The Masthead | Spring, Summer, and Fall 2019 by Salem State University

Spring, Summer, and Fall 2019

THE MASTHEAD SALEM STATE UNIVERSITY ENGLISH GRADUATE STUDENT NEWSLETTER SALEM STATE UNIVERSITY ENGLISH GRADUATE PROGRAM CONTACT INFORMATION

Theresa DeFrancis

Coordinator, Master of Arts in Teaching/English tdefrancis@salemstate.edu 978.542.7422

The English graduate student newsletter offers faculty descriptions of the courses, as well as upcoming events and important dates. If you have questions about registration, or need help deciding what to take, your graduate coordinator will be delighted to assist you. Feel free to contact the instructors of any courses you are interested in if you would like more detailed information.

IMPORTANT PROGRAM DATES September

Fall semester classes start the Wednesday after Labor Day.

October

Application to start the spring thesis, portfolio, or manuscript due to the graduate coordinator.

Roopika Risam

Spring 19 Interim Coordinator, Master of Arts in English rrisam@salemstate.edu 978.542.2662

J.D. Scrimgeour

Interim Chair, English jscrimgeour@salemstate.edu 978.542.7422

Keja Valens

Coordinator, Master of Arts in English kvalens@salemstate.edu 978.542.7050

Melanie Gonzalez

Coordinator, Master of Arts in Teaching/ESOL mgonzalez@salemstate.edu 978.542.2659

School of Graduate Studies 978.542.6323

Deadline to submit fall semester graduation application.

Application for November Language Exam due.

November

Language Exam.

December

Final theses and manuscripts, with all forms and signatures, due to graduate coordinator for fall graduation.

Fall semester classes end the third week of December.

January

Spring semester classes start after MLK holiday.

February

Application for March Language Exam due.

March

Deadline to submit spring semester graduation application.

Language Exam.

April

Application to write a fall thesis, portfolio, or manuscript due to graduate coordinator.

Registration for fall and summer classes.

Final theses and manuscripts, with all forms and signatures, due to graduate coordinator for fall graduation.

May

End of spring semester classes.

Graduate and Faculty Research Day.

Commencement Ceremonies salemstate.edu/commencement

Summer I classes start.

June

Application for July Language Exam due.

July

Summer II classes start.

Language Exam

July-August

Summer Institutes.

UPCOMING EVENTS WRITING AND RESEARCHING MAJOR PROJECTS: A WRITING CENTER/LIBRARY COLLABORATION: Thursday, November 1 3-5 pm Mary G. Walsh Writing Center Looking to get started on a major writing and research project due at the end of the semester? Or, are you in the middle of a project and feeling stuck? Join us for a writing center and library collaborative event where you’ll learn more about how to work through writing and researching together. Event includes time for one-on-one feedback from writing and research experts. Feel free to come for the whole event or just stop by. If interested, please RSVP to Becky Martini at rmartini@salemstate. edu by October 25 at 11:59 pm. Snacks and refreshments will be provided.

WRITER’S SERIES: MONA AWARD Thursday, November 8 7:30-9 pm Metro Room, Ellison Campus Center mona-awad-grou.squarespace.com Mona Awad was born in Montreal and has lived in the U.S. since 2009. Her debut novel, 13 WAYS OF LOOKING AT A FAT GIRL, published on February 23, 2016 (Penguin Books) won the Amazon Best First Novel award and was shortlisted for the Giller Prize.

LONG NIGHT AGAINST PROCRASTINATION Tuesday, November 27 8-11 pm Mary G. Walsh Writing Center Working on your final writing projects and need some support? Visit the writing center for one-on-one dropin tutoring, snacks and coffee. We’ve got a reserved quiet writing space in the library as well as lots of tutors available during these extended hours.

WRITER’S SERIES: UNDERGRADUATE STUDENT READING Monday, December 3 11 am-12 pm Metro Room, Ellison Campus Center

SUBMIT! Monday, December 17, 2018 6:30-7:30 pm Share your fall coursework with a wide audience! Learn how to submit your creative and critical work for presentation and publication. Practical and innovative strategies and tips from successful faculty and students.

