GW Magazine Seeks Parenting Stories from Alums

English alumni: GW Magazine wants to hear about the day that you became parents.

Since the magazine's spring issue will be out over Mother's Day and Father's Day, the staff thought it would be compelling to open "emotional time capsules" from the day that daughters and sons became mothers and fathers for the first time.  The ideas is to have alumni share a piece of their experience from a day that, presumably, changed everything! Any memories from that day are welcome -- big or small, sad or tender or funny.  Or, if you'd like, send in your reflections on the day as a whole.

This story idea is open to all alumni, and to the full spectrum of perspectives and ages. Send prose (around 300 words or less), poetry, art, etc., by Friday, Feb. 6 to magazine(at)gwu.edu. Or send a Tweet: @GWAlumniMag.

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Siegfried Huffnagle: Meet the New Communications Liaison

At Stonehenge, 2014

    The GW English Department is proud to announce that Siegfried Huffnagle will be the communications liaison for the spring 2015 semester! As communications liaison, Siegfried will be contributing to the production and management of content on this blog, our Twitter, and Facebook page.

    Hailing from Nashville, Tennessee, Siegfried is now in his third year of his pursuit of a B.A. in English at GW. Some of his favorite works include Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises, and E.M. Forster’s A Room With a View. His major interests are focused around travel, adventure, writing, and photography. Some of his biggest goals include paddling the length of the Mississippi, producing a memoir, and hiking the Appalachian Trail.

Stay connected with us by subscribing to this blog as well as our Facebookand Twitter (@GWEngl) accounts so you can receive updates about English Department news, events and publications!

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Creative Writing in GW Today

"For lessons in literature," GW Today reminds readers,

"George Washington University students do not have to rely on just books—they can meet authors in person through the English Department’s campus lecture series and public readings this semester. Several writers will come to campus through the Jenny McKean Moore Reading Series, led by Lisa Page, acting director of creative writing, and Jewish Lit Live, a class taught by English Professor Faye Moskowitz."

See the full GW Today calendar here.  And we'll see you all semester at these great Creative Writing events!

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GW English Professors on Twitter

Professor Hsy tweets
@Jonathan Hsy

GW English is on Twitter!  And we thought it might be useful to our readers, especially as the next Digital Humanities Symposium kicks off, to have a round-up of where to find us.  Join us on Friday, January 30, for a Digital Humanities Symposium which in fact includes a few twitter "celebrities" or experts such as Suey Park (@suey_park) and Dorothy Kim (@dorothyk98).  Professor Kim has done some excellent work theorizing Twitter as a digitally-mediated public space.  You can access her work here.

With any of the Twitter handles listed below, you can click right through and follow your professors if you choose.  As more faculty are on Twitter, we'll update this post, so check back later.  See you in virtual space!

With a medieval Grumpy Cat avatar-persona, Professor Jonathan Hsy tweets @JonathanHsy.  Follow this twitter feed if you're interested in linguistics, diversity in and outside the academy, disability history, digital humanities, and nerdy medieval things.  Professor Hsy has also blogged about the use of twitter at academic conferences; the blog post accessible here, which is from "In The Middle" (where he co-blogs alongside Professor Jeffrey Cohen and others), addresses medieval studies but extends to twitter usage in other domains.

Professor McRuer tweets
@RobertMcRuer

Department Chair Professor Robert McRuer tweets @RobertMcRuer.  Many of his tweets are connected to cultures of queerness and disability, and to globalization and resistance to austerity politics.  He is also on Instagram @RobertMcRuer.

Professor Jeffrey Cohen, with reflections on medieval studies, the future of the university, digital humanities, pedagogy, fossils, history, ecocriticism, and silly thoughts in general, can be found @jeffreyjcohen.

Professor Gayle Wald (@gaylewald) doesn't tweet very often, but when she does it's usually about academic conferences, noteworthy books she's read, and current events.


Professor Daniel DeWispelare (@periphrast) tweets sporadically about upcoming DC-area events, literacy, theory, philosophy, and contemporary fiction. 

Professor Holly Dugan tweets @trickyholly about Shakespeare, the senses, and early modern literature and history (as well as the occasional tweet about baseball, knitting, and perfume).

Professor Dugan tweets
@trickyholly

Professor Dan Moshenberg tweets @danwibg, focusing on women in and beyond the global prison, household, city, information networks.

Professor Maria Frawley tweets @janeaustenandme.  Her tweets explore a range of professional and personal interests connected to Honors education, nineteenth century print culture, and environmental issues. 

