{"id":688,"date":"2016-01-11T15:19:54","date_gmt":"2016-01-11T20:19:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/?p=688"},"modified":"2016-01-11T15:19:54","modified_gmt":"2016-01-11T20:19:54","slug":"monday-missive-january-11-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/blog\/2016\/01\/11\/monday-missive-january-11-2016\/","title":{"rendered":"Monday Missive – January 11, 2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"towers\"<\/a>The Rise and Fall of a Tower<\/b> — As I walked back to Fretwell after visiting Atkins Library last week, I encountered a tour group led by one of the backwards-walking students employed by the admissions office.\u00a0 “Here,” said the backwards-walking student, “is where the Belk Tower used to be.”\u00a0 I could tell that she wanted to give the rest of her Belk Tower spiel, but she just paused for a few awkward moments and then carried on with her tour. Like the backwards-walking student, I feel a bit disoriented by the sudden disappearance of the Belk Tower.<\/p>\n

Built in 1970, the Belk Tower served as a campus focal point for nearly a half-century.\u00a0 In many ways, however, its history extended back much, much further into the past.\u00a0 The historical roots of the Belk Tower can be traced back to the soaring obelisks that the ancient Egyptians built.\u00a0 These obelisks were part of the Egyptians’ passion for monumental architecture.\u00a0 By building structures that soared into the heavens, the Egyptians expressed their ambitions and staked their claim to greatness.\u00a0 Ever since, such structures have played similar roles but in many different contexts.\u00a0 It is no coincidence that the Washington Monument resembles an Egyptian obelisk.\u00a0 The Belk Tower, although not an obelisk, also served as an expression of ambition and a claim to greatness.\u00a0 My hope is that the symbolism associated with the Belk Tower will continue to resonate with the members of our campus even though the tower itself is now memory.<\/p>\n

Kudos<\/b>\u2014 As you know, I like to use my Monday Missives to share news about recent accomplishments by members of our department.\u00a0 Here is the latest news:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Juan Meneses <\/b>recently presented a paper titled Domination through Dialogue:\u00a0 Plurality, Tolerance, and Understanding as Instruments of Political Dispossession” at the MLA Conference, which took place in Austin, Texas.<\/div>\n
\nBecky Roeder<\/b> co-presented the following two papers at concurrent conferences in Washington, D.C.: A phonological model of the Canadian Shift<\/i>\u00a0at the Linguistic Society of America (LSA) annual meeting and Social motivation for a structural sound change? The Canadian Shift in four communities<\/i>\u00a0at the American Dialect society annual meeting.<\/p>\n
Upcoming Events and Deadlines<\/b>\u2014\u00a0Here are some dates to keep in mind:<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

January 21<\/span><\/span> \u2014 The last day to add\/drop with no grade.<\/p>\n

January 22<\/span><\/span> \u2014 The English Department meeting will take place on January 22, 2016<\/span><\/span>, from 11:00<\/span><\/span>–12:30<\/span><\/span> in the English Department Conference Room.<\/p>\n

Quirky Quiz Question<\/b>\u00a0\u2014 When the Washington Monument was completed in 1884, it was the tallest structure in the world.\u00a0 However, in 1889 another tower eclipsed it as the world’s tallest structure. What is the name of the tower completed in 1889?<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
Last week’s answer: Austin City Limits<\/strong><\/span><\/em><\/p>\n
\n
\"\"In addition to hosting this year’s MLA Convention, Austin is featured in a popular music program that is televised on PBS.\u00a0 What is the name of this program?<\/em><\/p>\n
\n
\"\"<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Rise and Fall of a Tower — As I walked back to Fretwell after visiting Atkins Library last week, I encountered a tour group led by one of the backwards-walking students employed by the admissions office.\u00a0 “Here,” said the backwards-walking student, “is where the Belk Tower used to be.”\u00a0 I could tell that she […]<\/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-688","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\/688","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=688"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":692,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/688\/revisions\/692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.charlotte.edu\/mark-west\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}