Newsletter: February 2024

The Current

Our monthly newsletter, published online during the academic year, celebrates the latest publications, acceptances, projects, presentations, awards, accolades, teaching highlights, activities, and more of English faculty, graduate students, and undergraduates.

Publications, Exhibits, and Acceptances

Julian Ankney has been chosen to take part in the Reclamation Poetry Gathering February 16 and 17 as part of the Arts Research Center’s (ARC) Poetry & the Senses program at UC Berkeley, which explores the relevance and urgency of lyrical making and storytelling in times of political crisis, and the value of engaging the senses as an act of care, mindfulness, and resistance. As a think tank for the arts at UC Berkeley, ARC acts as a facilitator and connector between campus and the many flourishing regional poetry communities. For more information about the Center or the program, visit arts.berkeley.edu.

Two of Colin Criss’s poems have been recently published: “Poem Spoken from One Second Behind the Self” appears in the current issue of Ploughshares and “Dolphins in Sligo Bay” in Fugue.

Desiree Hellegers’s poem “Catechism Follow Recess” appears in Counterpunch.

Will Hamlin‘s Introduction to Montaigne (Oxford, 2020) has been translated into Turkish and will be published in Istanbul later this year. Additional translations are in the works.

DJ Lee’s prose poem “Trail to Squires Lake” appears in the current issue of Unbroken.

Buddy Levy has agreed to a deal with The Explorers Club for the film/tv rights to his book Labyrinth of Ice: The Triumphant and Tragic Greely Polar Expedition (St. Martin’s Press, 2019). The Explorers Club is a venerated organization founded in 1904 dedicated to supporting scientific expeditions of all disciplines. (Levy, incidentally, recently became a member of the club as a National Fellow). The film and television branch of the Explorers Club is currently in meetings with entertainment industry executives at major studios discussing adapting Labyrinth of Ice as a feature film or limited episodic series.

Grant Maierhofer has four books forthcoming: Sentence-Making, a book on writing, is forthcoming this spring from Feral Dove Books, as is Bib, from Inside the Castle, Maintenance Art, from Sublunary Editions, and L.R.D., from Erratum Press.

Kirk McAuley’s new book, The Ecology of British and American Empire Writing, 1704 – 1894, was published in the Edinburgh Critical Studies in Atlantic Literatures and Cultures series at Edinburgh University Press (2024).

Pamela Thoma published “Barbie’s Feminisms?” in In Media Res, a Media commons Project, 31 January 2024. It is part of Barbie theme week, Monday, January 29, 2024 to Sunday, February 4, 2024.

Conferences, Readings, Workshops, Performances, and Presentations

Ashley Boyd and Rachael Wolney, along with some of the participants from their Palouse Reads project, will share their experience of being part of this project on Tuesday, February 6, from 6-7 PM at the Neill Public Library, sponsored by the David G. Pollart Center for Arts and Humanities.

Peter Chilson gave a presentation and was a panelist January 30 for the “Global Moment in Time” project sponsored by World Oregon and the U.S. State Department in Portland. The event hosted journalists and photojournalists discussing today’s stresses on the profession of journalism: economic uncertainty, professional isolation, the threat of political pressure and repression, physical exhaustion and insecurity, and the experience of bearing witness to traumatic events.

DJ Lee read her prose poems on January 21 for the virtual book launch of the anthology Migration and Home: The Elements of Place, edited by Simon Richard Wilson and published by NatureCulture, December 2023.

DJ Lee read from her memoir Remote: Finding Home in the Bitterroots at the grand opening of the Barnes and Noble in Kalispell, Montana, on February 9.

DJ Lee has been invited to read her prose poetry at the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture at a poetry symposium in Le Conner, Washington on April 6. The symposium celebrates two exhibitions Silva Cascadia: Under the Spell of the Forest & My Roots: Honoring the cultural identity of Skagit Valley’s under-resourced children.

