Monday Missive

The Power of Songs — There are two songs that I associate with the celebration of the New Year:  “Auld Lang Syne,” attributed to Robert Burns, and “Imagine,” co-written by John Lennon and Yoko Ono.  These songs capture two of our common responses to the arrival of the New Year.   “Auld Lang Syne” reflects our impulse to look backward and remember and honor our long-standing friendships.  “Imagine” asks us to look forward to a time when old-world prejudices give way to a new global harmony.

Robert Burns wrote down the words to “Auld Lang Syne” in 1788, but he drew his inspiration from an old Scottish folk song. Scholars who have studied the history of this song suggest that the lyrics as we know them today are a combination of the words from an anonymous folk song and original lines penned by Burns.

The song’s message about the importance of remembering old acquaintances speaks to our English Department as we mark this New Year.  My memories of Julian Mason, Anita Moss, and Stan Patten are brought to mind as I look back on 2018.  In keeping with the lyrics of the song, I propose that we raise a “cup of kindness” in honor of their many contributions to our department.

John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s “Imagine” was originally released in 1971, but its association with the New Year took root in 2005 when it was played for the first time at the New Year’s Times Square celebration just before the dropping of the illuminated ball.  Since then, it has been played every year at the New Year’s event at Times Square.

Given the recent escalation in international tensions, the song’s peace message seems especially appropriate now.  The song promotes the value of working toward world peace by breaking down nationalistic impulses.  In the words of the song, “Imagine there’s no countries.  It isn’t hard to do. …  Imagine all the people living life in peace.”

For me, no New Year’s celebration would be complete without hearing “Auld Lang Syne” and  “Imagine.”  These songs give voice to our shared feelings and help establish a sense of community encompassing both the singers and the listeners.  Such is the power of songs.

I wish you all a happy New Year!

Kudos  — As you know, I like to use my Monday Missives to share news about recent accomplishments by members of the English Department.  Here is the latest news:

Lara Vetter‘s A Curious Peril: H.D.’s Late Modernist Prose recently received a very positive review in Modernism/modernity 25.4 (2018).

Upcoming Events and Meetings — Here is a list of upcoming events and deadlines:

January 9 — First day of classes for the Spring 2019 semester.

January 16 — Last day for students to add or drop a course with no grade.

January 29 — The Personally Speaking presentation featuring Janaka Bowman Lewis will take place on Tuesday, January 29, 2019, at UNC Charlotte Center City.  Janaka’s presentation on her book Freedom Narratives of African American Women will begin at 6:30 p.m.  A book signing and reception will follow her presentation. For more information and to RSVP, please click on the following link:  https://exchange.uncc.edu/how-early-womens-writings-led-to-civil-rights-discourse/

Quirky Quiz Question — “Imagine” was originally released on a record label that was founded by the Beatles in 1968.  What is the name of this record label?

The film The Man Who Invented Christmas opens in 1842 with Charles Dickens touring a foreign country.  What country is he touring?

Dickens and the Creation of A Christmas Carol — While I was on the plane flying back from a conference at Oxford University earlier this month, I watched a film that was perfectly suited for the season.  Titled The Man Who Invented Christmas, this 2017 film tells the story of how Charles Dickens came to write A Christmas Carol.  The film stars Dan Stevens as Dickens and Christopher Plummer as Ebenezer Scrooge.

In the film, Dickens moves among three overlapping worlds.  Part of the film deals with his day-to-day life as an author, which involves interactions with family members, friends, and business associates.  Another part of the film dramatizes his interior world, which is where he interacts with his fictional characters, especially Scrooge.  A third part deals with his stressful childhood, which is at the root of an ongoing tension between Dickens and his father. The director, Bharat Nalluri, brings these three worlds together, culminating in the publication of A Christmas Carol on December 19, 1843.