SCHOOL OF GRADUATE STUDIES OPEN HOUSE, SATURDAY, APRIL 27, 2019

COURSE DESCRIPTIONS WINTER 2019, December 27-January English 871: Workshop in Academic Writing Prof. Rebecca Martini, PhD Time: WWW In this course, students will have the opportunity to explore their own writing processes and take a piece of writing through extensive creation, development, and/or revision. Students will review scholarly research about writing, explore their own individual writing processes, conduct style analyses of potential publication venues, and give/receive detailed feedback on their writing projects. Students can come into the class with a working manuscript or they can plan to create/write a research proposal during the course. Special attention to student interests and needs will determine additional areas of focus. This is a writing course that also fulfills an elective for the Certificate in Writing and Rhetoric.

SPRING 2019, January-May English 715: Topics in Digital Studies: African Diaspora Digital Humanities Prof. Roopika Risam, PhD Time: Mondays, 7-9:20 pm Hybrid As digital methods for humanities research produce a digital cultural record of humanity, we must be sure that we resist reproducing literary and cultural canons that privilege white European and American writers. Do you want to become part of an emerging community of literary and cultural studies scholars who are using computational and digital tools to change how we read, interpret, and teach African diasporic cultural production? This course examines how digital humanities methods can be applied to African American, Black British, Caribbean literary and cultural production to ensure that voices and stories that have long gone unheard find their place in the digital cultural record. Together, we will examine scholarship on African diaspora digital humanities and analyze digital archives, databases, critical digital editions, maps, and multimodal compositions of African diasporas. We will then use our knowledge and insights to collaboratively produce a digital humanities project using African diasporic materials as our sources. No prior experience with digital humanities or computational or digital tools is necessary. This is a literature course (world) that also fulfills a requirement for the Certificate in Digital Studies.

English 751: Masterpieces of 19 th c. English Literature Prof. Lisa Mulman, PhD Time: Mondays, 4:30-6:50 pm Readings in the famous novels of the age: Austen, Brontës, Dickens, Eliot, Hardy, Wilde, and others. Other genres also will be considered. This is a literature course (British).

English 787: The Literature of Genocide Prof. Stephenie Young, PhD Time: Tuesdays, 4:30-6:50 pm This is an intensive introduction to contemporary discussions of genocide and human rights in a broad context. The course mixes a basic historical and theoretical investigation of the contested concept of “genocide” with some difficult examples of the political, social, cultural, and aesthetic dimensions of claims made regarding

this term. We will look at the discursive development of genocide and institutions that affect the ‘reality’ of this on-going problem in the world. We will discuss the complicated issue of genocide and how to prevent it, and how to witness it in writing, film and art. We will also talk about related topics including humanitarianism, truth commissions and war crimes tribunals, testimony and the media. Using texts from philosophers, journalists, historians, activists, and poets, along with the contemporary news flow, we will examine some tricky cases and troubled places. This is a literature course (world) that also fulfills a requirement for the Graduate Certificate in Holocaust and Genocide Studies.

English 797: Feminist Rhetorical Theory and Criticism Prof. Jan Lindholm, PhD Time: Tuesdays, 7-9:20 pm For approximately the past forty years, feminist scholars have transformed understandings of rhetoric as they’ve challenged and reinterpreted rhetorical canons; expanded possible sites and subjects for research; illuminated the contexts in which speaking, writing, listening, and silencing take place; exposed the dynamics of power and privilege as they relate to communication; and developed research agendas and methodologies that emerged from their deep commitments to social justice, peace, and healing. And that’s only some of what they’ve done! This course will introduce you to theories and research methodologies that inform feminist scholarship in rhetoric. You’ll see those theories and methodologies put into practice and will have multiple opportunities yourself to join the conversations that these scholars have started for us—adding your own insights to the mix and pursuing questions that matter to you. This course counts towards the Certificate in Writing and Rhetoric as well as the MA and the MAT in English.

