EDEN

English Department Electronic Newsletter

Volume 6, Issue 2

November  2006

 

 

With the cold moving in and the semester over half over, we are now looking at registration and the classes we will be taking next semester.  This issue of EDEN will feature information on course offerings for the winter, as well as recent accomplishments, publications, and awards of faculty and students from NMU’s English Department.  Please look through the course descriptions, and contact the faculty member instructing the class or the English Department for more details or registration information. 

 

As always, please send me any professional or educational accomplishments or announcements that you would like to see in the next edition of EDEN.  I hope everyone has had an enjoyable semester so far. 

 

Rachel Hovel

EDEN Editor

 

 

 

Someone Said It:

 

Do not put statements in the negative form.
And don't start sentences with a conjunction.
If you reread your work, you will find on rereading that a
great deal of repetition can be avoided by rereading and editing.
Never use a long word when a diminutive one will do.
Unqualified superlatives are the worst of all.
De-accession euphemisms.
If any word is improper at the end of a sentence, a linking verb is.
Avoid trendy locutions that sound flaky.
Last, but not least, avoid cliches like the plague.

~William Safire, "Great Rules of Writing"

 

 

 

Announcements:

 

e Interested in being published?  Here is your chance!  Submit to The Offbeat, an annually-published Michigan-based literary magazine. We review and publish poetry, short stories, interviews, black and white art and photos, movie scripts, music, and more.  Anything that is literary will be considered.  There are no length requirements or limitations and you can submit as many pieces as you wish.  Anyone is welcome to submit work. 

 

The deadline for the next issue is February 1, 2007.  Please submit all pieces to offbeat@msu.edu and include your name, email address, address, and telephone number.  If it is a work of art, please specify the medium.  If you have any questions or comments please feel free to email Kristen DeMay, Editor of The Offbeat, at offbeat@msu.edu.

 

eThe North Wind editors are in need of good student writers to work for the paper.  Students are encouraged to stop by the North Wind office to speak with the editors and to fill out an application.  From the student’s point of view, the experience can be invaluable in the future, and those clips can help a student get that first job.  The North Wind even pays for each story!

eWe’ve all heard or used the phrases “The American Dream” or “The Good Life,” but have you ever thought to define this idea for yourself and others? One Book, One Community is sponsoring an essay contest on the theme of The New American Dream.  Adult submissions may be between 1000 and 1500 words. 

Please include a cover page with name, age and contact information (noted on cover page only). Essays must be typed, double-spaced, and can be mailed in or submitted electronically by or on December 1 at 5 p.m. Mail printed submissions to: Snowbound Books, 118 N. Third St.  Marquette, MI 49855  or e-mail typed submissions to snowboundbooks@chartermi.net.

Entries will be read by a panel of judges. There will be three winners in each category. Essays will be judged on content, creativity, and relevance. With permission, the two top winners will have their essays printed in the January 2007 issue of the Marquette Monthly and shared on the One Book, One Community website. A public reading of all 6 winning essays will be held on January 18, 2007, 7:00 p.m. at Peter White Public Library. The adult prizes include a 1st prize of a $100 gift certificate from Snowbound Books; a 2nd prize of a bountiful basket of Mexican foods; and a 3rd prize of Latin music. 

Submissions become the property of the One Book committee and will not be returned.  For more information, call Dianne Patrick at Snowbound Books, 228-4448 or email snowboundbooks@chartermi.net.

eThe Lois and Willard Cohodas Literary Prize is a prose non-fiction essay contest, open to all undergraduate students.  Cash prizes will be awarded to the top three essays.  All submissions will be reviewed and evaluated by NMU professors, at least one of whom will be from the English Department. 

 

Essays must focus on one or more of the following societal issues:

   -enhance religious, racial and cultural understanding, harmony and respect

   -eliminate hatred and racism

   -promote holocaust awareness

 

The first prize is an award of $500, second prize is $250, and third prize is $100.  Essays should be between 1,500 and 2,500 words.  Submissions must be received by the English Department (Gries 229) by March 1st, 2007, and students should submit the entry form with their essays.

 

This fund was established in 2004 by Rabbi Samuel and Lynn Stahl and Nancy and Paul Oberman, in honor of their parents’ 65th wedding anniversary.   Initially the fund was to endow a speakers series fund, but the intent of the fund was modified in August, 2006, to establish an essay contest and literary award.