For me, this film brought up memories from my own childhood.  My father was a great admirer of Dickens, and he often read Dickens’s books aloud to my brother, sister, and me during the evenings after we finished our homework.  For many years, he read A Christmas Carol to us on Christmas Eve.  While I was watching The Man Who Invented Christmas, I kept flashing back to my treasured memories of sitting on the couch in our living room, listening to the magic combination of Dickens’s words and my father’s voice.  The film ends with Dickens’s reconciliation with his father, and this ending made me miss my father.   As the credits started to roll, I silently thanked my lucky stars that Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol and that my Jewish father introduced to me to this classic story.

I wish you all the best for the holiday season.

Kudos  — As you know, I like to use my Monday Missives to share news about recent accomplishments by members of the English Department.  Here is the latest news:

Alan Rauch recently received a Helm Fellowship from the Lilly Library for a research project titled “Women, Science, and Translation in the Nineteenth Century.”

Ralf Thiede just received a contract from Routledge for a book tentatively titled Language, Mind, and Power:  Why We Need Linguistic Equality.  Dan Boisvert is the co-author of this book.

Upcoming Events and Meetings — Here is a list of upcoming events and deadlines:

January 9 — First day of classes for the Spring 2019 semester.

January 16 — Last day for students to add or drop a course with no grade.

January 29 — The Personally Speaking presentation featuring Janaka Bowman Lewis will take place on Tuesday, January 29, 2019, at UNC Charlotte Center City.  Janaka’s presentation on her book Freedom Narratives of African American Women will begin at 6:30 p.m.  A book signing and reception will follow her presentation. For more information and to RSVP, please click on the following link:  https://exchange.uncc.edu/how-early-womens-writings-led-to-civil-rights-discourse/

Quirky Quiz Question — The film The Man Who Invented Christmas opens in 1842 with Charles Dickens touring a foreign country.  What country is he touring?

Last week’s answer: Oakland

As far as I know, this winter’s commencement marked the first time that our graduating students did “The Wave.”  In sports circles, however, there is a great deal of debate about when “The Wave” made its first appearance.  The first documented example of sports fans doing “The Wave” occurred on October 15, 1981, during a baseball playoff game between the Athletics and the Yankees.  What is the name of the city where the Athletics play?

International Accord — My Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary provides the following definition for the word accord:  “to bring into agreement; … to be consistent or in harmony.”  This word popped into my mind as I was leaving the Oxford Education Research Symposium last Friday afternoon.  Of the many conferences that I have attended over the decades, this one is by far the most international in nature.  This year’s Oxford Education Research Symposium featured 26 presentations, and the presenters came from the following countries:  Australia, Canada, Greece, India, Indonesia, Israel, Malaysia, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Vietnam.  While I listened to their presentations, it became clear to me that these diverse presenters agreed on many issues.  Moreover, they all took a respectful approach when responding to the other presenters.  This approach gave the conference a positive and harmonious feel.

In this time of escalating international tensions, I came away from the conference with a sense of hope that scholars from so many different parts of the world can still reach agreement on the value of education and the importance of research.  I was especially pleased to see the professor from Israel and the professor from Saudi Arabia sitting together throughout the conference.  They did not let their religious differences or the conflict between their two nations interfere with their ability to discuss their research findings or interact as colleagues.

This time of the year, people often express a desire for peace on earth, but current events make such expressions for world peace seem more and more out of reach.  Still, my recent experience at Oxford University gives me cause for hope.  If professors and researchers from so many different countries can reach accord, then perhaps there is still a chance that the diverse nations of the world can figure out how to coexist in harmony.

Kudos  — As you know, I like to use my Monday Missives to share news about recent accomplishments by members of the English Department.  Here is the latest news:

Boyd Davis recently had a co-authored article accepted for publication.  Here are the details: van Ravenstein K and Davis B. “When More Than Exercise Is Needed to Increase Chances of Aging in Place: Qualitative Analysis of a Telehealth Physical Activity Program to Improve Mobility in Low-Income Older Adults.” JMIR Aging (forthcoming). doi:10.2196/11955

Consuelo Salas recently led a workshop titled “Creative Research Methods: An Approach to Studying Food” at the Cultural Rhetorics conference.  Also, Consuelo and Atkins Library librarians Kim Looby and Natalie Ornat were recently awarded a SoTL grant for their collaborative project “Multi Discipline Collaboration in the Teaching of Inquiry and Critical Thinking.” In their two-year project Salas, Looby and Ornat will study the effectiveness of their collaborative teaching of the research process within Salas’ LBST 2301 courses.