English 817: Contemporary Approaches to Composition Prof. Tanya Rodrigue, PhD Time: Wednesdays, 4:30-6:50 pm This course investigates research and theories that inform current composition pedagogy and adapt these perspectives to actual classroom situations. Students will study theories of writing pedagogies and reflect on their own assumptions and practices about writing and the teaching of writing. Students will develop methods for teaching analysis, invention, drafting, revision, assignment design, and assessment, with special attention to the teaching of 21st century literacies and teaching with technologies. This is a writing course that is also part of our new Certificate in Writing and Rhetoric.

English 818: Poetry Workshop Prof. Alexandria Peary, PhD Time: Thursdays, 4:30-6:50 pm In this course, the process of writing poems is emphasized, with attention to prewriting, invention, drafting, and revision and less emphasis on polished product and outcome. As Emily Dickinson said, “I dwell in Possibility”—this is a poetry course that also dwells in possibility. The phase of invention is especially studied through prompts and heuristics with the goal of developing an imagination of abundance: part of a lifelong (if desired) writing practice as a poet. Students will be presented strategies and opportunities for publication, including an assignment of a micro review of a poetry book or literary journal, and will have the opportunity to interact with guest speakers who are contemporary poets. In addition to exploring creative process, this course provides advanced study in poetic structures including figurative language, imagery, voice, line, stanza, form, and meter, and narrative. This is a writing workshop that may be repeated for a maximum of nine credits.

English 820: Workshop in Fiction and Narrative Forms Prof. Kevin Carey Time: Thursdays, 7-9:20 pm Have you written a few chapters of a novel? Are you working on a short story or two? Maybe you have an idea for a nonfiction piece you’ve always wanted to write. Wherever you’re at in the writing process, this workshop can help bring your ideas to the page, or fine tune that manuscript you’ve already got going. Come join other writers in a supportive community and get your projects ready for publication. We will read each other’s fiction (and other narrative forms) and provide rigorous feedback with an emphasis on revision. In addition, we will read and analyze works of contemporary writing. Discussions topics will include the tools of the trade and publication. This is a writing workshop that may be repeated for a maximum of nine credits.

English 870: Writing Center Graduate Practicum Prof. Rebecca Martini, PhD Time: Wednesdays, 1:40-3:30 pm In this course, students examine how individualized writing instruction and one-on-one conferencing can be beneficial to writers by exploring a range of strategies for facilitating a successful conference, new media and online tutoring, working with writers across disciplines, navigating error, working with multilingual writers, and investigating how identity shapes writing. Students gain hands-on experience working with college writers through three hours of tutoring per week, either face-to-face in our writing center or online. Course format is flexible for students whose schedules prevent them from enrolling in the face-to-face class on Wednesday afternoons. This course is also part of our new Certificate in Writing and Rhetoric! Contact Becky Martini at rmartini@salemstate.edu for more information.

SUMMER I, 2019 May 20-June 29 English 713: Digital Humanities Prof. Roopika Risma, PhD Time: WWW In this fully-online course, we will experiment with digital humanities tools and methods of analysis to introduce you to the possibilities of digital humanities. This cutting-edge area of interdisciplinary scholarship uses computational and digital tools to analyze and interpret literature, culture, and history. The goal of our exploration is to consider the relationship between close reading, the bread and butter of literary analysis, and the discoveries that engaging with digital methods can inspire. For each of the first five weeks of class, you will read about digital humanities, play around with digital humanities tools, and reflect on and discuss your insights. We will experiment with social media analysis, computational textual analysis, digital mapping, and algorithms. During the last week of the class, you will design and begin implementing a (very) small-scale digital humanities project using digital humanities methods based on your interests. Previous students have developed lesson plans for their teaching, used textual analysis to interpret their own creative writing, and used digital mapping for their MA capstone research. No prior experience with computational or digital tools is necessary. This course counts for the MA, MAT, and Certificate in Digital Studies.