 

eCALL FOR PAPERS.  The Michigan Academy of Science, Arts, and Letters is having its 2007 Annual Meeting March 9th-10th at Ferris State University.  Abstracts (of 200 words or less) are being sought in the genres of “Rhetoric and Composition” and “Language and Literature.” In addition, Northern will be heading up a “Native American Studies” panel, so papers are welcome within that field as well.  This conference is open to faculty, graduate students, and undergraduates alike.  The deadline for submitting abstracts is November 4th.  Please contact Jamie Kuehnl at jkuehnl@nmu.edu for additional information.

 

eA reminder for graduate students interested in pedagogy courses: you can, with instructor’s permission, take any current graduate course with a “P” suffix to explore teaching that course’s material.  Directed Study forms, available in the English Department office, may be used for this purpose.

 

 

 

Upcoming Events:

 

e The MFA in English and Passages North present poet Ilya Kaminsky, author of Dancing in Odessa and winner of the American Academy of Arts and Letters' Metcalf Award.  He will be speaking Friday, November 3, at 7:30 pm at the Peter White Public Library. 

 

Come for food, drink, and twelve generous chairs.  Everyone is welcome. 

 

Ilya Kaminsky was born in Odessa, former Soviet Union, now Ukraine, in 1977, to Jewish parents who had prospered against long odds: His paternal grandfather had been killed by Stalin, his grandmother sent to Siberia, and his father stolen from an orphanage and raised by an uncle. Kaminsky lost his hearing at age 4 and his homeland at age 16, when, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, anti-Semitism forced his family to seek political asylum in the United States.

 

 

 

Notable events:

 

Tortilla Curtain Author Participates in ITV Reading, Discussion

T.C. Boyle, author of The Tortilla Curtain, will present a reading from his book and participate in a live discussion with campus and community members via interactive television (ITV) on Wednesday, Nov. 1. The event is part of the “One Book, One Community” program. It is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. in the Great Lakes Rooms of the University Center.

             

The two-way, interactive broadcast will enable both the audience and Boyle to see and hear each other. Deanna Hemmila (Alumni Operations) and Jim Schiffer (English) will moderate the discussion. Participants are encouraged to submit questions in advance to the program Web site. For those unable to attend, streaming video will be available during and after the event through a link on the same Web site.

The “One Book, One Community” program encourages the Marquette County and NMU communities to read the same book this fall and to come together to discuss it in a variety of events. The Tortilla Curtain is a novel that examines the social and political aspects of illegal immigration.

Boyle has authored 19 fiction books and has published short stories in several magazines, including The New Yorker, Harper's, Esquire, Playboy and GQ. Among the literary awards he received is the PEN/Faulkner Foundation Bernard Malamud Short Fiction Prize in 1999, for T.C. Boyle Stories, the Collected Stories. He lives near Santa Barbara, Calif., with his wife and three children. For more information on the author, visit www.tcboyle.com.

 

This article by Kristi Evans originally appeared in the Campus Newsletter.

 

 

 

New or specially offered courses: 

 

e EN 411: Topics in World Literature: War Literature of the Twentieth Century

Instructor: Mark Smith

 

World Wars I & II and even more significantly the development of the nuclear bomb and its use in August 1945 make the military history of the twentieth century atypical; numerous other regional wars (Boer, Korean, Vietnam, Iran-Iraq, Persian Gulf, and many others) make it typical.  Since writing and publishing was relatively much easier and less expensive in the twentieth century than in previous ones, a huge number of books, most written by military experts, historians and politicians, provide almost countless perspectives on war in the twentieth century.  One hundred, 200 or 300 years in the future it’s likely only a small number of these works will still be available and read widely, those that deserve to be called literature, those that are comparable to Homer’s The Iliad, Thucydides’ The Peloponnesian Wars, and Stephen Crane’s The Red Badge of Courage.  In this course we’ll do our best to identify these works and then read, discuss, write about and enjoy these literary works about war in the twentieth century. 

 

The books everyone in the class will read will be selected from the following list:

Ambrose, Stephen.  Citizen Soldiers. About World War II on Western Front from D-Day until V - E Day.

Beevor, Anthony.  Stalingrad. About this epic battle of WWII.

Graves, Robert.  Goodbye to All That. Autobiographical account of his WWI experiences.

