Reading Matters, Vol. 12, Issue 10

From (under) the Chair's Desk

February is a month of deadlines. Big deadline issues facing the department include our submission of proposals for hiring new positions next year, and I am looking forward to a lively department-wide discussion on our priorities, along with a whole range of important deadlines for graduate issues. This is the month for the NRC-led assessment of graduate programs—and thanks to Barbara Eckstein and Cherie Rieskamp for their great work tackling a fiendishly complicated NRC institutional questionnaire. All faculty should have received an e-mail and now a paper letter from the National Academies giving their personal login information to fill out the NRC’s 2006 Assessment of Research Doctorate Programs. Your participation in this survey is potentially of great value for the department, and I appeal to you all to complete the survey before the February 15 deadline. This month we will also be undertaking the CLAS-generated Strategic Assessment of Departmental Graduate Programs and responding to the Graduate College’s call for Strategic Initiative Funds, as well as learning of our TA allocations from CLAS—all of which suggests there will be plenty of business for the February 15 departmental discussion of graduate issues. Meanwhile, this is the month to reflect on last year’s achievements, with all faculty cvs due to Erin Hackathorn by February 21. And, to help towards next year’s achievements in research, I encourage everyone eligible to apply for the 2007-08 Arts and Humanities Initiatives grants, the deadline for which is February 12. For such a short month, February promises to be eventful.

On a different winter note, Doug Trevor and myself have been noticing a perhaps increasing tendency of a few of our undergraduate students to be less than civil in their engagement with faculty. I am convinced that the underlying culprit is e-mail. Students are so comfortable with the oh-so-informal conventions of e-mail (oh-so-even-less-formal when deployed by them as teenagers, I suspect) and by the ability to send a message before thinking, let alone editing, that we are seeing an increase in cases where student comments directed at faculty or graduate instructors are inappropriate at the least and sometimes downright rude. Of course, this is a difficult area to try to legislate in: not only would one not want to appear to challenge free speech rights, but one also runs the horrible risk of looking prudish or simply daft if one tries floating a policy that everyone has to be polite all the time. I certainly don’t want to stifle energetic debate or even colorful verbal engagement—heck, no. But it is striking to me that the Division of Student Service’s Code of Student Life prohibits assaults, threats, and harassment but nowhere explicitly spells out a prohibition on being rude to your teacher or to others. Do others see this as an issue, I wonder, and is it reaching a level where the department might want to formulate a paragraph for our website laying out our expectations of a civil discourse and sensitivity to language both within the classroom and in e-mails to instructors?

Time to start tackling a few of those deadline tasks…

CLAS Matters

There are some items of interest to faculty in this week’s DEO mailing.

1. The College has put out its call for proposals for First-Year Seminars for Fall 2007. Proposals are due to the College by April 2. As in past years, the English Department will make the $2,500 research budget generated by a seminar available to support the research of the faculty member who teaches the course.

2. Modest financial support is available for two undergraduate awards that support undergraduate research and “mentor-protégé relationships between undergraduate students and faculty members” through the CLAS Dewey Stuit Fund.

3. The College advice on faculty advising includes a handy website with links to further websites that may be of interest to all teaching faculty.

4. If February looks challenging for faculty, apparently March may present a challenge to the scheduling abilities of your Microsoft computer; see here for the full details.

Publications, Presentations, and other Faculty Matters

Ed Folsom was in Washington DC at the end of January to serve on an NEH selection panel for British and American Editions, and on February 15 and 16, he will be a national panelist for the English test for ACT. He will be traveling to Paris, France, on February 21 for the organizational meeting of the International Whitman Association, which will begin the work of developing a new section of the online Whitman Archive (whitmanarchive.org) devoted to translations of Leaves of Grass. We also note that Ed has recently been selected to serve on the second UI presidential search committee.

Robin Hemley gave readings in the fall at Columbia University, Holy Cross, Trinity College, Marist University, St John's University and will be giving readings in February at University of Alaska, Anchorage, College of Dupage, and Penn State. In January, his short story "All Good Things Are Surprises" appeared on NarrativeMagazine.com. His story "Reply All" appeared in Norton's More Sudden Fiction. His essay "Painful Howls from Places That Undoubtedly Exist," appeared in the December issue of The AWP Writers Chronicle. His essay "A Reincarnation Just When I Didn't Need One" was just reprinted in Modern Love, an anthology of the Best of the New York Times Modern Love Column. An article on summer camp, "If You're Happy and You Know It," will appear February in The Chicago Tribune Sunday Magazine. He also just found out that his story "The Warehouse of Saints" has been selected to appear in The Best American Fantasy series.

