Michigan State University

The Department of English at Michigan State University provides students with an excellent education in the liberal arts—one that strikes an ideal balance between creativity and critical inquiry. Undergraduate and graduate students, whether planning to enter professional or academic job markets after graduation, leave with skills allowing them to communicate, collaborate, and problem solve in a cultural landscape growing increasingly global.

Student–faculty interaction is at the center of our department. At present, more than 40 faculty members dedicate themselves to teaching excellence and outstanding scholarship. Faculty areas of specialization are wide-ranging and encompass literary periods and genres, language studies, critical theory, new media studies, cultural studies, and creative writing.

Our students develop exceptional writing skills. And, because they are exposed to a variety of learning experiences and faculty members who offer disparate perspectives, they acquire the know-how to confront large-scale issues and effect change around the world.


Faculty News

Jyotsna G. Singh last semester was a long-term Fellow-in-Residence at the John Carter Brown Library at Brown University, Providence, 2010-2011.  

Marcia Aldrich's essay, "The Dead Dog Essay," was recently selected as a Notable Essay in The Best American Essays 2009. Six essays published in Fourth Genre, edited by Marcia, have been selected as Notable Essays :

  • Jocelyn Bartkevicius, "Crossroads"
  • Joy Castro, "Grip"
  • Sara Crosby, "The Black and White"
  • Patricia Hohl, "Pasture"
  • Geeta Kothari, "Flight"
  • Donna Steiner, "Elements of the Wind"

MORE FACULTY NEWS:

A short documentary co-produced by Salah D. Hassan, Geri Alumit Zeldes (School of Journalism), and Brian J. Bowe (GVSU), premiered in Dearborn on December 1. "The Death of an Imam" examines the controversial FBI shooting on October 28, 2009 of Imam Luqman Ameen Abdullah, a Detroit-area Muslim leader.  The film explores issues at the core of the incident: allegations of a terrorism conspiracy, use of FBI informants and Muslims in the mainstream media. The documentary is part of MSU’s project titled “Islam, Muslims and Journalism Education” that Hassan has been coordinating for the last 2 years. More information is available at www.imaje.msu.edu.

Sheng-mei Ma has published a new critical study, Diaspora Literature and Visual Culture: Asia in Flight (London: Routledge, 2011). His book offers an incisive and ambitious critique of Asian Diaspora culture, looking specifically at literature and visual popular culture. Individual chapters discuss a number of interesting topics, including Asianness, Orientalism, and Asian American identity, drawing on a variety of pop culture sources from The Matrix Trilogy to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

Student News

Nichole Keway has been awarded the Frances C. Allen Fellowship at the  Newberry Library in Chicago, Illinois. Nicole's dissertation focuses  on Native American literatures, and she will spend part of the 2011-2012  academic year at the Newberry conducting research in the D'arcy  McNickle Collection, one of the most substantial and important collections of Native American materials in the United States

 

 

Home Page Content

 

Would you like to receive handcrafted updates about faculty doings, department events, goings-on in the literary world, and the future of the humanities? Follow us on Twitter! Our handle is @MSUEnglish. ***

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Cathy Davidson Lecture

Duke University

"Now You See It: How the Science of Attention Will Transform the Way We Live ,Work, and Learn."

Friday, April 20th

Wells Hall, B117, 3:00-5:00 pm

Cathy N. Davidson served as Vice Provost for Interdisciplinary Studies at Duke University from 1998 until 2006, where she helped create the Program in Information Science + Information Studies, the Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, the John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute, adn many other programs. In 2002, she founded HASTAC (Humanities, Arts, Science and Technology Advanced Collaboratory, or 'haystack"), a virtual network of innovators with over 6500 members. She is the Ruth F. DeVarney Professor of English and the John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Duke Univeristy, and has published more than twenty books, including Revolution of the Word: The Rise of the Novel in America, Closing: The Life and Death of an American Factory (with photographer Bill Bamberger) and The Future of Thinking (with HASTAC co-founder David Theo Goldberg).

In 2010, President Obama nominated her to a six-year term on the National Council on the Humanities, a positioned confirmed by the Senate in July 2011. She is currently on a thirty-site author tour for her latest book, Now You See It: How the Brain Science of Attention Will Transform the Way We Live, Work, nd Learn (Viking Press), which Publishers Weekly has named "one of the top tent science books" of the Fall 2011 Season.

CR: New Issue!

Drawing (on) Borges

 

The lastest issue of CR, MSU's award-winning journal devoted to the comparative studies of the Americas, is "Drawing (on) Borges." For a complete description of the contents of this special issue, click here.

Look out for CR's forthcoming issue, "Animals...in Theory"

Sexual Assault Awareness Month

Throughout the month, MSU faculty and students will be offering a series of events, including films, lectures, marches, and Chalk the Walk, to call attention to the issues surrounding sexual assault in local and globa contexts. Click here for a flyer listing events, locations, and times.

 

Shakespeare at MSU:

Click here for the State News' coverage of the Pigeon Creek Shakesspeare Company's production of Henry IV, Part I. The link includes a video clip from the play, produced in conjunction with the Ohio Valley Shakespeare Conference.

 

MSU Film Collective:

The MSU Film Collective is a group of faculty, students, and cinephiles who gather weekly to screen and discuss good films. Each week, a faculty member introduces a film and leads a discussion after the screening. The public is encouraged to attend. Screenings are held on Thursdays, at 8:00 pm in Wells Hall B122.

Spring Series:

"What Moves in Motion Pictures?"

 

Our spring program is comprised of films that explore, in various ways, cinema’s capacity to capture movement, to animate bodies, and in the process, to move spectators affectively and politically. Click here for the complete program.

 

 

Spotlight

English Department Speaker Series, Spring 2012

 

For the complete spring speakers schedule, click here.

Upcoming Speakers

Ph.D. Candidate Speakers

Shannon Sears

"'What a man's resolution can achieve': Gendered Vacancy in The Woman in White"

Nels Olson

"Antebellum American Narratives of the Nation that are not 'National Narratives'"

Friday, April 6th

3:00 pm, Morrill 213

Aime Ellis Book Release:

If We Must Die: From Bigger Thomas to Biggie Smalls (Wayne State University Press, 2011)

 

New Curriculum:

The Department of English has launched a new curriculum this semester. Current majors can complete their program using the requirements in force when they declared their English major. See your advisor ASAP if you need help in planning.

 

New Film Studies Web Site:

With new initiatives in a Film Studies minor and a Fiction Film Specialization, we decided it was a good time to develop a web site dedicated to Film Studies at MSU. Cllick here to be directed to this new web site where you'll find information about Film Studies programs, current and future film screenings, and careers in the film industry.

 

Newsletter:

Alumni, students, and friends of the English Department. Take a few minutes, please, to send us your contact information. We would like to keep you updated on what we're doing. Click here.

Previous editions of The Tattler:

The Tattler (PDF) (2009)

The Tattler (PDF) (2008)

The Tattler (PDF) (2007)

 

 

 


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