Letter from the Chair
Greetings to the Friends of the English Department at the University of Pittsburgh. This Newsletter is intended to keep you up to date on the department, its activities, and its graduates.
I am writing today about the last two academic years, 1999/2000 and 2000/2001.
In addition, however, the newsletter is an invitation for you to renew your involvement with the us and to think of the department as an exciting and available resource. We sponsor a variety of events on campus, several a month, including lectures, readings, films, and colloquia. The Contemporary Writers Series has become a major event on the city’s cultural calendar. Through the Western Pennsylvania Writing Project we sponsor activities and meetings for teachers and a summer institute for young writers. Most of these activities are open to the public. You can find a schedule of events on our homepage.
Milestones: Both Marcia Landy and Colin MacCabe have been appointed Distinguished Professors. This is among the highest distinctions of rank in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Jim Knapp has been appointed FAS Associate Dean. We have had several retirements since the last newsletter: William E. Coles, Jr., Austin Flanders, Bob Marshall, Mike Taube and Ed Ochester. Jonathan Arac (our Mellon Professor), left to become Chair of the English department at Columbia University in New York. Catherine Gammon resigned to pursue her Zen training full-time. Patsy Sims has announced that she will retire at the end of the up-coming academic year. She will be with us this Fall and, in the Spring Term, on Semester at Sea. Joe Harris has gone to Duke and Margaret Marshall to the University of Miami.
This will be Nick Coles’ last year as Director of the Western Pennsylvania Writing Project. We expect to appoint a new Director later this year. There are several new Program Directors: Jean Carr has served as Director of the Composition Program. Jim Seitz will take that position in January. Lynn Emanuel is the Director of the Writing Program; John Twyning is Director of the Literature Program; Eric Clarke is the Director of Graduate Studies.
We have hired several new tenure/tenure stream faculty members: Kathryn Flannery (Composition), Tony Hoagland (Poetry), Jennifer Trainor (Composition), Stefan Wheelock (African American Literature and Culture), and Kimberly Latta (18th Century British). And we have hired several new Lecturers. All will be teaching a variety of undergraduate courses: Geeta Kothari (Director of the Writing Center), Jan Beatty, Ellen Bishop, Jean Grace, Mark Kemp, Jennifer Lee, and Jeff Oaks (Coordinator, Contemporary Writers Series).
Honors and Awards: Lucy Fischer was elected President of the Society for Cinema Studies. Phil Smith was awarded the France Andrew March Award for Service to the Profession, sponsored by the Association of Departments of English, MLA. Paul Bove continues to serve as Editor of boundary 2; he was appointed Distinguished Adjunct Professor of Comparative Literature, Beijing Language and Culture University, and boundary 2 has signed a contract with the People’s Literature Publishing House for an annual volume to be translated and published in China. Richard Tobias was honored for his work with the University of Pittsburgh Faculty Senate. Eric Clarke was awarded the "Reconocimiento Oficial" by the Legislative Assembly of Mexico City. Nick Coles spent a year as the Oishei Visiting Professor in Teacher Education, Canisius College and he serves as a member of the National Task Force, National Writing Project. Marcia Landy was Visiting Fellow, Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge (UK) and Visiting Fellow, Department of Film and Television Studies, University of Warwick (UK). Toi Derricotte’s, The Black Notebooks, was translated into French and nominated for Grand Prix, ELLE Magazine, Paris, France. Jennifer Trainor won the NCTE Promising Researcher Award.
By invitation of the previous editor, Mariolina Salvatori and Paul Kameen have assumed the editorship of Reader: Essays in Reader-Oriented Theory, Criticism and Pedagogy, a well-respected academic journal.
Carnegie Scholars: Jim Seitz was selected by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the Pew National Fellowship Program as a Carnegie Scholar. This is a national competition, the most prestigious of the awards in support of teaching. 29 Carnegie Scholar were selected for the program that includes two summer residencies at the Carnegie Foundation (in Menlo Park, CA). According to the Carnegie Foundation, "The central work of the Carnegie Scholars is to create and disseminate examples of the scholarship of teaching and learning that contribute to thought and practice in their field."
The Carnegie Scholars work on a project related to their disciplines with the goal of fostering scholarly inquiry in pedagogy and presenting their work to a national and international audience.
Seitz’s project proposal is titled "Students as Teachers." He is working on the ways students can be engaged through collaborative teaching groups that plan, perform, and write about sessions in which they teach a topic related to course content.
Mariolina Salvatori was selected as a Carnegie Scholar in 1999. Her project concerns the role of "difficulty" in the learning process. What counts as difficult? How do learners experience it? How can faculty most profitably engage students with materials that are importantly and necessarily difficult, beyond their immediate comprehension?
There are few universities with two Carnegie scholars; it brings us great distinction to have two awardees in one department. We are, in fact, the only department to be so honored. I have proposed to Jim and Mariolina that we sponsor an event on campus to highlight their participation.