Jon Wilcox recently published an essay titled “Rewriting Ælfric: An Alternative Ending of a Rogationtide Homily” in Essays for Joyce Hill on Her Sixtieth Birthday, ed. Mary Swan, Leeds Studies in English n.s. 37 (Leeds: School of English, University of Leeds, 2006): 229-39.

Graduate Matters

The new research/teaching fellowship opportunity for dissertating students has been named the Dietz Fellowship in honor of Elizabeth Dietz, former graduate student and Seely Fellow. Elizabeth died of cancer in Houston, Texas, on April 20, 2005. She received an MFA in poetry from the Writers Workshop in 1988 and a PhD in English from Iowa in 2000. Under the direction of Huston Diehl, Elizabeth wrote a dissertation entitled "Partiality, Sight, Memory, and Eros in Early Modern England." A successful TA and Program Associate at Iowa, Elizabeth was an assistant professor in English at Rice University at the time of her death.

Elizabeth's parents have kindly allowed us to use their name for the fellowship. They send best wishes to all the applicants.

A number of faculty and students were quoted in a Jan. 26 Daily Iowan article about the progress being made in developing an undergraduate creative writing major.

Simon Barcelona, a first-year English major hailing from Wauwatosa, WI, was interviewed in the Milwaukee Journal Star as part of a series on young chefs.

Live from Prairie Lights is no longer being broadcast live on the radio, but there are still two ways for catch the readings other than attending them in person. Delayed broadcasts will be presented on Iowa Public Radio stations (at 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. Saturdays, and 7 p.m. Sundays on AM 910 WSUI, AM 640 WOI and AM 1010 KRNI. A program is also broadcast at 5 p.m. Sundays on 91.7 FM KSUI), and streaming audio of the live events will now be available via the UI Writing University website. (Look for a link in the upper right-hand corner of http://writinguniversity.uiowa.edu.) A UI news release about these changes is available here.

NWP Matters

Robin Hemley's recent activities are listed above under "Publications, Presentations, and Other Faculty Matters."

On Looking, by Lia Purpura, this semester's Bedell Visiting Writer, is a finalist for this year's National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism, one of the premier book awards in the country. The winners of the NBCC Awards will be announced in early March. More details about the book, including an excerpt and an interview with Lia Purpura, can be found here at Sarabande's website.

Spring Ulmer's book of poems, Benjamin's Spectacles, was chosen by Sonia Sanchez as the winner of the Kore Press first book Award.

Feb. 1 (Thr.), 3:45 p.m., Gerber Lounge—Department Meeting: five-year hiring plan and search requests for next year

Feb. 2 (Fri.), 2:30-4:00 p.m., 331 EPB—The Early Modern Reading Group will meet to discuss Wes Kisting's conference paper, "The Theater of Conscience: Reforming Spectacle in Measure for Measure." A copy will be available for photocopying in the Zimansky Reading Room. Please contact Stacy Erickson (stacy-erickson@uiowa.edu) for more details.

Feb. 13 (Tue.), 1:00-5:00 p.m., The Lucas Dodge Room (256) of the Iowa Memorial Union—The University of Iowa Libraries and the University of Iowa Press will present a free seminar “Publishing a Scholarly Book.” A schedule and registration information is available here.

Feb. 13 (Tue.), 4:00-6:00 p.m., Phillips 315—Kenneth Harrow, Professor, Dept. of English, Michigan State Univ., will give a lecture titled “Before and After: The Attempt at a Radical Critique of African Cinema; The Attempt at an Answer.” This event is co-sponsored by the Dept. of French & Italian, the Dept. of English, and the Caribbean, Diaspora, and Atlantic Studies Program.

Feb. 14 (Wed.), 6:00-8:30 p.m., International Commons (UCC 1117)—Film screening of Darwin’s Nightmare, followed by a lecture entitled “Death and the Maidens: 22 Reflections on Sauper's Darwin's Nightmare, 10 Reflections on Jean-Pierre Bekolo's Les Saignantes,” presented by Kenneth Harrow, Professor, Dept. of English, Michigan State Univ. This event is co-sponsored by the Dept. of French & Italian, the Dept. of English, and the Caribbean, Diaspora, and Atlantic Studies Program.