Lana Jack gave two talks on Thursday, January 18 about her brief memoir about growing up as a fisherwoman on Nc’Wana, “the Big River.” The essay appeared in the April 2023 issue of The Oregon Humanities magazine. Lana Jack Is a Celilo Wy-am community organizer and Director/Founder of the Columbia River Indian Center. She has spent her life fighting for federal recognition of the Celilo Wy-am. Jack is a Coast Salish land defender, lobbyist, mediator, treaty negotiator, and jingle dress healer. The talks, partly organized by Desiree Hellegers, were sponsored by Native American Programs and the Collective for Social and Environmental Justice, with funding from the WSU Vancouver Council on Equity Diversity and Inclusion.

The Program in Women’s Gender and Sexuality Studies directed by Pamela Thoma, hosted a webinar with Dr. Chandni Desai (University of Toronto) on Thursday, February 8, 4:30 p.m., via Zoom. The title of Dr. Desai’s presentation is “Nakba Continued: Genocide in Gaza.”

Stephen Sexton, Irish poet and winner of the 2019 Forward Prize for best first collection, will be visiting WSU to give the Honors College’s Bhatia Lecture on Tuesday, March 19. Please save the date. The event is organized by Colin Criss. Time and location to be decided.

A publishing panel will be held at the Holland Library Atrium on March 20 from 1:00-2:00 PM. The panel, sponsored by the David G. Pollart Center for Arts and Humanities and organized by DJ Lee, will include Kim Hogeland, acquisitions editor of OSU Press; Linda Bathgate, Assistant Director and Editor-in-Chief of WSU Press; Alexandra Teague, University of Idaho professor and faculty editor of Fugue and our own Lauren Westerfield, Editor-in-Chief of Blood Orange Review. Reception to follow sponsored by the Program in Women’s Gender and Sexuality Studies.

The Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee (EDIC) will hold the following Spring workshops:

  • Anna Bushy, Elizabeth Forsythe, and Sharmin Sarker Sumaiya: Grad Instructor-Led Workshop on “Making Classrooms Accessible,” 12:10-1:30 PM, March 6 (in person and Zoom)
  • Wendy Steele: “Canvas Accessibility Workshop,” 12:10-1:00 PM, March 20 (in person and Zoom)
  • Wendy Steele: “Canvas Accessibility Workshop Follow-Up,” 12:10-1:00 PM, March 27 (in person and Zoom)
  • EDIC Members Led Workshop (topic to be decided), 12:10-1:30 PM, April 10 (Zoom only).

Please contact Nazua Idris for more information.

The Collective for Social and Environmental Justice (CSEJ) at WSU Vancouver is coordinating teach-ins on the crisis in Palestine and Israel every second and fourth Wednesday this term, from 2 to 3:30 in VDEN 129 (on the Vancouver campus) and on Zoom. Preregistration is required. You are welcome to bring your entire class, but if you plan to do so, please notify Desiree Hellegers a week in advance via email. The series includes the following sessions:

  • January 24: “Pinkwashing, featuring excerpts from Pinkwashing Exposed: Seattle Fights Back,” with Nishant Shahani, Professor, Program in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, and Ash Debuse, Student Organizer, Collective for Social and Environmental Justice.
  • February 14: “Sexual Violence in the Conflict,” with Desiree Hellegers, Professor, Department of English, and Nishant Shahani, Professor, Women’s Gender, and Sexuality Studies.
  • February 28: “The Impact of the Crisis on Electoral Politics,” with Paul Thiers, Associate Professor, Department of Political Science, and Mark Stephan, Associate Professor, Department of Political Science.
  • March 27: “The Targeting of Reporters and Cultural Workers,” with Desiree Hellegers, Professor, Department of English, and Nishant Shahani, Professor, Program in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.
  • April 10: “Health Impacts in the West Bank and Gaza,” with Patricia Kullberg, MD, MPH, former Medical Director, Multnomah County Health Department and member of the Old Mole Variety Hour Collective on KBOO Radio, and Linda Eddy, PhD, RN, ARPN, Professor, College of Nursing, WSU Vancouver, and former Fulbright Fellow in the West Bank.
  • April 24: “Censorship and Propaganda in the Crisis,” with Laurie Mercier, Professor, Department of History, and Sam Lohman, Reference Coordinator and Information Access Librarian.

WSU’s Interdisciplinary Social Justice Conference (SJCON) is scheduled for April 19 and 20, 2024. Please save the date. A call for proposals will be coming soon.

