Reading Matters, Vol. 10, Issue 4, November 17, 2004
Ed Folsom will be teaching a special one-day seminar on Whitman to graduate students and honors undergraduates at Northwestern University on Thursday, Nov. 18 and will be giving a lecture on "Naturalizing Whitman, Nationalizing Whitman" at Northwestern's American Cultures Colloquium on Friday, Nov. 19. This past spring, he presented the Lewis Lecture at Texas A&M University, the Gilbert Lecture at Southern Methodist University, and the keynote address at the "Multitudes of Walt Whitman" conference at Grinnell College.
Peter Nazareth has recently published an essay, "Nazareth on Persaud: Yogic Realism in the West," Confluence 3(4), July/Aug. 2004 and a short story, "Mama's Umbrella," SUFI 63, autumn 2004.
Bob Sayre writes that he recently donated his copies and transcripts of Thoreau's Indian notebooks to Special Collections at the University of Iowa Library. The "Indian Books," as Thoreau called them, were his 12 manuscript books, totaling 3,000 pages of notes and excerpts from his reading about American Indians, as well as other native people from around the world. Professor Sayre used them in writing Thoreau and the American Indians. The copies were made from microfilms of the originals, in the Morgan Library. The transcripts are Xeroxes of the typed copies of the originals, done in the 1930s by seven graduate students of Professor Arthur Christy of Columbia University.
Thom Swiss has been invited to serve as President of the Board of Directors of The Electronic Literature Organization for the term of 2005-2007. The appointment will bring the UI English Department into conversation—around the subjects of new media literature and scholarship—with UCLA, UC Santa Barbara, Georgia Tech, and the University of Bergen.
Jon Wilcox's essay "Wulfstan's Sermo Lupi ad Anglos as Political Performance: 16 February 1014 and Beyond" was published in Wulfstan, Archbishop of York, ed. Matthew Townend, Studies in the Early Middle Ages 10 (Turnhoult: Brepols, 2004): 375-96.
Job Tracks 2003-04
As this year’s academic job searches swing into fever pitch, here is corrected information on the placement of English Department Ph.D.s who graduated in 2003-04, along with updated news on earlier graduates. Please send any additions or corrections to jonathan-wilcox@uiowa.edu.
Ph.D. graduates 03-04
Bidisha Banerjee (Aug 04, dir. Emery)
Megan Early (Aug 04, dir. Mangum), U of Iowa, Visiting Asst. Prof.
Jean Fernandez (Aug 04, dir. Stewart), U of Maryland—Baltimore (TT)
Isiah Lavender (Aug 04, dir. Landon), U of Central Arkansas (TT)
Tom McLean (Aug 04, dir. Pascoe)
Shirley Lopez (May 04, dir. Fox), College of DuPage, Glen Ellyn, IL, Asst. Prof. (TT)
Jennifer Ryan (May 04, dir. Morris), Grinnell College, IA, Visiting Asst. Prof.
Damon Franke (Dec 03, dir. Boos), U of Southern Mississippi (TT)
Susan Hwang (Dec 03, dir. Lutz), non-profit museum admin, Los Angeles
Elyse Myers (Dec 03, dir. Lutz), U of Iowa, Visiting Asst. Prof.
Eun-Jun (Missa) Yook (Dec 03, dir. Mangum & Pascoe) visiting position in S. Korea
Robin Barrow (Aug 03, dir. Boos), U of Tennessee— Knoxville, lecturer
David Banash (Aug 03, dir. Kuenzli) Western Illinois U (TT)
Martin Buinicki (May 03, dir. Folsom), Valparaiso U (TT)
Tom Gannon (May 03, dir. Folsom), U of Nebraska (TT)
Mary Beth Pope (May 03, dir. Landon), College of Notre Dame, Baltimore (TT)
JoAnn Quiñones-Perdomo (May 03, dir. Adams), Earlham College, IN (TT)
Earlier graduates with job news, 2003-04
Jodi Byrd (Dec 02): Political Science, U of Hawaii (TT?)
James Tweedie (Dec 02), Comp. Lit. (film), U of Washington (TT)
Michael Tavel Clarke (Dec 01), U of Calgary (TT)
Kim Smith (Aug 01): Kansas State U (TT)
Lara Trubowitz (May 01): U of Iowa (TT)
Kim Fortuny (Dec 00), Bogazici U, Istanbul, Turkey (permanent)
Carol Tyx (July 00), Mt. Mercy College, Cedar Rapids (TT)
Holly Welker (Dec 00) Penn State Erie (TT)
Martha Patterson (May 1996), McKendree College, Lebanon, IL
Dissertation Defenses:
On Nov. 16, Ervin Nieves successfully defended his dissertation "Beyond Darwinism: Chicana/o Literature and Modern Scientific Literary Analysis: A Biographical, Historical and Interdisciplinary Reappraisal of the Literary World of Josefina (Josephina) Niggli and Oscar Zeta Acosta." Tom Lutz was the chair, and the defense occurred at 8:30 a.m., 331 EPB.