Heller, Joseph.  Catch-22. A classic, including lots of black humor, set in Italy during WWII.

Hemingway, Ernest.  A Farewell to Arms.  His classic about WWI.

Hersey, John.  Hiroshima. About aftermath of this nuclear bombing.

Klein, Gerda Weissmann.  All But My Life.  Autobiographical account of author’s survival in work camps and her avoidance of gas chambers, though she was a Jew.

O’Brien, Tim.  The Things They Carried or In the Lake of the Woods. Highly regarded novels about Vietnam War.

O’Shea, Stephen.  Back to the Front. Canadian author writes about WWI from a present-day perspective.

Remarque, Erich Marie.  All Quiet on the Western Front. Classic about a German Soldier in WWI.

Sajer, Guy.  The Forgotten Soldier.  A too often overlooked account of a German soldier’s experience on Eastern Front in WWII.

Sides, Hampton.  The Ghost Soldiers:  The Epic Account of World War II’s Greatest Rescue Mission.  Suspenseful account of the rescue of American soldiers who survived the Bataan Death March.

Wiesel, Elie.  Night.  Succinct and powerful account of his shipment to death camp along with his family and community near the end of WWII.

 

Expected course work will include reading 7-10 books (These will be books everyone in the class will read, and will be selected by the instructor after consulting with those enrolled.  They will be selected from the list above.); reading some selected poetry and short stories (exact works will be selected by the instructor after consulting with those enrolled); reading 1-2 additional, self-selected book and a presentation to the class about this reading; keeping a reading journal; writing 2-4 papers and/or completion of another major project cleared with the instructor; participating in class discussions, small group work, and other in-class activities; and viewing one or more films dealing with the course texts or subject matter. 

 

eEN 4/595 Seminar: Issues in Literature: Ethics and Literature

Instructor: James Livingston

 

The course will cover the following works in the order listed, allotting about eight class hours to each (counting the Shakespeare and Hogarth sets as one each).  Class presentations will include literary backgrounds, analysis of the fictions or works, and notes on critical approaches, and later adaptations; in keeping with the seminar approach, students will work in teams to present biographical surveys and critical synopses for each writer.  Discussions will focus on the ethical issues raised and resolved in the works and the ways they change in time and context.  During the first half of the semester students will develop a five-page discussion of ethical concerns in one of the artists covered in the seminar.  Students will also write a major eight-to-ten page research paper on a work or artist featured in the class; they will present the results of their research at the end of the class, distributing copies of their work during week 13 and leading 15-minute discussions during the final week.  Class participation will be considered an important factor in the class, and presentations and writing will determine the student’s grade. 


Titles of works used in the class:

Sophocles.  The Three Theban Plays, tr. Robert Fagles.         

William Hogarth.  A Rake’s Progress.  Engraving Sequence.  Engravings of William Hogarth. 

Igor Stravinsky et al.  Oedipus Rex and The Rake’s Progress.  

Oratorio and libretto: Riverrun                      

Fyodor Dostoevsky.  Notes from Underground and The Grand Inquisitor.         

Annie Dillard.  Pilgrim at Tinker Creek. 

Wendell Berry.  Selected Poems. 
Melinda Haynes.  Chalktown. 
William Shakespeare.  Twelfth Night, ed. Jonathan Crewe, The Tempest, ed. Peter Holland. 
Marc Norman and Tom Stoppard.  Shakespeare in Love.  Screenplay

Alternate:  Flannery O’Connor.  Wise Blood and selected stories from Complete Writings. 

 

e EN 505: Genres of Writing

Instructor: Russell Prather

 

This interdisciplinary graduate seminar investigates word-image combinations - what some modern scholars have taken to calling “imagetext” -  in a survey of various intersections in the historical development of literature and art.  The course will balance theory, analysis, research and practice; a very important component will be students’ own creative experiments combining word and image (and perhaps other media).