Bellet Award: Paul Kameen was awarded one of the 2001 Tina and David Bellet Teaching Excellence Awards. It recognizes not only the skill and effectiveness of his teaching but also his long commitment to undergraduate writing, to the composition program, and to general education.
American Nightmare: Colin MacCabe has developed a genre of video/essay to bring the highest level of film scholarship and cultural criticism to a broad international audience. This project is represented by the remarkable Century of Cinema series. Brilliantly conceived, staggeringly difficult to produce, the series includes sixteen television documentaries highlighting national cinemas, with leading figures as directors. His most recent project in this genre is "The American Nightmare" (directed by Adam Simon, co-produced with Paula Jalfon), a meticulously research and extremely compelling account of the American horror movie understood in relation to post-war American, European, and World history. "The American Nightmare" was aired on the Independent Film Channel in October 2000. The film was chosen for the Berlin Film Festival, and it was given extensive coverage in the US media, including a long article in the New York Times ("Do Horror Films Filter the Horrors of History," October 14, 2000). Adam Lowenstein is one of the scholars featured in the film. He is also quoted extensively in the article in the Times.
Adoption Studies: Over the last several years, Marianne Novy has been developing an area of scholarly concern in relation to literary representations of adoption and adopted children. Her leadership in this movement was reported in the University of Pittsburgh, Fall 2000 Women’s Studies Newsletter. Among her initiatives, she has developed special sessions on this topic for the MLA convention. She has spoken before the American Adoption Congress. She is the Co-Chair of the Alliance for the Study of Adoption, Identity and Kinship (a membership group with a list-serve and a newsletter). This year saw the publication of her book, Imagining Adoption: Essays on Literature and Culture (U of Michigan P), an edited collection including her introduction, "Imagining Adoption" and her essay, "Adoption in Silas Marner and Daniel Deronda."
Western Pennsylvania Writing Project: The Western Pennsylvania Writing Project was identified once again as a "model" site by the National Writing Project. The NWP singled out as distinctive achievements the following: the Young Writers Institute (this summer, 350 children working at 6 sites, many of their expenses covered by a scholarship fund); the on-going Youth and Community Programs, including monthly Saturday writing workshops and the Writing Odyssey series for parents and children; PS Write, an intensive program working with teachers, parents, administrators and students at two city schools; and the general range and quality of the 17 School Based Professional Development Programs in 8 school districts. In addition, the Writing Project works in partnership with Beginning with Books in Sto-Rox, and with the Evergreen School through its Disney grant with schools in the Gateway, Penn Hills, and Pittsburgh Public systems (as well as with a mix of urban and suburban districts. They have targeted and contracted with three distressed districts: Wilkinsburg, Sto-Rox, and Aliquippa and will be working with them in the coming year. The WPWP is one of the most visible and successful examples of the University’s out-reach to the city of Pittsburgh and to the region.
Literature and Culture of the African Diaspora: With funding from the Provost’s office, and in cooperation with the Department of Africana Studies, the English department developed and presented a year long series of events devoted to the literature and culture of the African diaspora. These included a reading by the poet and novelist, Merle Collins; a panel discussion, "African American Writing in the Academy and Other Public Places," featuring Mae Henderson and Samuel R. Delany; a reading by Samuel R. Delaney; a performance and presentation by James Hatch, Woodie King, Jr., Shauneille Perry, and Elizabeth Van Dyke; and a screening of the film "Nightjohn," including a discussion with the noted director, Charles Burnett.
Diversity Seminar: The Diversity Seminar was given the 2000 Chancellor’s Award for Affirmative Action. Jean Carr and Marianne Novy helped to develop this program, taught in it, and served as project co-coordinators.
Scholarship and Prize Funds:
The planning and budget committee has targeted the Nancy Anderson Fellowship in English Literature as the focus for development efforts. The income from this fund provides a fellowship in English Literature to a "deserving graduate student." The department has used the money to fund a PhD student at the final stages of the dissertation. At current levels, the fellowship is available only every other year. We would like to bring funding to a level where there could be an annual Anderson Fellowship. Please keep this fellowship in mind as you think about your annual giving.
I am also pleased to announce a new prize fund: The Carol Kay Memorial Fund in British Literature. The purpose of this award is to provide a substantial prize for the best essay on British Literature between 1500-1900 written by a Pitt undergraduate. The Award is in memory of our colleague, Carol Kay, and the strong legacy of her scholarship and teaching. There are several annual prizes sponsored by the English department. Some of them are in dire need of endowment funding. If you would like to donate to the Kay Memorial Fund or to any of the prize funds, please let us know.
Finally: Please keep in touch. We’d like to know where you are and what you are doing. If you have questions for me (or thoughts or concerns), please call or write. My e-mail address is barth@pitt.edu. If you are on the internet, be sure to check our Homepage.
I’ll look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,
Dave Bartholomae