{"id":1561,"date":"2018-09-04T08:48:59","date_gmt":"2018-09-04T12:48:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/?p=1561"},"modified":"2018-09-04T08:48:59","modified_gmt":"2018-09-04T12:48:59","slug":"monday-missive-september-3-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/blog\/2018\/09\/04\/monday-missive-september-3-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"Monday Missive – September 3, 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a><\/div>\n
Promoting Literacy and Literature<\/b>\u00a0— I had the privilege of interviewing Roald Dahl about a year before his death.\u00a0 I concluded the interview by asking him if he found it more satisfying to write for children or adults.\u00a0 Here is his response: “It’s more rewarding to write for children.\u00a0 When I am writing for adults, I’m just trying to entertain them.\u00a0 But a good children’s book does much more than entertain.\u00a0 It teaches children the use of words, the joy of playing with language.\u00a0 Above all, it helps children learn not to be frightened of books.\u00a0 Once they can get through a book and enjoy it, they realize that books are something that they can cope with.\u00a0 If they are going to amount to anything in life, they need to be able to handle books.\u00a0 If my books can help children become readers, then I feel I have accomplished something important.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Dahl’s response to my question popped into my head when the the Charlotte Chapter of the Executive Women International (EWI) invited me to participate in their Reading Rally at the Merry Oaks Elementary School in Charlotte.\u00a0 They asked me if I would read a book aloud to a large group of children participating in the school’s enrichment program.\u00a0 They explained that they host their Reading Rally at this school at the beginning of every school year.\u00a0 As part of this annual event, they provide all of the children in the program with free children’s books and school supplies.\u00a0 When I received their invitation, I flashed back on Dahl’s comment about the importance of helping children appreciate books, and I immediately accepted their invitation.\u00a0 Given that I was already thinking about Dahl, I decided to read Dahl’s\u00a0The Enormous Crocodile.<\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\"\"<\/a>The EWI Reading Rally took place on August 30, and it was a great success.\u00a0 The children enjoyed hearing about the Enormous Crocodile’s foiled plans to gobble up unsuspecting children, and they were thrilled at the opportunity to select two children’s books that they could keep and take home to read at their leisure.\u00a0 The women who organized this event did an excellent job of encouraging the children to become readers and develop an appreciation of books.<\/p>\n

Although I had never heard of the Charlotte Chapter of the Executive Women International prior to being invited to participate in their Reading Rally, I knew several of the members because of their associations with UNC Charlotte.\u00a0 In fact, two of the members–Shannon Homesley and Brenda Shue–took graduate courses from me while they were earning their M.A. degrees.\u00a0 Participating in the EWI’s Reading Rally reminded me that there are many community organizations that are interested in promoting literacy and literature and in partnering with our English Department in our various community engagement activities.<\/p>\n

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Kudos<\/b>\u00a0\u00a0\u2014 As you know, I like to use my Monday Missives to share news about recent accomplishments by members of the English Department.\u00a0 Here is the latest news:<\/p>\n

Boyd Davis<\/b>\u00a0is the co-author of paper titled “Working with Interpreters in Adolescent Health Care: Conflicts of Positioning in Family Communication,” which was recently presented at the \u00a0International Conference on Communication in Healthcare in Porto, Portugal.<\/p>\n

Dina Massachi<\/b>, a graduate of our M.A. program, recently gave the following two related presentations at the OzCon International conference held in Pomona, California: \u00a0\u201c100 Years Full Circle\u2014 L. Frank Baum, Todrick Hall and an Emotionally Intelligent Tin Woodman\u201d and\u00a0\u201cHeart over Head\u2014 Evolving Views on Male Emotional Intelligence and the Tin Woodman.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alan Rauch<\/b>‘s\u00a0Dolphin<\/i>\u00a0has been translated into Italian as\u00a0Il Delfino<\/i>\u00a0and published by Nottetempo.<\/p>\n

Upcoming Events and Meetings<\/b>\u00a0—\u00a0Here is a list of upcoming events and meetings:<\/p>\n

Visiting YA author Alan Gratz will speak on campus on Wednesday, September 5th, at 5 pm in the English Department Seminar Room (290B Fretwell). This presentation is part of the NC Humanities Council funded project titled “The Child in Southern Literature and Film.” \u00a0 Alan received degrees in Creative Writing and English Education from the University of Tennessee and lives in Asheville, NC. He has written more than 14 books for young readers, including the latest,\u00a0Ban This Book<\/i>, which is set in NC.\u00a0 For more information about this author, please click of the following link: \u00a0www.alangratz.com<\/a><\/p>\n

The Library Social and Award Ceremony for Prof. Consuelo Salas will take place on Thursday, September 6, at 4 pm in the Halton Reading Room (Atkins Library).<\/p>\n

The first English Department Meeting of this academic year will take place on Friday, September 7, 11:00 am to 12:30 pm in the English Department Seminar Room (290B\u00a0Fretwell).<\/p>\n

Quirky Quiz Question<\/b>\u00a0\u2014 Roald Dahl’s belief in the importance of reading is especially evident in his children’s book about a brilliant girl who taught herself how to read at the age of three.\u00a0 A musical based on this book will be performed by the Children’s Theatre of Charlotte this fall.\u00a0 Do you know the title of this book?<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Last week’s answer: Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffman<\/strong><\/div>\n
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All the President’s Menfeatures two characters who are based on the real-life journalists Bon Woodward and Carl Bernstein.\u00a0 Do you know the names of the actors who played these roles?\u00a0<\/em><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Promoting Literacy and Literature\u00a0— I had the privilege of interviewing Roald Dahl about a year before his death.\u00a0 I concluded the interview by asking him if he found it more satisfying to write for children or adults.\u00a0 Here is his response: “It’s more rewarding to write for children.\u00a0 When I am writing for adults, I’m […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":202,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1561","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-monday-missive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1561","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/202"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1561"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1561\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1568,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1561\/revisions\/1568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1561"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1561"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1561"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}