 

Texts and issues for investigation may include: medieval illuminated manuscripts (e.g., the Aberdeen Beastiary), the tradition of Ut Pictura Poesis (“as in painting so in poetry”), 18th-century engraving (e.g., William Hogarth, William Blake), 19th-century book illustration, literature’s response to 19th-century painterly aesthetics, the effect of innovations in visual technologies like photography on literature and painting, modernist and avant-garde experimentation (e.g., Mallarme, Appollinaire), Dada and Surrealist poetry (e.g., Andre Breton, Kurt Schwitters, Hans Arp, Max Ernst), concrete poetry (e.g., Ian Hamilton Finlay), children’s books (e.g., Maurice Sendak, Maria Kalman), “outsider” art (e.g., Adolph Wolfli, Henry Darger, Howard Finster), contemporary artists’ books, graphic novels (e.g., Daniel Clowes’ Ghost World, Art Speilgelman’s Maus, Chris Ware’s Jimmy Corrigan), contemporary visual art (e.g., Mel Botchner, Jenny Holzer, Barbara Kruger), hypertext and digital art.  To help guide our investigation, there may also be readings from works such as John Berger’s Ways of Seeing, Johanna Drucker’s The Century of Artists’ Books, Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics and W. J. T. Mitchell’s Iconology: Image, Text, Ideology, among others.

 

This interdisciplinary course is designed to bring together students from the MA and MFA programs; students will themselves be asked to determine, at the beginning of the semester, the relative emphasis they wish to place on three course assignments (one critical paper, one research-based presentation, and one creative or experimental work) based on their own needs and goals. 

 

eEN 560:  Colonialism/Postcolonialism: Novel, Theory, Criticism

Instructor: Dr. Jaspal K. Singh          

 

The rise of the novel in the postcolonial world of the former British colonies has produced an important field in transnational cultural studies.  This course will introduce students to texts from Africa and South Asia by major authors who are writing back to the empire.  Topics will include colonialism, nationalism, hybridity, language, feminism and postcolonialism, production and consumption, transnationalism, and questions of identity. 

 

The purpose of the course is to examine the colonial legacy in a number of texts, as characters grapple with the very difficult task of sculpting a national identity in the aftermath of colonialism. Such an identity becomes highly conflicted as the characters are torn between the binary oppositions of modernity/tradition, Western/Eastern, and individual/collective.  We will examine the representations of the colonized in colonial discourse and their reconstructions in national discourse.  What are the political reasons behind such reconstructions?  We will analyze some of the solutions provided, ranging from Negritude, Satya Graha (Non-Violence) and Swadeshi (Domestic Products) to collective action by women, and we will also consider some of the forms used to express those solutions.

 

Theoretical Texts:

Colonialism/Postcolonialism, Ania Loomba

The Wretched of the Earth, Franz Fanon

The Colonizer and the Colonized, Albert Memmi

 

Novels:              

The Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad

A Passage to India, E.M. Forster

Midnight’s Children, Salman Rushdie                      

The Gods of Small Things, Arundhati Roy              

Nervous Condition, Tsitsi Dangarembga

Country of My Skull, A. Krog

A Human Being Died That Night, Gobodo-Mandikazela

Ways of Dying, Zakes Mda

 

e NAS 295:  Indigenous Environmental Movements

Instructor:  Aimee Cree Dunn

 

Indigenous peoples around the world face environmental issues that threaten their cultural and ecological survival.  Special topics course NAS 295: Indigenous Environmental Movements will study these environmental issues and will explore how indigenous peoples are resisting these threats in efforts to protect the land and their ways of life.

 

e EN 350 “Methods and Materials in The Teaching of English” is only for secondary English education majors and minors who plan to student teach during the fall semester, 2007.

Kia Jane Richmond

Instructor permission is required for admission to the class. Students who have been accepted to methods level of the School of Education, have passed the basic MTTC, and plan to student teach in the fall should email Dr. Kia Jane Richmond at krichmon@nmu.edu with the following information to be enrolled in the class:

• Name
• Student ID #
• Phone Number
• Major
• Minor
• Accepted to Methods Yes/No
• Passed MTTC Basic Skills test Yes/No
• When planning to student teach

 

 

 

Faculty Accomplishments:

 

e Stephen Burn conducted an interview with American novelist Lee Siegel, which appeared in the electronic book review. He reviewed Jonathan Franzen's memoir, The Discomfort Zone, for the Times Literary Supplement, and he reviewed Tom LeClair's novel, The Liquidators, for the American Book Review.

 

ePeter Goodrich has published “Sorcerous Style: Clark Ashton Smith’s The Double Shadow and other Fantasies” in The Freedom of Fantastic Things: Selected Criticism on Clark Ashton Smith (Hippocampus Press, 2006). Edited by Scott Connors, the anthology is a definitive assessment of the California fantasy writer’s work by friends, fans, and scholars.

