Trecia Pottinger received PhD

Trecia Pottinger has received her PhD with her dissertation entitled, "Black Suburbanization on Philadelphia's Main Line, 1894-1975." Katherine Solomonson, adviser.

A.J Lewis received PhD

A.J. Lewis has received his PhD with his dissertation entitled, "The Falling Dream: Unreason and Enchantment in the Gay Liberation."  Rod Ferguson, Reg Kunzel, advisers.

Fall Grant Writing Workshops

Each fall, we host a series of grant writing workshops to help improve our students access to funding and to familiarize you with the grant writing process. These workshops are mandatory for first year students in American Studies, but open to any other grad students in the American Studies department who would like to participate. They serve as a great refresher if you are applying to the Ford Foundation Fellowships or the IDF in early November. This year the workshops will be held on Friday, October 2nd (time and location TBA) and Monday, October 19th (3:30-5:30pm, location TBA). Please note them on your calendar and an agenda for the workshops will be sent closer to the dates.

 

During the first meeting, we will go over the various types of fellowships, grants, and funds available nationwide and at the University of Minnesota. We will also talk about what a successful grant proposal looks like. We will also be reading and commenting on proposals on proposals on October 2. Prior to the first meeting, I ask that you put together a draft of a grant application. You are required to bring a draft of a grant application statement with you to the first meeting. I will be giving you individual feedback on your proposals. To do so, I need you to send me a copy of your proposals by September 10, 2015. 
If you have any questions about the workshop please contact Bianet Castellanos, mbc@umn.edu

 

Spring 2015 Prelim Exams Milestones

THE FOLLOWING STUDENTS have passed their preliminary portfolio & oral exams and have attained doctoral candidacy:  Amber Annis, Sarah Atwood-Hoffman, and Kong Pha.

Michigan Societ of Fellows Post-Doc Fellowships

THE MICHIGAN SOCIETY OF FELLOWS has 3-year fellowships in the Humanities, Arts, Sciences, and Professions for 2016-2019. The fellowships are held at the University of Michigan with an annual stipend of $55,000. Applications are due on September 29^th, 2015. 

The Michigan Society of Fellows was founded in 1970 through grants from the Ford Foundation and Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studies for the purpose of promoting academic and creative excellence in the humanities, the arts, the social, physical, and life sciences, and in the professions. In 2007, the Mellon Foundation awarded a grant to add Mellon Fellows in the humanities.  The objective of the Society is to provide financial and intellectual support for individuals holding advanced degrees in their fields, who are selected for their outstanding achievement, professional promise, and interdisciplinary interests. We invite applications from qualified candidates for three-year fellowships at the University of Michigan.

Candidates should be near the beginning of their professional careers.  Those selected for fellowships must have received the Ph.D. degree or comparable artistic or professional degree between June 1, 2013, and September 1, 2016.  Fellows are appointed as Assistant Professors in appropriate departments and as Postdoctoral Scholars in the Michigan Society of Fellows. They are expected to be in residence in Ann Arbor during the academic years of the fellowship, to teach for the equivalent of one academic year, to participate in the informal intellectual life of the Society, and to devote time to their independent research or artistic projects.  This is not an artist-in-residence program but rather an opportunity to develop one’s work in conversation with fellows from a range of disciplines during the three years of the fellowship. Applications from degree candidates and recipients of the Ph.D. or comparable artistic or professional degree from the University of Michigan will not be considered.

Applications will be reviewed by Society members and University faculty.  Final selections will be made in late January by Senior Fellows of the Society.  Fellows will be selected for three-year terms to begin September 1, 2016.  The annual stipend will be $55,000.

The online application is available at: http://societyoffellows.umich.edu

email:  society.of.fellows@umich.edu

Waleed Mahdi accepts position at George Mason

WALEED MAHDI, American Studies PhD Candidate, has accepted a one-year full-time position as a term assistant professor of Arabic at George Mason University in Fairfax Virginia.

TA Position in Art History

ART HISTORY is seeking a graduate student to serve as a TA for ARTH 3929 – Cinema Now. This is a 25% Teaching Assistantship (10 hours/week). TAs will receive a base salary of $19.70 an hour. The class meets twice a week on Mondays and Wednesdays from 2:30-5:00 pm.This would be an especially good position for an advanced graduate student who is already beyond their guaranteed funding.Please contact Erik Farseth at: farse003@umn.edu if you are interested in applying for this position.

Library Copyright Workshop

FALL INSTRUCTORS, University Libraries offers a variety of workshops to help you navigate many issues around teaching. In particular they are offering an hour-long workshop on copyrights and fair use. Click here to learn more about the course, register, and see other workshops they provide.