Upcoming Events and Meetings — Here is a list of upcoming events and meetings:

December 12 — The English Department’s Holiday Party will be held on Wednesday, December 12, from 11:30 to 1:30 in the Faculty/Staff Lounge.  Please sign up on the potluck list located on the desk outside of Monica’s office.

December 15 — The Commencement for the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences will take place in the Barnhardt Student Activity Center (SAC) on Saturday, December 15, at 3:00 pm.

January 29 — The Personally Speaking presentation featuring Janaka Bowman Lewis will take place on Tuesday, January 29, 2019, at UNC Charlotte Center City.  Janaka’s presentation on her book Freedom Narratives of African American Women will begin at 6:30 p.m.  A book signing and reception will follow her presentation. For more information and to RSVP, please click on the following link:  https://exchange.uncc.edu/how-early-womens-writings-led-to-civil-rights-discourse/

Quirky Quiz Question — The effort to establish an international organization to help the nations of the world work out their differences without resorting to war led to the formation of the United Nations after World War Two.  However, before the establishment of the United Nations, an effort was made to establish a similar international organization following World War One.  What was the name of the organization that was a predecessor to the United Nations?

Last week’s answer: Christchurch

Oxford University is home to a number of semi-independent colleges.  What is the name of the college where Lewis Carroll taught?

Celebrating the Life and Legacy of Dr. Julian Dewey Mason, Jr. –The English Department is sponsoring a celebration of the life and legacy of Julian Mason, who died on March 20, 2018.  This event will take place in the English Department’s Seminar Room (Fretwell 290B) on Friday, November 30 from 3:00 pm to 4:30 pm.  The department is organizing this event at the request of Julian’s wife, Elsie Mason, along with a group of Julian’s friends, professional colleagues, and former students.

Julian joined the English Department in 1966, and he served as the English Department Chair from 1978 to 1984.  He continued to teach in the department until his retirement in 1989.  During his years as a faculty member, he introduced courses on Southern literature, founded the American Studies Program, and helped create the forerunner to our current Africana Studies Department.

As a scholar and writer, Julian is best known for The Poems of Phillis Wheatley.  The University of North Carolina Press published the first edition of this book in 1966.  The same press published a revised and enlarged edition of this book in 1989.  Julian also wrote poetry.  A collection of his poems was published in 2016 under the title of The Net Needle.  This collection will be available at the gathering on Friday.

Julian had a passion for book collecting, and he knew a great deal about rare books.  A longtime supporter of Atkins Library, he often donated rare editions of notable books to the Special Collections Department of the Atkins Library.  In 2016, Julian and his wife, Elsie (a former librarian who worked for many years at Atkins Library), donated a very rare copy of Olaudah Equiano’s famous slave narrative, Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, to Atkins Library as part of the library’s special event to celebrate the acquisition of the library’s two millionth volume.

On a personal note, I feel a special connection to Julian, for he hired me in 1984.  I was the last person he hired before he stepped down as the Chair of the English Department.  Over the course of my career, I have followed in Julian’s footsteps. Like Julian, I served as the Director of the American Studies Program and went on to become the Chair of the English Department.   In a very real sense, I am part of Julian’s legacy.

The Night of the Hunter — The Fall Film Series of the NC Humanities Council grant funded project, The Child in Southern Literature and Film, continues today (November 26) at 5pm in the Student Union Theater with a screening of the 1955 thriller The Night of the Hunter.  In this film, the children in a family are threatened by a corrupt minister.  Sam Shapiro will introduce the film and lead a discussion after the screening.  Everyone is invited to attend.