SUMMER II, 2019, July 8-August 17 English 794: Studies in Literature of the World: Post-colonial Adaptation Prof. Michael Jaros, PhD Time: WWW This online course shall focus on the ways that various colonial and post-colonial texts have been revised and/or adapted both within and across genres. The course is designed to allow working teachers, creative writers, and others interested in graduate literature studies

to discover new strategies for engaging with both traditional and nontraditional texts, building stronger genre awareness and a working knowledge of some of the cultural and theoretical paradigms that postcolonial adaptation involves. Some potential texts to be included: Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness; Francis Ford Coppola (dir) , Apocalypse Now; Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmakers Apocalypse; Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart; Roddy Doyle, The Commitments; Alan Parker (dir) The Commitments; Derek Walcott, Omeros, Pantomime; Daniel DeFoe, Robinson Crusoe; Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God; Suzan-Lori Parks (screenwriter) Their Eyes Were Watching God; David Henry Wang, Yellowface. This is a literature course.

English 830:Digital Writing Prof. Rebecca Martini, PhD Time: WWW This course introduces students to the study and practice of digital writing. Alongside engaging with contemporary scholarship and theories, students have lots of opportunities for creativity and play as they compose with texts, images, video, and sound. In addition, students will consider the ethics of digital composing and have the opportunity to explore digital writing pedagogy. No prior experience with technology is necessary. This is a writing course that also fulfills a requirement in the Certificate in Digital Studies and is part of our new Certificate in Writing and Rhetoric. Contact Becky Martini at rmartini@ salemstate.edu for more information.

SUMMER INSTITUTES, M-F, 8:30-4:30 on the week indicated English 822A: Nonfiction Workshop Prof. Regina Flynn Time: July 8-July 12 A course in writing nonfiction, ranging from the personal to the objective, from brief journalistic pieces to literary essays. Classes will involve workshop discussions of students’ writing, attention to the details of style, and the study of lessons derived from professional writers. In this course we will discover how landscapes, city buildings, ocean views, and industrial buildings, shape our vision and define our worlds. This course will explore a number of walks in and around the Boston/North Shore area and assigned readings will focus on the long and short of walking and why it is important to a writer. A writing workshop; may be repeated for a maximum of nine credits.

English 833: Topics in Writing: Visual Rhetoric Prof. Tanya Rodrigue, PhD Time: July 15-July 19 Using an interdisciplinary approach, this course introduces students to theories, practices, and methodologies of visual rhetoric. Students will explore how images function, communicate, and circulate in the world, as well as how they shape communication practices, cultures, identities, communities, and perceptions. This course will support students in analyzing visuals and composing with visuals in multimodal projects such as photoessays, websites, or videos. This is a writing course that also counts toward the Certificate in Writing and Rhetoric.

English 831AN: Topics in American Literature and Criticism: Border Poetics Prof. Stephenie Young, PhD Time: July 29-August 2 In this course we will look at “border poetics”—aesthetic representations and practices that analyze border politics concerned with the formation, status and challenges faced by communities interacting with or living in the US/Mexican border region. Through reading literature and looking at visual art we will explore the experiences of communities that pass through and/or live in the US/

Mexican border region and look at how individual’s lives are shaped by geopolitical, linguistic, racial, economic, social and cultural forces. By examining a wide variety of work in fiction and nonfiction (oral testimony/written histories), contemporary film, Border Studies (theory), and visual art, you will be exposed to the experiences of those who live in these intersecting communities at the borders. Texts may include: T.C. Boyle, The Tortilla Curtain, Yuri Herrera, Signs Preceding the End of the World, Jason de Leon, Land of Open Graves, Graciela Limón, The River Flows North, Carlos Fuentes, The Crystal Frontier, Leslie Marmon Silko, Almanac of the Dead, Sandra Cisneros, The House on Mango Street, and Joseph Nevins, Operation Gatekeeper and Beyond: The War on “Illegals” and the Remaking of the U.S.-Mexican Boundary. This is a literature course (American) that fulfills a requirement for the Graduate Certificate in Holocaust and Genocide Studies.