Teaching Highlights, Activities, and Innovations

Linguistics Club, advisor Michael Thomas, met with the Linguistics Circle at noon on January 23 to discuss Florida Man and the idiomatic nature of language, and on January 31 to discuss why in English we face the future and put the past behind us. On Wednesday, February 15, the Linguistics Circle will explore the role metaphor plays in constructing meaning from language. Everyone is welcome! Avery 110 from 12:00-1:00 PM.

The English Department Recognition Gathering organized by Roger Whitson, Donna Potts, Kim Pedersen, and DJ Lee will take place on March 6 in the Bundy Reading Room from 4:00-6:00 PM, with catering by Zoes. This is a casual event meant to celebrate our collective achievements and to talk with our colleagues in a relaxing atmosphere. There will be decorations and music.

The English Department’s Open Mic Club organized by Linda Russo will be held at Brused Books in downtown Pullman, 6-7:30 PM, on the following dates: February 8 and 22, March 21, April 4 and 18. The club met on January 25 for a very successful reading.

WSU Visiting Writers Series, co-directed by Cameron McGill and Julian Ankney, welcomed poet and author Addie Tsai on Tuesday, January 30. The VWS will host poet, author, and editor Gabrielle Calvocoressi on Tuesday, April 2, at 5:00 PM in the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art and on YouTube Live Stream. Visit the WSU Visiting Writers Series Website for more information.

On January 16, as part of the National Day of Racial Healing 2024, the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, the Department of English, and the Visiting Writers Series hosted a program in response to the theme “Writers Give Voice: Reading and Open Mic.” The event was organized by Cameron McGill. Readers included creative writing students and faculty and student editors/contributors of WSU creative writing publications. Before and after the program, visitors were encouraged to view current museum exhibitions, including “Jeffrey Gibson: They Teach Love,” “From the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation,” and “Here in a Homemade Forest: Common Reading Connections,” featuring the work of Native American artists.

Write Club, organized by Donna Campbell, will meet in Spring 2024 weekly on alternate days (Mondays and Tuesdays) to accommodate the greatest number of votes from the poll. Monday Dates (Zoom only) will occur February 19, March 4, March 25, April 8, and April 22 from 9:30-11:00 a.m. Contact Donna Campbell for the Zoom link. Tuesday Dates (Zoom and in-person in Avery 110) will occur February 13, February 27, March 19, April 2, and April 16 from 9:30-11:00 AM.

Congratulations to our faculty on their recent promotions. Each promotion represents years of hard work, talent, dedication, and commitment to our students and our larger communities: Ashley Boyd, Tenure-Track Professor; Leeann Hunter, Scholarly Professor; Meagan Lobnitz, Teaching Associate Professor; Grant Maierhofer, Teaching Associate Professor; Kirk McAuley, Tenure-Track Professor; Cameron McGill, Scholarly Associate Professor; Wendy Olson, Tenure-Track Professor; Linda Russo, Scholarly Professor; Rachel Sanchez, Scholarly Professor; Lauren Westerfield, Scholarly Associate Professor.

From the Chair’s Desk

Dear all,

In the past month, I have been delighted to participate in readings, panels, talks, and activities from every area of our department. I attended the National Day of Racial Healing Open Mic organized by Creative Writing professor, Cameron McGill. I listened to a talk by WSUV WGSS professor, Nishant Shahani, on Pinkwashing. I attended the panel at Neill Public Library, organized by Ashley Boyd, our English Education professor, and Rachael Wolney, our PhD student, featuring participants from their program, Palouse Reads. The reading group, comprised of high school and college educators, spent the summer reading young adult novels that focused on a variety of social issues that impact our own community. I worked with our professional writing faculty to set up a reading group that continues our fall discussions of Equity and Social Justice in Professional Writing. I even had a chance to peek in on the North American Computational Linguistics Open Competition for high school students, organized by linguistics professors, Nancy Bell and Mike Thomas. I look forward to more exciting events throughout the month of February.

Meanwhile, promotions have been announced for our amazing faculty! Congratulations to all!

Best,

Donna L. Potts