Kudos  — As you know, I like to use my Monday Missives to share news about recent accomplishments by members of the English Department.  Here is the latest news:

Boyd Davis has agreed to serve as a keynote speaker at an international conference titled “Seniors, Foreign Caregivers, Families, Institutions:  Linguistic and Multidisciplinary Perspectives.”  This conference will take place in Varese, Italy, in April 2019.

Janaka Lewis published an article titled “A Tale of Two Sisters:  An Appreciation of Sisters & Champions:  The True Story of Venus and Serena Williams” in the Winter 2018 issue of RISE:  A Children’s Literacy Journal.

Sarah Minslow published an article titled “The Magic of Exploring Literary Wonderlands” in the Winter 2018 issue of RISE:  A Children’s Literacy Journal.

Upcoming Events and Meetings — Here is a list of upcoming events and meetings:

November 29 — Public reception and presentation by Daniel Shealy on the history of Little Women will take place on Thursday, November 29, in Atkins Library’s Halton Room from 3:30 pm to 5:30 pm.

November 30 — Department Meeting, 11-12:30, in the conference room (Fretwell 280C).

November 30 — ELC Faculty Meet and Greet, 12:30-1:30 in the faculty lounge (Fretwell 248C).

November 30 — Faculty Talk – Pilar Blitvich, “Smart Mobs, CyberPublic Shaming, and Social Justice,” 1:00-2:00pm in the English Department Conference Room.

November 30 — There will be a gathering in celebration of the life of Dr. Julian D. Mason, Professor Emeritus at 3:00pm in the seminar room (Fretwell 290B).

Quirky Quiz Question — The famous film critic Roger Ebert described The Night of the Hunter “one of the most frightening movies” ever made.  Ebert’s fame was tied to a television program that he did in collaboration with another film critic.  What is the name of Ebert’s collaborator?

Little Womenfocuses on the four March sisters.  What are the first names of these four sisters?

Location, Location, Location — This past weekend, I saw Being There, the final film in the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library’s film series titled “Hal Ashby in the Seventies.”  Sam Shapiro, the organizer of this film series and a part-time faculty member in our English Department, introduced the film by commenting on the making of the film and discussing the relationship between Hal Ashby (the director) and Peter Sellers (the star of the film).  For Sellers, Being There was his final film.  Being There was released in 1979, and Sellers died in 1980.  Sam then concluded his introductory comments by mentioning that most of the movie was filmed at Biltmore House in Asheville.

Having toured Biltmore House, I enjoyed seeing the various ways in which this house figures in the film.  I took pleasure in recognizing specific rooms, gardens, and landscape features associated with Biltmore House, but it all seemed different seeing these features within the context of the film.  When I toured Biltmore House, it struck me as something of a grand tourist attraction.  However, when I saw Biltmore House portrayed as a lived-in residence in the movie, it seemed more like a real house to me.

The first time I ever gave much thought to film locations was in 1969, and it involved the movie Downhill Racer, starring Robert Redford.  Several scenes in the movie were shot less than a mile from my childhood home on South Turkey Creek Road near Conifer, Colorado.  In the movie, these scenes are presented as taking place in the Colorado town of Idaho Springs.  However, I knew exactly where these scenes were shot, and they were many miles from the town of Idaho Springs. Our whole family went to see the Downhill Racer as soon as it was released, and we couldn’t help but announce to everyone in the theater that those scenes took place on our road.   I enjoyed seeing our familiar road in the movie, but I remember thinking that the film was distorting reality.

Forty-two years after the release of Downhill Racer, the topic of film locations again surfaced in my life.  Gavin, our son, found out that The Hunger Games was being filmed in the Charlotte area, and he auditioned to be an extra.  He ended up spending the entire summer of 2011 working as an extra, although he is only in the film for about a nano-second.  Because of Gavin’s involvement in the film, I knew the specific places in the Charlotte area where the film was shot.  Nevertheless, when I saw the film in the theater, I did not have a sense that I was seeing scenes from Charlotte on the screen.   Through the magic of movie making, the real places that were used in the film were so completely transformed that they appeared to be from an entirely different world that had nothing to do with Charlotte.