 

e Amber Kinonen will have a piece titled "Au Train Songbird Trail" in November's issue of Sirr Magazine.  The piece was written in Jim McCommon's graduate level course on nature writing.

 

eZ. Z. Lehmberg and two tutors from the Writing Center, Monica Zavala and Kimberly Wheeler, presented a paper at the 23rd Annual Conference of the Midwest Writing Centers Association, Oct. 26-28, St. Louis, Missouri.  Their paper was titled, “Reading and Writing Between the Lines.”  At the same conference, Z. Z. Lehmberg was nominated and elected to be on the Board of the Midwest Writing Centers Association.

 

eBeverly Matherne did a blues poetry performance at Houmas House plantation near Baton Rouge, LA, on the occasion of “Awesome Art in Autumn Gardens:  A Gathering of Louisiana Artists.”  She and her musician were one of thirteen performing groups stationed across the gardens during this annual art show.  Her trip and performance were sponsored by River Region Art Association, the Louisiana Division of the Arts, and the Baton Rouge Arts Council.

 

She also did a blues performance in Gretna, LA, funded by Friends of CODOFIL (Council for the Development of French in Louisiana), West Bank.

 

eJames Schiffer chaired the Fall meeting of the Michigan Association of Departments of English (MADE), which was held in Petoskey on October 13.  Professor Sidonie Smith, Chair of the English Department at the University of Michigan, was the featured speaker, with her talk  on “Human Rights, Literature, and the Contemporary English Department.”  Jim has served the last two and a half years as President of MADE, and it looks as if he will be serving in that capacity for at least one more year.

 

eJaspal Singh has a number of upcoming publications, including:

“Africa in India: The African Diaspora in India in Kamal Amrohi’s Film Razia Sultan,” An Anthology of African in India, Ed. John Hawley, forthcoming 2007.

“Female Sexuality in the Land of Kama Sutra: Maddening  Inscriptions and the Constructions of Postcolonial Female (Sexual) Identity in Aparna Sen's Parama," Michigan Academician, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, forthcoming 2007.              

“Memory of Trauma in Meena Alexander’s Texts,” Indian Diaspora: Retrospect and Prospect,” New Delhi: Sage Publication, forthcoming 2007.

“Contrary Space and the Sikh Women: Imperial Aftermath in Bhisha Sahni'sTamas and Gulzar's Maachis,” Sikh Formation: Religion, Culture, and Theory, forthcoming 2007.

 

Her upcoming conferences include:

“Madness as Resistance in African and Caribbean Women’s Text,” AUETSA (African University English Teachers of South Africa), University of Kwa-Zulu Natal, Durban, South Africa, 2007.

“The Indian Diaspora in South Africa,” Contemporary Theory Conference, University of Goa, India, 2007.

 

eJohn Smolens was interviewed in the October issue of The Writer magazine.

 

eHeidi Stevenson is presenting preliminary findings from the research she conducted for her dissertation, titled "Finding Our Places, Defining Our Places:

Service Learning and Ecocomposition in the Freshman Composition Classroom" to the Qualitative Research Network, a part of the CCCC's annual conference in New York City on March 21-24, 2007.  She is also chairing a session for CCCC's, titled "WAC and Quantitative Reasoning: Curricular Breadth, Improved Learning, and Innovative Assessment."

 

e Russell Thorburn has published a poem, “Watching the Three Stooges at Fifty, in the Hospital,” in the Spring 2006 issue of Prairie Schooner.  His play Dylan Thomas in New York has been approved for production as part of Theatre-Studio, Inc.’s TSI/PlayTime Series in New York City.

 

 

Student Accomplishments:

 

eLisa Fay Coutley had two poems accepted by Eclipse. "Dirty Fruit" and "Memorandum" will appear in their 2007 issue. 

 

 

 

Feedback:

 

*What did you think of this issue of EDEN?

 

*What do you want to see in the next issue?

 

*Email rhovel@nmu.edu with any comments, questions or concerns.  Faculty and students are asked to send announcements of courses and events, as well as news of your accomplishments.  Undergraduate and graduate students are also encouraged to submit poems for possible publication. 

 

Thank you! 

 

Rachel Hovel

EDEN Editor