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Department of English ANNUAL NEWSLETTER 2018 My goal has always been to attend law school. I had no idea that studying English would also allow me to gain exposure in Irish history and literature, computer coding, and zombie films in relation to eighteenth- century texts.” —Dani Perez ’18 1 WELCOME FROM THE CHAIR Welcome. Composing my greeting to all of you— alums, colleagues, students, friends— provides me the chance to pause and assess the state of the department, our achievements, and the challenges before us. The ongoing worry, of course, is our dropping enrollment, which seems to have leveled off a bit, though a large drop in the number of potential students in the traditional-age bracket looms on the horizon. We continue to broadcast the message about the value of the English major—and the wide range of employment opportunities our students discover upon graduation. Our efforts continue, meanwhile, to redefine and assess exactly what we want our students to learn, to re- articulate our goals, and to publicize them Department Chair Knoper with Awards Night as widely as we can. undergraduate speaker Pavithra Devajaran. This is my chance, also, to publicize her field. Peruse the list of other faculty- Photo: Dennis Vandal the outstanding achievements of our written books below. But also take note of faculty, students, and alumni, the awards the long and impressive list of publications sustain a vibrant intellectual and creative won, and the honors received. Highlights by alums of our graduate programs! life here in South College. What we do, of in the list include the prestigious Ruth Our new colleague Marjorie course, relies a great deal on the generous Lilly Poetry Prize, received by Martín Rubright, who is also the new director support of our alumni and friends. Espada for his lifetime accomplishments, of the Arthur F. Kinney Center for We are very grateful for your ongoing TABLE OF CONTENTS and Steve Harris’s winning the Fulbright Interdisciplinary Renaissance Studies, contributions—to the general gift fund, Department News ...........................................................................................4 Distinguished Research Chair in Arts invested enormous energy and acumen in scholarships, and special programs— The Chromatic Universe of an Urban Indian .........................................5 and Social Sciences in Canada and successfully organizing Keith Hamilton which enable us to support our talented Thanks for editorial assistance are owed to Meg Caulmare, Jennifer Jacobson, and Alumna Spotlight .............................................................................................6 North America, one of the most coveted Cobb’s performances of American Moor, undergraduate and graduate students, Janine Solberg. Undergraduate Spotlight ..............................................................................7 appointments in the Fulbright Scholar his residency here, and the associated including those with financial needs, and Undergraduate Studies ..................................................................................8 Program. As always, our faculty members programming and events. Jen Adams to maintain such special programs as the Thanks for images are owed to Cayli Armstrong, Mabrouka Boukraa, Graduate Studies ..............................................................................................9 are astonishingly creative, producing oversaw the celebrations of the Oxford Juniper Initiative, the Oxford Summer Benjamin Dussault, Harley Erdman, MFA Program for Poets and Writers ........................................................10 each year a new crop of eye-opening, Summer Seminar’s 50th anniversary. And Seminar, and the Professional Writing and Kevin Hodgson, Elena Kalodner-Martin, Kinney Center for Interdisciplinary Renaissance Studies .................11 award-winning books. Jordy Rosenberg’s the MFA Program’s revival of the Juniper Technical Communication Specialization. and Cynthia Ntinunu. UMass Writing Program ...............................................................................12 Confessions of the Fox has especially been Festival was an extraordinary success. This newsletter provides a glimpse of Cover Photo: Benjamin Dussault Western Massachusetts Writing Project .................................................13 a success, welcomed with extraordinary Read about all of these events below. the fruits of your support. I hope you Program for Professional Writing acclaim almost everywhere, from The I am sad to have to say that our beloved will enjoy reading about the department and Technical Communication ...............................................................14 New Yorker and New York Times to colleague Ron Welburn has now retired. and the people who make it the thriving Oxford Summer Seminar ............................................................................15 the Huffington Post. Rebecca Lorimer His reflections on his career appear in community it is, and I hope you will keep Alternative Theaters: Navigating the Edinburgh Festival ...............16 Leonard’s Writing on the Move: Migrant this newsletter. I am also extremely sorry in touch with us and share your own New Books .......................................................................................................17 Women and the Value of Literacy, the book to report that another beloved retired memories and accomplishments. colleague, Gary Aho, recently passed —Randall Knoper, Chair Returning Alumni ..........................................................................................20 that ensured her award of tenure, won a away. The department did not add any Giving to the Department Donors, 2018 ..............................................21 2019 Outstanding Book Award from the Conference on College Composition and new faculty members this year, but our Communication, the highest award in committed and lively teachers and scholars 2 3 DEPARTMENT NEWS Martín Espada was awarded the 2018 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, presented annually to a living U.S. poet whose lifetime accomplishments warrant singular recognition. It is one of the most prestigious awards given to American poet—and, with a prize of $100,000, one of the nation’s largest literary prizes. Sponsored and administered by the Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine, the prize was formally presented to Espada at a ceremony on June 11. Don Share, editor of Poetry magazine, observed, “Martín Espada’s work and life tell the real and lived story of America, in which the importance of poems and legal rights go hand in hand.” Photo: John Solem Photo: D Toomey Stephen Harris was named as the Fulbright Distinguished Research Chair in Arts & Social Sciences in Canada and THE CHROMATIC UNIVERSE OF AN URBAN INDIAN Emeritus Professor Ron Welburn Reflects On His UMass Career North America for 2018–19. This award includes a one-year appointment at Carleton University in Ottawa, Ontario. Fulbright Distinguished Chair Awards are among the most Siyo! Greetings to all! I write this within was fortunate to begin honing my inter- music professor felt that Charles Ives was prestigious appointments in the Fulbright Scholar Program. two weeks of becoming officially retired disciplinary background from childhood overrated. But Ralph Ellison’s course, Harris’s research project is titled “Semantic Field Parsing in from the UMass Amherst English knowledge, eventually writing poems, de- “Fiction and Democracy,” offered an Literature.” He will be programming a computer to identify department, my professional home veloping a serious interest in many forms of interdisciplinary respite. and categorize noun phrases in Old English literature. since spring 1992: 27 calendar years, music, and becoming an amateur musician. These kinds of experiences prepared culminating close to 40 years of full-time Two insights stay with me from my me for a life at UMass Amherst. In April, teaching. Being retired is going to be days in college at Lincoln University in I hope to share my perceptions on both a bittersweet—not having to adhere to Pennsylvania: I encountered Penn profes- indigenous studies and jazz as democratic established routines, teaching, mentoring, sor Morse Peckham’s Man’s Rage for Chaos, foundations for American studies, music and program and committee involvement which discussed natural relationships especially being globally contrapuntal Jordy Rosenberg’s novel Confessions of and leadership. However, delayed writing between art forms, and then had writ- to current anxieties in the U.S. political the Fox was a New York Times Editor’s projects will have my attention. er-in-residence playwright Ronald Milner economy—just a few notions from (with Choice selection and was shortlisted for In spring of 1990, I received an invi- affirm those relationships by telling me that apologies to composer George Russell) the the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize tation from the department’s then-chair Faulkner was the “funkiest writer in the chromatic universe of an urban Indian. and recognized by The New Yorker, the Bob Bagg to apply for a position teaching English language…. He swings like a Lester Tabatnee. Wanishii. Wa’du. Thank you, Huffington Post, Buzzfeed, and Kirkus American literatures. Joe Skerrett had Young or a Charlie Parker.” I began to friends. Dodada gv’hi. Weekly as one of the best books of 2018. recommended me and to his memory I appreciate how the stories told in perfor- TheNew York Times heralded it as “a mind-