On Dec. 1, Deirdre McMahon will defend her dissertation, "'Strange Family Stories': Race and Domesticity in Nineteenth-Century British Literature." Florence Boos is the chair, and the defense will occur at 11:45 a.m., 331 EPB.
Wed., Nov. 17 - Ethnomusicologist Matt Sakakeeny will give a presentation called "The Truth of Fiction: Representing New Orleans Music" in 109 EPB at 9:30 a.m. All are welcome. He will also be available that afternoon to talk to graduate students interested in
ethnomusicology or New Orleans music in particular. Matt is a graduate student in ethnomusicology at Columbia University. For further information contact Barbara Eckstein.
Wed., Nov. 17 - Suzanne Paola will give a reading. Gerber Lounge, 7 p.m.
Tue., Nov. 30 - Loren Glass will be a guest on Dennis Reese’s radio show “Talk of Iowa,” on WSUI AM 910, at 10 a.m. to talk about his book Authors Inc.: Literary Celebrity in the Modern
Fri., Dec. 10 - WSUI's Know the Score will feature (among others) Tom Lutz in a show called "The Politics of American Music." The show can be heard online (91.7 FM) or can be attended at the art museum, where a cash bar can ease you into the weekend, 5-7 p.m. For more detail on the show, see WSUI's upcoming events page.
The University of Iowa Obermann Center for Advanced Studies Announces Obermann Stipends for the Summer 2005 Research Seminar
Up to ten fellows to be selected, $2500 stipends, plus up to $500 (or $1000 for overseas travel) to help defray travel/housing expenses of visiting scholars
Carnival may be defined as street theatre enacted by individuals with a wide range of creative and political agendas. Literal and metaphorical masking and unmasking occur on several levels and in various interstices. We will examine different kinds of carnival events - from officially recognized formal carnivals such as those in Venice or Trinidad that represent nationalist agendas and are commodified accordingly, to informal carnivals, or carnivalesque performances such as Black Indian parades during Mardi Gras that have developed from or on the fringes of formal carnivals, to visual and performing artists who have used carnival themes in their work. The seminar will focus on the interrelationships of symbols and the meanings of carnival events from around the world. This interdisciplinary seminar will explore the changing meaning of the aesthetics and cultural politics of carnival interpreted broadly as the clash of cultural meanings and practices between social actors.
How, we will ask together, has migration influenced the carnival performances and peoples' participation? If carnival reveals the public secrets and fantasies of a society, how might these have shifted over time? How have the changing conceptions of citizenship and relationships to the nation-state affected the production and performances of carnival and carnival events? How have overseas/diaspora carnivals and re-imagined aesthetic traditions interacted with those from the original 'homelands' as is the case with Caribbean carnivals? Is carnival as democratic as proclaimed?
The seminar invites scholars, visual artists and performing artists from as wide an array of fields as possible including but not limited to theatre, visual arts, anthropology, music, dance, history, art history, political theory, literature, Caribbean studies, Latin American studies, performance studies, gender studies, carnival studies, intercultural performance studies, ethno-musicology, and semiotics.
Successful applicants will be expected to develop a first draft of an essay by the start of the seminar. Participants will read and discuss each of the draft essays along with common readings and will attend special presentations by notable speakers. Participants will revise their essays during and immediately following the seminar for inclusion in an edited volume.
Fellows are provided with offices, personal computers, Internet access, technical support, library delivery service, copying, and meeting rooms.
Directors: Michaeline A. Crichlow, Associate Professor, African-American World Studies, Director of the Caribbean, Diaspora, and Atlantic Studies Program and Loyce L. Arthur, Associate Professor, Head of Design, Theatre Arts Department, The University of Iowa.
Seminar Dates: July 6-16, 2005 - Application Deadline: February 11, 2005
For more details see
http://www.uiowa.edu/obermann/seminars/SummerSem/2005/stipend2005.html
or download a PDF version of the full Application Guidelines from
http://www.uiowa.edu/obermann/seminars/SummerSem/2005/CarnivalStipends.pdf
Please send any items for Reading Matters to Carolyn Jacobson at carolyn-jacobson@uiowa.edu. Reading Matters will appear every other Wednesday, and submissions should be received by 5 p.m. on the preceding Monday. Please send submissions for the next issue by 5 p.m. on Nov. 29. Thanks very much.