By studying films, we can better understand how talented filmmakers, such as Hal Ashby, use their films to portray, distort, and transform reality.  In a sense, films provide with us with opportunities to see our familiar world in different ways. This theme runs through the various film studies courses that we offer in the English Department.  In the spring 2019 semester, for example, we are offering several such courses, including Sam Shapiro’s “Paranoid Cinema:  American Movies in the 1970s” and Henry Doss’s “Southern Childhood in Films, Stories, and Performance.”  These various film studies courses will cover many movies, which were filmed in many different locations.  However, if one were to look for a great location to study films, one need look no further than our own English Department.

Kudos  — As you know, I like to use my Monday Missives to share news about recent accomplishments by members of the English Department.  Here is the latest news:

Balaka Basu recently presented a paper titled “Fan Fiction as Literature: Post Canonical Writing and the Poetics of Genre” at Fan Studies Network – North America in Chicago at DuPaul University.

Clayton Tarr recently presented a paper titled “Counting Cards: Enumeration and Revolution in A Tale of Two Cities and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” at the Victorians Institute Conference in Asheville.

Upcoming Events and Meetings — Here is a list of upcoming events and meetings:

November 14 — As part of International Education Week, on Wednesday, Nov. 14th from 9-3:30 Sarah Minslow’s War and Genocide in Children’s Literature class will host their annual Promoting Peace Project. This year they will create murals of handprints to symbolize the role each of us plays in creating a more peaceful society. Stop by to make a donation and add your handprint for peace to the mural. All donations will support refugee children. It will be held in the courtyard between CHHS and CoEd.

Quirky Quiz Question — In addition to starring in Being There, Peter Sellers starred in the original Pink Panther movies.  What was the name of the character he played in these films?

Contributing to Charlotte’s Literary Scene — Members of our English Department regularly contribute to the Charlotte area’s literary scene, but this past week our department shifted into overdrive.  Members of our department made contributions to three separate literary events in the span of three days.

It all started on Thursday, November 1, with Verse & Vino, the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library Foundation’s annual celebration of literature.   This gigantic fund-raising event takes place at the Charlotte Convention Center in the largest ballroom in the city.   Setting up for this event is a tremendous challenge, but there is no challenge too big for our Angie Williams.  This year, just as she has done for the past three years, Angie volunteered to help set up for Verse & Vino.  I know the organizers who put Verse & Vino together, and they all commented to me on how valuable Angie’s help was in transforming the cavernous ballroom into a celebratory space.

The very next day, Bryn Chancellor played host to the North Carolina Writers’ Network’s conference.  I emailed Bryn asking her for news about the conference, and she sent me the following response:

The nonprofit North Carolina Writers’ Network, the state’s oldest and largest literary arts services organization, holds three annual conferences that bring together hundreds of writers from around “The Writingest State” for workshops, readings, and lively discussions in support of their mission statement that writing is “necessary both for self-expression and community spirit, that well-written words can connect people across time and distance, and that the deeply satisfying experiences of writing and reading should be available to everyone.” The network rotates conference locations, and Charlotte was the city for fall. Organizers reached out to UNC Charlotte Department of English to see if we would want to sponsor an event, which we did: a pre-conference “tailgate” open to all to kick off the weekend. I led writers in exercises focused on observation and memory intended to help them find material for their stories and poems as well as to sink into the writing mindset. Throughout the weekend, the conference offered myriad sessions focused on the craft and business of writing, as well as panels, social events, and readings, including a wonderful staged performance during the evening banquet. Paula Martinac presented a session on creating diverse characters, and I led one on dialogue and setting in fiction writing.