Feb. 15 (Thr.), 3:45 p.m., Gerber Lounge—Department Meeting: discussion of graduate matters

Feb. 15 (Thr.), 6:00 p.m., UI Museum of Art—Reading by members of earthwords, the UI undergraduate literary review, including English major Molly Gallentine

Feb. 15 (Thr.), 7:30 p.m., UI Museum of Art—Nick Kowalczyk, writer-in-residence at the UI Museum of Art and a student in the Nonfiction Writing Program, will giving a reading with Russell Valentino and John D'Agata. More details are available here.

Feb. 22 (Thr.) - Feb. 24 (Sat.)—Studies in Sound: Listening in the Age of Visual Culture, an interdisciplinary graduate conference hosted by the Department of Cinema and Comparative Literature. The conference will feature Caryl Flinn as the keynote speaker as well as "The Audible Picture Show," a performance of sound works for a "dark screen."

Feb. 22 (Thr.), 4:00 p.m., Univ. of Iowa Museum of Art—Adriana Méndez-Rodenas will give a talk titled “Through the Green Threshold: 19th-Century Naturalists and the Romance of the Jungle.” The respondents to her talk will be Julie Hochstrasser, School of Art and Art History, and H. Glenn Penny, Department of History. Professor Mendez is in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese, and Director of Caribbean, Diaspora and Atlantic Studies. Professor Mendez’ talk is a collaboration of the Obermann-Stanley Fellow Program, International Programs, Interdisciplinary 18th and 19th Century Colloquium, 18th and 19th Century Fauna and Flora Series, and the UIMA. This talk is a part of a series presented in connection with the UIMA exhibition Picturing Eden (Feb. 4-May 13). More information is available here.

Feb. 22 (Thr.), 7:00 p.m., Prairie Lights Bookstore—Lia Purpura, Bedell Visiting Writer in the Non-Fiction Writing Program, will read from her latest collection of short essays, On Looking. More information is available here.

Feb. 26 (Mon.), 3:30-5:00 p.m., International Programs Commons Room, 1117 University Capitol Centre—Talk by Barbara Mooney, Dept. of Art & Art History, University of Iowa, “African American Slave Architecture: Issues and Opportunities.” This talk is part of the Caribbean, Diaspora and Atlantic Studies Program’s Spring Lecture and Performance Series: Caribbean Discourses and Contrapuntal Modernity.

Feb. 26 (Mon.), 7:00 p.m., Prairie Lights Bookstore—Robin Hemley will join current NWP student Brian Goedde and recent NWP grads Bonny Rough (NWP ’05) and Kerry Reilly (NWP ’03) to read from Modern Love: 50 Extraordinary Tales of Desire, Deceit, and Devotion, a collection of pieces from the New York Times Modern Love column. More details available here.

Mar. 1-4 (Thr.-Sun.)—Obermann Symposium "Obscenity," organized by Loren Glass

Mar. 2 (Fri.), 2:30-4:00 p.m., 331 EBP—The Early Modern Reading Group will meet to discuss Stacy Erickson’s dissertation, "Collaboration in the Marketplace: Writers, Printers, and Publishers in Early Modern England."

Mar. 2 (Fri.), 5:00 p.m., 116 Art Building West—Robert Minsky will present "Material as Metaphor," the 2007 Mitchell Lecture in the Art of the Book. A reception will follow. Richard Minsky's book art has been exhibited in major art galleries and museums around the world. He bought his first letterpress in 1960, and was trained in traditional craft bookbinding. He was the founder of the Center for Book Arts in New York City and still serves at Chairman. In this illustrated talk he will show how his work evolved and changed the way we see books. Learn more about Richard's work at http://www.minsky.com.

Mar. 7 (Wed.), 3:30-5:00 p.m., International Programs Commons Room, 1117 University Capitol Centre—Talk by Julia Cuervo Hewitt, Dept. of Spanish, Italian & Portuguese, The Pennsylvania State University, “Ñañas, Jungle, Monte: An Afro-Caribbean Discourse.” This talk is part of the Caribbean, Diaspora and Atlantic Studies Program’s Spring Lecture and Performance Series: Caribbean Discourses and Contrapuntal Modernity and is co-sponsored with UI Dept. of Spanish & Portuguese.

Mar. 8 (Thr.), 3:45 p.m., Gerber Lounge—Department Meeting: report on the Gateway Course and (if time) continued discussion of Outcomes Assessment

March 15 (Thr.)—Submission deadline for the 7th annual Craft Critique Culture Conference. Details available here.

