This Week in English | November 19 – 25, 2018
Maine Campus Covers Pafunda Reading
Cultural editor Olivia Shipsey wrote up Danielle Pafunda’s recent reading for the New Writing Series in a Maine Campus article that ran under the headline “Neo-gothic resistance with Danielle Pafunda” on November 12. Shipsey writes:
Pafunda’s neo-gothic feminist style allows her to spin personal thoughts, experiences, and emotions into provocative poetry. Her love of the gothic spurred from her childhood exposure to the horror genre. The eerie slowness of anticipation seen in old films now plays an essential role in her work as an adult, along with childhood memories and her grandmother’s stories.
Shipsey closes the event report with Pafunda’s own characterization of her recent work during the question and answer session that followed here reading:
“[These works are] an inquiry into what it means to care for each other at times when we are divided, and times that we might not have what we need to care for each other,” Pafunda said.
An album of photographs from the reading is now vailable on the NWS Flickr page.
Writing Center News
Writing Center director Paige Mitchell writes in with this update:
The Writing Center recently introduced seventeen students from John Mascetta’s LAS 150 course to a range of tutorial genres: resumes, political science papers, study habits, fiction pieces, ENG 101 portfolios, and even, as John was delighted to see, assignments from his class! Our ENG 395 tutors-in-training took charge of this workshop and facilitated each tutorial with professionalism. They learned together, enjoyed themselves, and secured more return clients for the Writing Center!
Alumna Sarah Lingo at National Communications Association
Sarah Lingo, who graduated with an English major from UMaine in 2012, is now pursuing her doctoral degree in Rhetoric and Public Culture at Northwestern University in Chicago. This past week Lingo made two presentations at the National Communication Association’s 104th annual conference, held in Salt Lake City. On Thursday she talked about “Playful Acts: Improv as Commemoration” (with a focus on the Chicago-based Improvised Jane Austen group) as part of a panel titled “‘All the World’s a Stage’: Concepts of Play and Performance in TV, at Work, and in Improv.” On Friday, she participated in a roundtable on “scholars sharing great ideas for teaching specific concepts and skills,” contributing remarks on “Shark Tank: Making Claims and Using Evidence.” Lingo’s honors thesis while at UMaine was on the topic of obsession in Herman Melville’s Moby Dick. Her committee included Greg Howard, Sarah Harlan-Haughey, Naomi Jacobs, and myself.
Upcoming Events
The Undergraduate Studies Committee, chaired by Benjamin Friedlander, next meets on the Monday after Thanksgiving, November 26, at noon.
Also at noon on Monday, podcaster Amy Wicks will talk with students who are curious about what they can do with an English degree in a lunchtime event hosted by Sarah Harlan-Haughey.
On November 28, the Maine Writers Series hosts two former Belfast poet laureates, Linda Buckmaster and Elizabeth Garber, for an event celebrating their recent memoirs. Kathleen Ellis will introduce the reading, which takes place in the Writing Center at 4pm.
On November 29, poet Kate Colby reads in the New Writing Series.
On November 30, Elizabeth Neiman will moderate and participate in a panel on the question of aesthetics in creative writing and literature pedagogy. Steve Evans, Gregory Howard, and Danielle Pafunda will also participate. The event will be held in the Writing Center at 3pm. Snacks will be served. All are welcome.
The next department meeting is scheduled for Thursday, December 6, at 2pm in the Hatlen Room (Neville 406). Several conflicts have been noted by faculty members: look for an update early in the week of November 26.
Also on December 6, Joanna (Jody) Crouse, Kathleen Ellis, and Leonore Hildebrandt will read in the final event of the fall New Writing Series.
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This Week in English 39 was sent to faculty, students, and friends of the department on Tuesday, November 19, 2018. Several events were added to the web archived version on November 20. If you would rather not receive these weekly bulletins, please reply with <unsubscribe> in your subject line. Earlier installments are archived on our website.
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