This Week in English | September 23-29, 2024

Amber Hathaway Rescheduled Talk This Wednesday

Local author Amber Hathaway’s talk on Grizzly was due to take place during the first week of classes and has been rescheduled for Wednesday September 25th at noon in the Lown Room Memorial Union. As Elizabeth Neiman says:

Grizzly, an anthology of fiction and other artistic work by femme survivors of sexual assault, is now published and Amber is happy to share her contribution (a short story titled “Jane”) with students and faculty! This event, featuring a discussion between Amber and UMaine faculty from several different disciplinary perspectives about the anthology, includes a Q&A with Amber about her pairing of WGS with math as an undergraduate at UMaine and the ways in which WGS perspectives may have impacted her graduate work in math and physics at UMaine as well as her emerging career as a local writer. Hollie Adams is involved from her perspective as a creative writer. Cookies and tea/coffee are on the house.

The poster included below includes more information but misstates the start time. Professor Neiman confirms that the event starts at noon. 

New Writing Series Starts on Thursday

The New Writing Series is sponsored by the English Department in partnership with the Center for Poetry and Poetics (formerly the National Poetry Foundation). Since its inception in 1999, the series has hosted more than 400 creative writers in a wide range of genres for live readings on campus. This fall the series marks its 25th anniversary by offering seven events, all of which take place in the Fernald APPE Space in the IMRC (Stewart Commons 104) on Thursday afternoons starting at 4:30pm. They are free and open to the public.

The NWS kicks off this Thursday at 4:30pm with an event celebrating Chelsea Johanson’s recent translations of two volumes of poetry by Carlos Villacorta, Dark Matter and Book of Temptation and Oblivion. Johanson is pursuing a BA at UMaine with a double major in Spanish and International affairs and a minor in French. In the introduction to Dark Matter, Johanson writes:

Translation is becoming increasingly crucial as we consider the importance of a multicultural and globalized society. It can help us understand different perspectives and new ideas; it can help us gain a richer knowledge of surrounding cultures; and it can illuminate the idea of creating a wider audience for enjoying literature of different languages. Dr. Villacorta has given me the honor of translating two of his poetry books through a months-long research project; these books have never been translated into English before, so it is an amazing opportunity to be able to share them with more people.

Light refreshments will be served at the IMRC (Stewart Commons 104) starting at 4pm. Steve Evans will offer some remarks about the series and the upcoming season at 4:30 and Zach Ludington will introduce the event. 

Other authors featured this fall include Keith Rosson (introduced by Jeremy Parker), Rod Moody-Corbett (introduced by Hollie Adams), Dawn Lundy Martin (introduced by Jennifer Moxley), Babak Lakghomi (introduced by Greg Howard), Daisy Fried (introduced by Steve Evans), and Nick Rees Gardner (introduced by Morgan Talty).

Falconer Publishes Edited Collection on Writing in STEM

Heather Falconer has a collection on the power of inclusive teaching in STEM education contexts. Co-edited with LaKeisha McClary (The George Washington University), Inclusive STEM: Transforming Disciplinary Writing Instruction for a Socially Just Future provides higher education instructors insights on how they can create a sense of belonging for students from groups that have historically been kept out of STEM disciplines, how faculty can consciously create space for student voices to be heard, and how to do so with an eye toward the discursive practices of STEM disciplines. The collection is available in open access through University Press of Colorado/The WAC Clearinghouse.

Billitteri Delivers Keynote Address in Rome

Carla Billitteri writes to us from Italy with the following exciting news: 

I delivered the opening keynote address for the 2024 AISNA conference on Wednesday, September 18. The conference took place in Rome in the Center of American Studies housed in Palazzo Caetani, one of the most beautiful palaces in Rome, the favorite refuge of Henry James. The AISNA is the Italian Association of North American Studies—the equivalent of the MLA in the States.

My title was “‘A perpetual cutting’: resistance to form and aporetic dialogism in radical black aesthetics.”

I discussed the continuities and discontinuities between Black radical tradition and contemporary radical Black aesthetics, focusing in particular on the work of Fred Moten and Claudia Rankine, and providing a typology of several modalities of “resistance to form” in both Moten and Rankine as well as modalities of aporetic dialogism in Rankine.

The keynote was very well received. Several Italian colleagues traveled to Rome just to hear my work. I was deeply honored by the invitation and the collective reception.

Neiman Article in Eighteenth-Century Fiction

Elizabeth Neiman wrote in response to last week’s bulletin:

I really enjoyed seeing the publication updates on Ryan’s two (!) books. That reminded me that I’d love to share with others a new article published this past July in Eighteenth-Century Fiction in an upcoming This Week in English.

This article, “A Critical Turn Inwards in The Woman of Colour (1808): on Teaching Romanticism Now,” is a palimpsest of sorts—tracing back to an initial proposal for a special issue in a different journal back in fall 2019 and drafted in summer 2021.  Though accepted for the special issue, that journal had some set-backs that led to continued delays and ultimately my decision to retract the article and seek publication elsewhere.

This choice was a bit of a risk in terms as the essay (a response to a special issue on pedagogy) is experimental in tone and style, drawing together excerpts from the memoir I drafted during the pandemic, reflections on pedagogical approaches to the novel The Woman of Colour and also literary criticism. I am particularly excited to share it with the department as I refer specifically to several courses and also the work of students (from a fall course taught in fall 2019 to a graduate course in spring 2023). I was thrilled that Eighteenth-Century Fiction was interested!

Alum Ernest Scheyder’s Book on Longlist for NBA 

This welcome note recently came our way from alumnus Ernie Scheyder. He writes:

I was a member of the UMaine English class of 2006. I wanted to reach out and share that my book, The War Below, was just named to the longlist for the National Book Award in the nonfiction category.

