language in the Twenty-First Century," was presented in a networking session to 110 social workers. The second lecture, "Dialects in West Virginia", was presented to 250 social workers in a longer workshop.
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DONALD E. HALL finished his last year of service on the MLA Convention Program committee by reviewing and judging app. 250 possible special sessions for the convention in Philadelphia (he has to recuse himself from considering any of the fine proposals that included papers by members of our department). Donald has been nominated as a candidate in this year's election to serve on the Association of Departments of English Executive Committee. He has also been appointed to the national peer review board for the Fulbright Specialist Program, administered by CIES.
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Donald E. Hall
Chair, Department of English

EGO Election Results

Introducing your officers for the '09-'10 academic year:

PhD Rep., President: Jessica Queener

MFA Rep., Vice-President: Rebecca Schwab

MA Rep.: Lindsey Joyce

MA-PWE Rep.: Bryan Coyle

Activities Coordinators: Andrea Bebell, Erin Johns, and Teresa Pershing

Congratulations officers, and thanks to all who ran and voted this year.  In addition to planning events like the fall book sale and the colloquium, the degree representatives will serve on the Graduate Program Committee. This means if you'd like an issue brought up for discussion at a GPC meeting in the '09-'10 academic year, you can contact your degree rep with your concerns. Or, attend an EGO meeting and join the discussion.

MFA reading recordings

If you missed the MFA reading last night, or if you want to relive it, check out the CLC's Creative Readings page:

http://www.clc.wvu.edu/projects/creative_reading_podcasts

Scroll to the bottom to see the latest recordings.

It really was the best reading of the year...

Though Professor Gouge failed to show after signing up to wear the scone costume, the MFA reading proceeded as planned and was, of course, a rousing success. 

Listeners were treated to readings by poet Matt Buchanan, who dazzled us with his Indiana wit and his willingness to enter the imagination of a “scuzzoid kid”; nonfiction writer Sarah Beth Childers, who reminded us of the value of maps and the importance of keeping out of the line of fire; fiction writer Lori D’Angelo, who bravely read a brand new piece about a one-time jock and his kind of dead, kind of ex-girlfriend, and to whose dog, Maggie, we send our regards; nonfiction writer Rachel Rosolina, whose essay no doubt brought a tear to her dad’s eye and taught us a thing or two about church organs and what’s inside them; fiction writer John Shumate, who explored the challenges of interior decorating and the problems of art school, which he left---we’re so glad---to be with us; and poet Erin Veith, whose poems, like origami, were folded just so.

The “emerging writers” graciously thanked their committee members---Mark Brazaitis, Jim Harms, Ellesa High, John Lamb, Emily Mitchell, Kevin Oderman, Mary Ann Samyn, and Ethel Morgan Smith---all of whom were in attendance in person or in spirit (or both!).

In addition to the creative writing faculty, the audience included many parents and other picture-takers, along with Professors Brady, Allen, and Ballentine, all of whom looked on with appropriate awe.  And the hooding---the most anxiety-provoking part of the evening (at least for this blogger)---was accomplished with something like elegance.

Congratulations Matt, Sarah Beth, Lori, Rachel, John, and Erin!  We’re proud of all you’ve accomplished so far and we’re pleased to have worked with you.  Here’s wishing you lots of happiness and good writing ahead.  We’ll be reading your work---

The Infinite Promise of May

In celebration of May Day and the last day of Spring Semester classes, it seems apt to invoke one of my favorite concepts: the Infinite Promise of May.

This refers to that moment in academic life when, as school falls away, almost anything seems possible. You could, if you wanted to, spend the next three months driving Route 66 from Chicago to LA. or reading all of Proust. Two weeks in Dar es Salaam? Building a garage? The itinerant life of a rodeo clown? Anything could happen. There might even be time just to focus on your writing.

Okay, sure, there may be a summer class to teach or fall courses to prep or dissertation chapters to read, and the Infinite Promise of May will inevitably turn into the Diminished Expectations of August, but, once that last paper is graded, for just a little while, all of that recedes from view as you catch a glimpse of the horizon.