English 761: Shakespeare Teacher’s Institute with Actors’ Shakespeare Project Prof. Jeff Theis, PhD Time: August 5-August 9 ENG 761, Shakespeare Teacher’s Institute is for teachers and teachersin-training and brings Shakespeare’s plays to life through performance techniques and scholarly research. Each summer we focus on one specific play. In a low-stakes setting, students will do some acting, learn about curriculum development, and generate both teaching lesson plans/assessments and an annotated bibliography based upon scholarly research. Online discussions after the institute and a reconvene meeting are also required. May be repeated for credit or taken only for professional development points. Course location is still tbd. We might meet on the SSU campus or off site at the Charlestown Working Theatre. Email Jeff Theis (jtheis@salemstate.edu) with any questions about the course or to indicate your contact info (mainly email address as well as mailing address). This is a literature course (British).

FALL 2019 English 725: Intro to Graduate Study in Literature Prof. Keja Valens, PhD Time: Mondays, 7-8:10 pm HYB This course introduces students to thinking and writing about literature in the context of literary theory. It considers big questions such as: what is literature and what does it do? What is language and how does it function? Who writes and how? Students develop methods of participating in debates and relevant to the field, engaging literary theory and criticism, and writing for a scholarly audience. The hybrid nature of this course is to meet face to face for 70 minutes every week and for an online equivalent of 70 minutes every week. Required of all MA and MA/MAT students in their first semester in the program.

English 745: Intro to Writing and Rhetoric Prof. Rebecca Martini, PhD Time: Thursdays, 4:30-6:50 pm HYB This course introduces students to the discipline of writing and rhetoric, its formation, histories, methods, and methodologies. Students will study key concepts, theories, and practices as well as trace and explore historical and ongoing conversations related to writing, writing processes, and writing practices. Through reading contemporary works in writing and rhetoric, we will trace the field’s development and question what it means to be writers and rhetoricians today. After reading key texts during the first part of the course, we will spend the second part of the course exploring additional topics based on student interests. Topics for further consideration include feminist rhetorics, professional writing, multilingual writing, cultural rhetorics, genre studies, digital rhetoric, visual rhetoric, writing program administration, and writing pedagogy. This course counts for the MA, MAT, and Certificate in Writing and Rhetoric.

English 700: Early American Literature Prof. Lucinda Damon-Bach, PhD Time: Wednesdays, 4:30-6:50 Beginning with literature that precedes British colonization (explorers’ narratives and Native American oral literature), this course will focus on texts written (or transcribed/translated) between 1620 and 1800—histories, autobiographies, poems, plays, and novels. These works illuminate the complexity of this period of American culture, telling stories of pilgrimage, colonization, and genocide; private piety and public life; the growth of national identity (political, cultural, and literary); Puritanism, Quakerism, and Deism; race and gender; slavery and the beginnings of a movement towards its abolition. As we read we will consider the ways that these stories overlap and interconnect, and the ways that they shape texts of different periods and genres. Two required field trips to Salem and Plymouth are planned. This is a literature course (American).

English 794: Topics in Literature of the World: After the Fall of the Wall: Nostalgia in Eastern Europe Prof. Stephenie Young, PhD Time: Thursdays, 4:30-6:50 pm

This six-meter-high statue of the dictator Joseph Stalin was placed in the central square of Gori, Georgia in 1952. In 2011 it was removed by the Georgian government. Although the Berlin wall fell thirty years ago (Nov. 9th, 1989), a number of people (both old and young) in Eastern Europe still consider the socialist period as “the good old times.” In places such as Romania and Georgia, Communism is not looked upon by some as the hated, oppressive regime that was brought down by popular uprisings, but rather as a time of innocence and a better life. Why is this? Are these people disappointed in what has happened since the fall of the wall? Or are they simply romanticizing the past and ignoring the extreme violence and oppression of the times? Keeping these questions in mind, we will study “postcommunist nostalgia” as a cultural and political phenomenon through the lens of the literature, art and film of the former Soviet Bloc and other non-Soviet countries that existed under socialist and communist governments in the 20th century. This is a literature course (world) that also fulfills a requirement for the Certificate in Holocaust and Genocide Studies.