To say that I’m blown away would be an understatement. Grateful and honored to be on this list among some true titans.

I look back very fondly on my time at the UMaine English Department. It taught me to think critically and deeply about our world, skills that helped greatly when writing The War Below. I was a Writing Center tutor during my time in Orono, an experience I loved as well. 

A huge thank you to Harvey Kail, Pat Burnes and everyone in the UMaine English Department.

If you’re an alum and want to share some good news, we’re all ears! Just hit reply and we’ll cue up an item for a future bulletin.

English 693 Updates

English 693: Principled Practices in the Teaching of Writing had a guest last week: Amy Cicchino of Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University stopped in (virtually) to discuss her chapter, “‘I Passed First-Year Writing—Now What?’: Adapting Strategies from First-Year Writing to Writing in the Disciplines.”  We covered that chapter, teaching practices, the job market in higher education, and just about everything else, it seemed!  Our next virtual guest, Yvonne Lee of Lehigh University, will be visiting in October. 

College Composition Updates 

The microteaching sessions have begun in College Composition! Throughout each week, TAs attend small group sessions where they either present a recent teaching activity for feedback or share a plan for a future class meeting that they would like to talk through. These sessions are meant to help TAs develop their teaching practices, share what is working, and celebrate one another’s successes. These sessions will run through October 25.

The Boston Rhetoric and Writing Network (BRAWN) has awarded the College Composition program a grant to support the organizing, digitizing, and analysis of the archives of the program. Second-year MA student Tulane Simpson will be leading the charge on this work throughout the 24-25 school year. 

What’s Happening in College Composition Classes 

Jody Crouse reports in on her section of English 100, the first of a two-semester “stretch” course:

In our Stretch class we are talking about how our language reflects, shapes, and enacts our identity by exploring some of the language communities with which we engage, both in-person and virtually.  We are also examining how our participation in one discourse community can support or conflict with our participation in another one, and how this ultimately influences our reading and writing.

Kaytlin Black reports in on her section of English 101:

In previous semesters, I conducted a handful of analog-style-classes—meaning I asked my students to put all of their technology away and simply focus on their writing utensil and the blank page. After these classes, I had students come up to me and express their gratitude to me for getting them off of their devices and simply focusing on the writing. Then, in the spring semester, I took ENG 579: Theorizing and Researching Composing in which one of our weekly deliverables was a “lab notebook” which we submitted to Dylan Dryer and then received in-line responses with probing questions from him to encourage us to think deeper or through a different lens about the week’s text. Through this weekly exercise, I gained an appreciation for working “offline” and was curious how I could turn this deliverable into a similar assignment for English 101 students this fall. Well, after ample course planning and scouring Amazon for an affordable set of notebooks, I did! 

This past week, my English 101 students submitted their first notebook entry which asked them to read “Chapter 1: Engaged Pedagogy” from bell hooks’s Teaching to Transgress. For their notebook entries, students are given guiding questions such as: What is the controlling purpose? What words/phrases are new to you? What does a quick google search or the context clues tell you about the word/phrase?Is there a particular claim that is eye-catching to you? What stood out? Who do you think is the intended audience of this text? What claims from the text do you think would appeal to or offend this audience? How do the author’s claims intersect with your own life? Is there a claim that you agree or disagree with? Explain. Do any of the author’s claims align with your interests? If so, how? (A handful of these questions and the inclusion of hooks’s text in my sequence are from the influence of Miracle Gant, so shout out to Miracle!)

Students turned in their notebooks to me today (Friday, 9/20), so I will take the weekend to grade them and leave feedback this weekend (via colored pens and colored sticky notes), and they will have their notebooks returned to them on Monday for our next reading—a compilation of excerpts from Rick Rubin’s The Creative Act: A Way of Being. If readers of the Bulletin are interested in the initial annotations and notes, I’m happy to share some images.

ENG 215 Students Exploring Cognitive Models of Writing through Multimodal Activities

Students in Theories and Practices of Writing (ENG 215) with Professor Falconer have been exploring the relationships between reading and writing, and cognitive models of writing development. This past week, they embraced multimodal composing processes to articulate the relationships between reading and writing, and development over time. These visuals are on display outside of Dr. Falconer’s office (319 Neville) and will be up until Oct 1.

Spire Seeks Editorial Team Members  

Olivia Olson is the Editor-in-Chief of Spire: the Maine Journal of Conservation and Sustainability. She writes to say that the journal is

looking for graduate and undergraduate students who may be interested in joining our editorial team. We are looking for motivated individuals who are interested in promoting action surrounding conservation and sustainability. If you are interested or have any questions, please send an email to spire@maine.edu. And for more information, including access to all of our previous issues, please visit umaine.edu/spire.

Your Favorite Punctuation Mark? An Informal Poll

Last week’s bulletin ended with an item about our favorite punctuation marks and some of the literary figures we identity with them—you know, Dickinson’s dash, Whitman’s ellipsis, Proust’s semicolon, Frank O’Hara’s exclamation point, Pound’s colon, and so forth. A few readers chimed in with their own picks.

First-year MA student Will Lathrop replied: “I like Charles Olson’s open parenthesis (that he leaves hanging.” 

Alum Ann Snow says: “I very much enjoy writing letters. When I am writing, I use three punctuation marks as in a train of thought…”

MA alum Paul Eaton exclaims: “Ginsberg’s ampersands!”

And first-year MA student Hannah Boyle confesses: “I love the em dash with my entire being.” 

Keep them coming, won’t you?  

This Week in English 155 was sent to students, faculty, staff, alumni, and friends of the department on September 24, 2024. 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. We’re also (since March of 2024) on Linked In. To learn more about faculty members mentioned in this bulletin, visit our People page.

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University of Maine Language Acknowledgment