Publishing Internships!

Interested in getting a handle on the publishing world? The Department of English sponsors annual internships with the University of Minnesota Press. Two English majors are chosen for year-long internships in which they work on editorial, marketing, and production functions and receive four credits each semester. Application deadline for next year is April 20: email cover letter, unofficial transcript, and 2-3 page purpose statement drawing connections between academic work, this internship, and career goals. Must be of junior standing and have completed EngL 3001 Textual Analysis and at least two additional "foundation requirements" in major.

Annual Campus-Community Colloquim

On Monday, April 30, the Annual English Department Campus-Community Colloquium takes place 12:45 - 2:15 pm in Lind Hall 207A. Students from Eric Daigre's year-long Community Learning Internships course will present about their literacy work in the K-12, nonprofit, and adult basic education worlds. Lively presentations, dialogues with community partners, and Q and A sessions. Food, beverages, and celebration!

Writer's Block Workshop with Juliet Patterson

Ivory Tower presents an opportunity to work on revising poems with local poet Juliet Patterson this Wednesday the 18th in Coffman 304 at 5:30 pm. Patterson is a poet, community activist, and teaching artist living in Minneapolis. Her first book, The Truant Lover, won the Nightboat Poetry Prize in 2004. Her forthcoming book, Threnody, speaks about ecological crisis and our "attempts to conceptualize nature and wilderness in the face of loss." If possible, PLEASE BRING 3-4 POEMS you'd like to take a fresh look at, but don't reread them before the workshop begins! Mesa pizza!

Job Placement Meeting

On Thursday, April 26, at 3 pm, there will be a required meeting for people going on the job market in fall 2012; we will discuss the overall job search process as well as the documents you will need to work on over the summer. Strongly recommended for students who do not plan to go on the job market this fall but do plan to go on the market the year after: getting an early start on the job search documents and the overall process is vitally important. Lind Hall 207A.

BA Alum Strayed in National Press

Cheryl Strayed (BA 1997) has been featured in Interview Magazine, Vogue Magazine, and the New York Times in the past month, after publishing the memoir Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail (Knopf). Strayed is the author of a 2005 novel, Torch. She also writes the advice column "Dear Sugar" in the online literary magazine Rumpus. She grew up in Minnesota and lives now in Portland, Oregon.

English Major Triumphs in Spoken Word

Last year, English undergraduate Michael Lee was named the 2011 Best Individual Poet at the national College Unions Poetry Slam, leading the University of Minnesota team to a fourth place finish. He also received a 2011 Verve Grant for Spoken Word Artists, the only spoken word grant in the country. And now, in collaboration with Runner Runner, a Minneapolis production company, he has made a stunning video of his elegiac spoken word poem "Pass On," which has been entered in the 2012 Vimeo online video awards. More . . .

President's Student Leadership & Service Awardees

Two English majors and one MFA candidate have been selected to receive a President's Student Leadership & Service Award this spring. English senior Kari Eloranta is actively involved with civic engagement and is the undergraduate Service-Learning Mentor for the English course, The Literature of Public Life (ENGL 1501W); she also coordinates the University YMCA's tutoring projects this year. English senior Echo Martin is the web editor for two English student publications, Ivory Tower and Parachute, and has been involved with service learning and the English major student group FUSE. Third-year MFA candidate Claire Stanford is involved with sustainable agriculture and youth farm work in the Frogtown neighborhood of Saint Paul. Only about 35 students--both undergraduate and graduate--are selected from across the University, approximately one-half of one percent of the student body, for exceptional leadership and service to the University of Minnesota and the surrounding community.

Graduate Students Publish Books!

Three current graduate students in the Department of English are publishing books this year. PhD candidate Katie Robison was recently interviewed in the Minnesota Daily about her new debut young adult novel Downburst (Quil Books, Inc.). She is working toward a PhD in medieval and early modern literature. Meanwhile, MFA candidate Feng Sun Chen just published her first poetry collection Butcher's Tree with Black Ocean. MFA candidate Sarah Fox publishes Mother Substance, her second collection with Coffee House Press, next fall. The three authors will be reading from their respective books at 12:30 pm April 26, in Lind Hall 207A.

Hancher to Join Senate Consultive Committee

Professor Michael Hancher has been asked to serve a one-year term on the Faculty Consultative Committee of the Faculty Senate, which serves as the consulting body to President Eric Kaler and as the executive committee of the Faculty Senate. Professor Hancher finished a three-year term to this elected body in 2011.

Prospective Student Visit

The Department of English welcomes prospective graduate students March 22-23. Events scheduled include a reading by MFA alum authors, a subfield meeting and conference, class visits, library tour, and dinner with graduate students and faculty. We look forward to meeting you!

Nuruddin Farah Staged Reading

Novelist Nuruddin Farah, the College of Liberal Arts Winton Chair hosted by English, will receive a public staged reading of his latest play, A Stone Thrown at the Guilty, February 18 and 19 at 7:30 pm. The reading will be directed by University of Minnesota Assistant Professor of Theater Dominic Taylor, featuring a a cast of professional actors. The play is inspired by two historical uprisings in Somalia under British rule, during 1922 and 1939-40. The free event takes place at the Rarig Center Stoll Thrust Theatre; no tickets necessary.

Nabil Matar to Receive AMSS Award

Professor Nabil Matar will receive the 2012 Building Bridges Award from the Association of Muslim Social Scientists on March 28 at Cambridge University. The award is given in recognition of Professor Matar's pioneering scholarship on the relationship between Islamic civilization and early modern Europe, which has helped to raise awareness of the historical roots of Western perceptions of Islam. More on Professor Matar.