English 833: Special Topics in Writing: Scriptwriting Prof. Kevin Carey, MFA Time: Thursdays, 7-9:20 pm Scriptwriting is a rigorous craft and, at its best, a fine art. It involves writing assignments which are tailored to help students master the basics of the art. This class will focus on the principles and practices of modern dramaturgy as it relates to the writing of film scripts. Characters, story, plot structure, and dialogue will be discussed and analyzed in contemporary and classic film scripts and in developing works of students. Students will complete a feature length film script by semester’s end. This is a writing course.

English 818: Poetry Workshop Prof. Ann Taylor, PhD Time: Mondays, 4:30-6:50 pm This is a workshop course in writing poetry, from inspiration to final draft. Students will practice both free and formal verse, while focusing on such topics as imagery, figurative language, symbol, diction, voice, sound, rhythm, and shape. Students will read poetry as writers read it, write and re-write their own poems, and discuss the poetry of classmates. As Dylan Thomas said, “I did not care what the words said, over much, nor what happened to Jack and Jill and the Mother Goose rest of them; I cared for the sound that their names, and the words describing their actions, made in my ears; I cared for the colours the words cast on my eyes . . . I fell in love – is the only expression I can think of – at once, and am still at the mercy of words . . .” This is a writing workshop; may be repeated for up to nine credits.

FACULTY BIOS Regina Robbins Flynn’s interests include the teaching of writing, especially creative non-fiction, travel writing and poetry. Her work experience prior to Salem State University, where she has taught for 25 years, included public relations and business. For eight years she was a member of the City Council in Salem. She coordinates the professional writing program in the English Department. She will teach ENG 822A Nonfiction Workshop in summer, 2019

Jeannette (Jan) M. Lindholm is Professor of English at Salem State and former coordinator of the university’s Mary G. Walsh Writing Center. Lindholm received her PhD in English Language and Literature from the University of Minnesota where she specialized in composition and rhetoric. She also holds degrees from Concordia College, Moorhead, MN (BA in English and German), Indiana University (MA in English Language and Literature), and Boston University School of Theology (MTS). Her research interests include: issues related to religion and rhetoric, genre theory, feminist rhetoric, and trauma theory’s relevance for writing in liturgical contexts. Lindholm has published widely as a writer of hymns and choral anthem texts. She will teach ENG 797 Feminist Rhetorical Theory and Criticism in spring 2019.

Rebecca Hallman Martini is assistant professor of English and the writing center coordinator at Salem State University. Her research and teaching interests include Writing Centers, WAC/WID, curriculum design, teaching multimodal/digital rhetoric, and qualitative method(ologies). Her scholarly work has appeared in Praxis: A Writing Center Journal, Computers and Composition, and Open Words: Access and English Studies. She recently delivered the keynote address at the 2017 South-Central Writing Center Association Conference in Edinburg, Texas and is currently working on a book project that is a critical ethnographic study of a writing center. She will teach ENG 871 Workshop in Academic Writing in winter, 2019, ENG 870 Writing Center Graduate Workshop in spring and fall, 2019, ENG 830 Digital Writing in summer 2019, and ENG 745 Introduction to Writing and Rhetoric in fall, 2019. Alexandria Peary is the author of five books, including Control Bird Alt Delete (Iowa Poetry Prize) and Prolific Moment: Theory and Practice of Mindfulness for Writing (Rutledge 2018). Her poems have appeared in the Yale Review, New American Writing, Boston Review, Painted Bridge Quarterly, Gettysburg Review, North American Review, jubilat, Fence, Crazyhorse, Volt, American Journal of Poetry, and Forklift, Ohio, among other places. More information about her work can be found at the Poetry foundation: poetryfoundation.org/poets/alexandria-peary. She will teach ENG 818 Poetry Workshop in Spring, 2019.

