This Week in English | May 2-8, 2022
English Department Recognition Ceremony Today at 4pm
Come help us celebrate this year’s student accomplishments at a Recognition Ceremony to be held in the Writing Center (fourth floor of Neville Hall) this afternoon, May 2, starting at 4pm. RSVPs for this relaxed, low-key event are encouraged but not required. In addition to inducting students into the UMaine chapter of Sigma Tau Delta, we will celebrate a variety of awards and scholarships.
McGillicuddy Humanities Fellow Profile
Bell Gellis has been awarded a 2022-23 undergraduate McGillicuddy Fellowship for their project “Is Our Perception of Transphobia Blurrred When We Are Confronted With It in a Familial Context?” Through a production of Blurrred: A Modern Fairy Tale by Makena Metz, Bell plans to explore to what extent different age groups perceive the concept of transphobia when it is blatantly apparent, but the words “transgender,” “trans,” or “transphobia” are not used. They have already begun their research journey, with Rosalie Purvis as their mentor.
Next Steps for MA Graduates
After Kimberly Bartenfelder graduates from the English master’s program at the University of Maine, she will attend Louisiana State University’s (LSU) Ph.D. program in English come Fall 2022. She will continue to work interdisciplinarily through LSU’s Writing & Culture track which includes courses in relevant literary periods and from areas of concentration like Cultural Studies and Women’s & Gender Studies. In doing so, her research focuses will be situated on the relationality of bodies and space(s) as her master’s thesis investigates. However, Kimberly intends to broaden her research interests to include how and why Louisiana’s and/or the South’s regional, geographic, and architectural spaces complicate the relationality of bodies and space(s). She will approach this through selected literature and attentiveness to the impacts of actualized communities and their members. Kimberly maintains her interest in Toni Morrison but is excited and open to other authors who navigate the potential of bodies, space(s), geography, and architecture in their texts. Kimberly would like to extend her appreciation to those who have encouraged and guided her at the University of Maine. She would like to congratulate her peers who have also accepted Ph.D. and/or MFA offers and those who are pursuing their interests elsewhere!
After graduation from the University of Maine’s MA in English program, Connor Ferguson plans to attend Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa for their MFA in Creative Writing and Environment, a three year hybrid program “that encourages writers to identify and explore in their stories and lyric impressions the complex influences of place, the natural world, and the environmental imagination.” Connor will also continue revisions on his creative writing thesis, Trip the Light Fantastic, and plans to begin the querying process shortly after graduation.
Ben Markey will pursue a Ph.D. in Rhetoric at Carnegie Mellon University.
Keaton Studebaker has accepted admission into the Ph.D. program in English at Duquesne University.
MA Student Publishes New Cookbook
Sarah W. Caron’s latest book was released on April 19, 2022. It’s called The Disney Princess Tea Parties Cookbook and features recipes and tidbits inspired by the canon of Disney Princesses. It was published by Insight and is her eighth book and sixth cookbook. A recent review of it can be found here.
This Week in English 128 was sent to students, faculty, staff, alumni, and friends of the department on May 2, 2022. If you would rather not receive these weekly bulletins, please reply with <unsubscribe> in your subject line. Earlier installments are archived on our website. If you’re on Facebook, please consider joining the English Department Group.
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