Professor David Mitchell tweets @dtmitchel. Many of his tweets are related to disability experience, crip/queer cultures, and disability studies.

Professor Margaret Soltan isn't on Twitter, but you can find her thoughts on university life and a range of other topics on her blog here.

PhD candidate Lori Brister tweets @LoriBrister. Lori tweets about Victorian literature, tourism, and the Digital Humanities.

PhD candidate and Graduate Assistant D. Gilson tweets and Instagrams @dgilson. Most of his posts are about contemporary poetry and creative nonfiction; hipster and gay culture; and frustrations with the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority.

PhD candidate and Graduate Assistant Maia Gil'Adi tweets @maiagiladi. Many of her tweets are connected to teaching experiences, remote-work updates with her writing group, and the digital humanities.

PhD candidate and Graduate Assistant Molly Lewis (@maebemollyfunke) tweets about a myriad of things, including but not limited to the topics of medieval literature, medieval and modern race, feminism, digital humanities, academia, popular culture, and encounters with life in DC.  She also live-tweets various academic talks and conferences. 

Ph.D candidate and Graduate Assistant  M.W. Bychowski tweets @Transliterature and blogs here.  Her blog, Things Transform, focuses on transgender, queerness, disability, and medieval studies.

PhD candidate and Graduate Assistant Haylie Swenson tweets (infrequently!) @haylieswenson. She also blogs about animal studies, ecologies, and medieval literature and art here.

And of course you can always follow GW English directly here.  A new Communications Liaison will have that Twitter account moving again very soon.  Tweet at us and let us know how your classes are going!

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Disrupting Digital Humanities Symposium: January 30

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Shakespeare in the Mediterranean: Summer 2015

Shakespeare never traveled beyond England, but the Mediterranean, especially Italy, inhabited his imagination and that of his audience.

Venetian Canals

Dubrovnik from the hills

This is your opportunity to travel in his stead. Make the voyage to Venice and read Othello and the Merchant of Venice along its canals; journey to Verona and read about star crossed young lovers in Romeo and Juliet; cross the Mediterranean to the magical sea coast of Illyria and read Twelfth Night in Dubrovnik.  

Come to the Mediterranean this summer with Professors Suzanne Miller (History) and Katherine Keller (English) and read these Shakespeare works and others.  We will also read historical documents and works Shakespeare might have read--traveler’s tales, romances from Italy, conduct books such as Castiglione’s The Courtier--to see how his understanding of contemporary Italy informed Shakespeare’s plays.

For more information, visit GW's study abroad website here. Or contact us directly: Professor Miller (smmiller@gwu.edu) or Professor Keller (kzkeller@gwu.edu).        

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MARGARET SOLTAN AT GEORGETOWN PUBLIC LIBRARY AND AT BOOKS@WORK

Next month, Margaret Soltan will lead a discussion on the subject of trust, using the story "Trust Me" by John Updike, for a class organized through Books@Work, a non-profit which "brings professor-led seminars to workplaces and community settings."

In March and April, she'll give a series of public lectures on poetry at the Georgetown Library.  Here's the schedule (all classes meet on Sunday):

March 1, 2:00 Introduction; Romantic Poetry

March 8, 2:00 Victorian Poetry

March 15, 2:00 Modernist Poetry

March 22, 2:00 Post-Modern Poetry

April 12, 2:00 Concluding Lecture

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Government Transparency and Personal Privacy in the Digital Age

GW English PhD ('08) Myra Remigio-Leonard is among the DC librarians working to organize a series of events in January titled "Orwellian America."

"Orwellian America is a series of programs focused on government transparency and personal privacy in the digital age during the last two weeks of January.  Events include a screening of "The Internet's Own Boy" at the Black Cat, a marathon reading of Orwell's "Nineteen Eighty-four" at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library, an interview with FRONTLINE producer Mike Wiser, and a spirited conversation between the Newseum and the Spy Museum called "Personal Privacy or National Security".  Our partner organizations will lead workshops on election transparency, accessing government information, and the Tor browser.  The series was funded by a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services.  More information can be found at dclibrary.org/1984, and look for us on Twitter at #dcpl1984."

GW English PhD Myra Remigio-Leonard
at the MLK Memorial Library 

Since finishing her Ph.D. in 2008, focused on children's literature and postcolonial studies, Myra finished a Master's of Library Science program and now works as a librarian in the Information Services division at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library in downtown DC.

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