Roopika Risam was recently awarded an NEH grand with librarian Susan Edwards for “Networking the Regional Comprehensives,” developing a network of digital humanities practitioners of teachingintensive universities. She is the author of New Digital Worlds: Postcolonial Digital Humanities in Theory, Praxis, and Pedagogy (Northwestern University Press). She will teach ENG 715 Topics in Digital Studies: African Diaspora Digital Humanities in spring 2019 and ENG 713 Introduction to Digital Studies in summer 2019. Tanya K. Rodrigue is an associate professor of English and coordinator of the Writing Intensive Curriculum (WIC) program. She teaches courses in writing and the teaching of writing. Her academic interests include writing pedagogy, writing across the curriculum, multimodal and digital reading and writing, and sonic rhetoric. Tanya’s work has been published in several peer-reviewed journals including Computers and Composition; Kairos: A Journal of Rhetoric, Technology, and Pedagogy; Pedagogy: Critical Approaches to Teaching Literature, Language, Composition, and Culture; Across the Disciplines; Writing and Pedagogy; and Composition Forum. She is also a regular guest blogger for Bedford Bits, a blog on the teaching of writing. She will teach ENG 817 Contemporary Approaches to Composition in spring, 2019 and ENG 833 Topics in Writing: Visual Rhetoric in summer, 2019. Ann Taylor is professor of English at Salem State University. She has written two books on college prose writing, academic and free-lance essays, and a collection of personal essays, Watching Birds: Reflections on the Wing. Her first poetry book, The River Within, won first prize in the Cathlamet Poetry competition at Ravenna Press. A chapbook, Bound Each to Each, was published by Finishing Line Press. Her recent collection of poems on the twelfth century scholars and lovers, Heloise and Abelard, was published in the summer of 2018. She is now at work on a new collection, In the Writing Zone. She will teach ENG 818 Poetry Workshop in fall 2019. Keja Valens teaches and writes on literatures of the Americas, queer theory, critical race studies, postcolonial theory, and ecopoetics. Her newest co-edited volume is Querying Consent: Beyond Permission and Refusal (Rutgers UP, 2018). Her other recent books are Desire between Women in Caribbean Literature (PalgraveMacmillan, 2013) and the co-edited Barbara Johnson Reader (Duke UP, 2014). Keja Valens’s next book project is a study of cookbooks, national culture, and independence movements in the Caribbean. She received her PhD in Comparative Literature from Harvard University in 2004. She will teach ENG 725 Introduction to Graduate Study in Literature in fall 2019. Stephenie Young, interim director of the Salem State University Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies (September 2018-January 2019) and professor in the English department, joined the faculty of Salem State in the fall of 2008. She competed

her MA and PhD in comparative literature at the State University of New York, Binghamton, and earned her BA in art history from California State University, Long Beach. She has also studied the practice of photography. Her current book project, The Forensics of Memoiralization, is about the “forensic imagination” and how forensic materials have been used to develop visual narratives that shape the discourse of memory politics in post-conflict former Yugoslavia. She is also working on several other projects including a phot/text essay about architectural ruins and abandons spaces as nostalgic remains in post-Soviet Geogia and also a multimedia project with artist Vladimir Miladinovic about evidence and its absence at mass grave sites created during the 1990s wars in the Balkans that the national and local narratives that arise in the post-conflict era as a result. For more information about her activities, see her personal website, stephenieayoung.com. She will teach ENG 831AN Topics in American Literature and Criticism: Border Poetics in summer 2019 and ENG 787 Literature of Genocide in fall 2019. Jeff Theis specializes in early modern literature with an emphasis on ecocritical approaches to Shakespeare and Milton. His first book focused on English forests in early modern literature and culture. His current book project focuses on the interrelation between architecture, nature, and the concept of home in the time of Shakespeare. He will teach ENG 761 Shakespeare Teachers Workshop in summer 2019. Kevin Carey is the author of The One Fifteen to Penn Station (CavanKerry Press, 2012), The Beach People (2014), and Jesus Was Homeboy (CavanKerry Press, 2016). He is also a playwright and a filmmaker. His 2012 co-directed documentary film about New Jersey poet Maria Mazziotti Gillan is called All That Lies Between Us. He will teach ENG 820: Workshop in Fiction and Narrative Forms in Spring 2019 and ENG 833: Special Topics in Writing: Scriptwriting in Fall 2019.