Mar. 26 (Mon.), 3:30-5:00 p.m., International Programs Commons Room, 1117 University Capitol Centre—Talk by Mary Lou Emery, “Arts of Seeing: Transatlantic Modernism and Anglophone Caribbean Literature.” This talk is part of the Caribbean, Diaspora and Atlantic Studies Program’s Spring Lecture and Performance Series: Caribbean Discourses and Contrapuntal Modernity.

Mar. 29 (Thr.), 4:00 p.m., Univ. of Iowa Museum of Art—Nick Yablon will give a talk titled "Trouble in Eden: Fantasies of Ruin on the American Urban Frontier, 1825-37." The respondents to his talk will be Joni Kinsey, School of Art and Art History, and Susan Scheckel, Department of English, State University of New York at Stony Brook and Visiting Scholar at the Obermann Center for Advanced Studies. Assistant Professor Yablon is in the Department of American Studies. His talk is a collaboration of International Programs, Interdisciplinary 18th and 19th Century Colloquium, and the UIMA. This talk is a part of a series presented in connection with the UIMA exhibition Picturing Eden (Feb. 4-May 13).

Apr. 5-7 (Thr.-Sat.)—Poetries Symposium, beginning with a keynote lecture by Cary Nelson

Apr. 6 (Fri.), 4:00 p.m., 40 Schaeffer Hall—Talk by Sidney Mintz, Dept. of Anthropology, Johns Hopkins University, "Emerging Creole: Creolization and the Construction of Culture." This talk is part of the Caribbean, Diaspora and Atlantic Studies Program’s Spring Lecture and Performance Series: Caribbean Discourses and Contrapuntal Modernity and is co-sponsored with the Dept. of Anthropology.

Apr. 10 (Tue.), 7:00 p.m., Prairie Lights Bookstore—Huston Diehl will read from her new book, Dream Not of Other Worlds: Teaching in a Segregated Elementary School, 1970.

Apr. 11 (Wed.), 7:00 p.m., Prairie Lights Bookstore—Robin Hemley will read from Invented Eden.

Apr. 12 (Thr.), 3:45 p.m., Gerber Lounge—Department Meeting: discussion of the possible new Creative Writing Track within the English Major

Apr. 13 (Fri.), 2:30-4:00 p.m., 331 EPB—The Early Modern Reading Group will meet to discuss an article by Jailyn Moreland. A copy will be available for photocopying in the Zimansky Reading Room. Please contact Stacy Erickson (stacy-erickson@uiowa.edu) for more details.

Apr. 19 (Thr.), 3:45-5:15 p.m., Ritchey Ballroom, IMU—The Graduate Awards Ceremony

Apr. 19 (Thr.), 7:30 p.m., UI Museum of Art—Riley Hanick, writer-in-residence at the UI Museum of Art and a student in the Nonfiction Writing Program, will giving a reading with Robin Hemley and Patricia Foster.

Apr. 27 (Fri.), 3:30-5:00 p.m., the Museum of Art's Lasansky Print Room and Willis Atrium—Undergraduate Honors Award Ceremony. Thesis advisors: Please note this date on your calendars and that this year the event is scheduled on a Friday rather than a Thursday as has been the tradition in the past.

May 2 (Wed.), 3:30 p.m., Harper Hall, Voxman Music Building—Steeldrum workshop and presentation by Ray Holman, composer and performer from Trinidad. This event is part of the Caribbean, Diaspora and Atlantic Studies Program’s Spring Lecture and Performance Series: Caribbean Discourses and Contrapuntal Modernity and is co-sponsored with the School of Music.

May 4 (Fri.), 2:30-4:00 p.m., 331 EPB—The Early Modern Reading Group will meet. Please contact Stacy Erickson (stacy-erickson@uiowa.edu) for more details.

May 5 (Sat.), 3:00 p.m., Clapp Recital Hall, Voxman Music Building—World Percussion Concert with Ray Holman. This event is part of the Caribbean, Diaspora and Atlantic Studies Program’s Spring Lecture and Performance Series: Caribbean Discourses and Contrapuntal Modernity.

Other Calendars

Future Issues

Please send any items for Reading Matters or the departmental calendar to Carolyn Jacobson at carolyn-jacobson@uiowa.edu. Reading Matters will appear every other Thursday during the semester, and submissions should be received by 5 p.m. the day before. Please send submissions for the next issue by 5 p.m. on Wed., Feb. 14. Thanks very much.