On Saturday, the Charlotte Mecklenburg Library Foundation held EpicFest, a free literary festival for children and their families that takes place at ImaginOn.   I serve on the steering committee for this festival, but I was not the only member of our department who contributed to the success of this event.   A number of the students from our English Learning Community volunteered.  Several of our graduate students also volunteered, including Samantha Holt and Shannon Murphy.  Moreover, Kelly Brabec, who recently graduated with an English major, volunteered for the third year in a row.

One of the reasons our English Department is able to play such important roles in supporting so many cultural events in the Charlotte community is that our department is itself an inclusive community that encompasses not just faculty members but also staff members, undergraduates, graduate students, and alumni.  With such a large and diverse community, we have the people, expertise and willingness to help out with a wide variety of cultural projects and events.

Southeastern Renaissance Conference — The 75th annual meeting of the Southeastern Renaissance Conference (SRC) took place on October 19-20, 2018, at Queens University of Charlotte and the UNC Charlotte Center City campus. The conference was supported by the English Department and College of Arts and Sciences at Queens and by the UNC Charlotte English Department. Helen Hull from Queens University and Kirk Melnikoff served as the conference co-hosts.  Both Kirk and Jen Munroe also presided over sessions at this conference.

Kudos  — As you know, I like to use my Monday Missives to share news about recent accomplishments by members of the English Department.  Here is the latest news:

JuliAnna Ávila‘s article titled “Compliant ‘Devices of Art’: Enlisting Dewey to Question Mandates” was just published in Teachers College Record.

Meghan Barnes recently wrote a piece about the women at the homeless shelter, and this story has been published on the Urban Ministries Center blog. You can check it out by clicking on the following link:  https://www.urbanministrycenter.org/what-is-community/

Mark de Castrique, a graduate of our M.A. program, recently published a mystery novel titled Secret Undertaking.

Quirky Quiz Question — Veterans Day will take place on Sunday, November 11.  What was the original name for this holiday?

Come and Sit for a Spell (or a Potion) — One of the reasons I like Halloween so much is that it harks back to a time when children knew all of their neighbors and felt free to visit them–a time when people sat on their front porches and invited passersby to sit on the porch swing for a spell.  However, with the rise of the suburban ranch house, the sociable front porch has given way to the private back patio or deck, and this change in domestic architecture has altered the ways in which neighbors interact.  Nowadays, many children hardly know their neighbors, and they certainly don’t feel free to ring their neighbors’ doorbells and ask for a treat–except for on Halloween.  On Halloween, we give ourselves permission to open our doors to our neighbors, to play, and to not take ourselves too seriously even if it’s just for a day.

I am pleased to report that the convivial spirit of Halloween pervaded the English Department last Friday thanks to the efforts of the students in Sigma Tau Delta, the English Graduate Student Association, and the Children’s Literature Graduate Organization.  These students held their second annual Haunted English Department Take Over on Friday, October 26, from 4:00 to 8:00 pm, and it was a smash hit.  We flung open the front doors of the English Department, and lots of students and children showed up in costumes.  A number of faculty and staff members, including me, opened our office doors to trick-or-treaters.  The student organizers decorated the department, held a costume contest, and set up Halloween-related craft projects.  They showed a scary movie and provided an abundance of pizza and other tasty snacks.  Everyone who participated had a great time.

I had to leave around 6:00, but the English Department was still rollicking when I headed home.  Seeing so many children, students, faculty, and staff members all having fun together, I concluded, as I drove home, that our English Department is not just an academic unit.  For many of us, it also functions as a community or a neighborhood of sorts.  If it’s haunted, I suspect that it’s haunted by friendly spirits who just want to sit for a spell and enjoy the convivial company.

 

Personally Speaking Dates — We have confirmed the dates next semester for not one but two English Department faculty who will be discussing their books at Personally Speaking:

Last week’s answer: John F. Kennedy

When Robert Frost was 86, he read a poem at the inauguration of a President.  What is the name of this President?