CFP: Inter-American Studies Conference, UC Santa Barbara

THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION of INTER-AMERICAN STUDIES is pleased to announce their call for papers for their Biennial Conference at UC Santa Barbara (Oct. 4^th-6^th, 2016). The conference is titled Human Rights in the Americas and submissions are due December 15^th. Click here for more information.

UofDelaware American Material Culture Studies Positions

THE UNIVERSITY OF DELAWARE is pleased to announce multiple tenure-track assistant or associate professor positions in American Material Culture Studies for the 2016-17 school year. Click here to learn more about the positions and to apply.

CFP: UC English Graduate Conference

UNIVERSITY of CHICAO’S English Graduate Conference, Words Unofficial: Gossip, Circulation, and Mediation, is still accepting papers for their conference on November 19^th and 20^th, 2015. Abstracts are due August 15^th. See below for more information.

University of Chicago English Graduate Conference

November 19-20, 2015

Keynote Speaker: Prof. Susan Phillips, Northwestern University

Associate Professor of English and Alumnae of Northwestern Teaching Professor

Faculty Roundtable:

Prof. Natasha Barnes, University of Illinois at Chicago

Associate Professor of African American Studies and English

Prof. Peter Coviello, University of Illinois at Chicago

Professor of English

Prof. Patrick Jagoda, University of Chicago

Assistant Professor of English

Prof. Lynn Spigel, Northwestern University

Frances Willard Professor of Screen Cultures

Moderator: Prof. Julie Orlemanski, University of Chicago

Assistant Professor of English

From Chaucer's House of Fame to Gossip Girl, the distortive 

power of rumor and gossip has long generated both fascination and anxiety across media, genres, and periods. In the digital age, unofficial discourse has acquired the potential for frenzied transmission, often substantiating established fears surrounding the nebulous nature of the intermediary. The fascination and paranoia attached to the spread and (mis)handling of information speaks to a deeply-rooted unease around origins, third-parties, and modes of exchange. To label gossip as solely nefarious, however, ignores its positive manifestations as participatory, subversive, and empowering, as well as its potential role in anti-hegemonic discourse or storytelling.

The University of Chicago Department of English Language and Literature seeks proposals for its 2015 Graduate Conference, “Words Unofficial: Gossip, Circulation, Mediation.” This conference will explore how various forms and modes, both literary and otherwise, have 

treated information misplaced and in motion. We are interested in fostering a cross-disciplinary and cross-temporal conversation, reflecting on various interpretations of unrecognized or cryptic modes of communication.

 

We invite papers including but not limited to the following:

• Chatter, babble, and nonsense
• Oral tradition
• Authorship, authority, and ownership
• Editorial intervention and print culture
• Misprints, typos, and misinterpretations
• Translation and intertextuality
• Spaces/structures of transmission
• Social media and global consciousness
• Tabloids, scandal, and celebrity culture
• Privacy and publicity
• Libel and slander
• Surveillance and ethics
• Social network theory

We welcome scholars from a variety of disciplines. Please submit an abstract of 200—250 words to words.unofficial.uchicago@gmail.com by August 15, 2015.

Young Scholars Showcase

AFRICAN AMERICAN & AFRICAN STUDIES is cosponsoring the Young Scholars Showcase which highlights 8 youth/young scholars of African descent. The event will take place Saturday, August 15^th from 11:00am – 1:00pm at the Eastside Freedom Library (1105 Greenbrier Street) in Saint Paul.

CFP Critical Ethnic Studies Association Journal

CRITICAL ETHNIC STUDIES ASSOCIATION has put out a call for papers for their upcoming special issue titled “What Justice Wants.” Submissions are due on September 30^th, 2015. See below to find out more about the issue, submission guidelines, and to apply. 

[Subject] CFP - Critical Ethnic Studies Journal Special Issue, "What
Justice Wants," due 9/30!

What Justice Wants -- CESA Journal Special Issue!

This special issue will bring together compelling discussions of
corresponding and sometimes competing definitions of justice in
critical ethnic studies. Each paper will respond to a set of questions
designed to reveal the salient points of convergence and difference
between intellectual/political traditions and approaches (e.g.
Indigenous sovereignty, Black radical traditions, queer of color
critique, Native feminisms, third world feminisms, Afropessimism,
disability/crip studies, trans* and multigender theories, border and
migration studies, critical refugee studies).

The submission deadline for this Fall 2016 special issue is September 30, 2015.
Please email submissions and inquiries to justice@criticalethnicstudies.org

This Special Issue's Co-Editors are: Eve Tuck and K. Wayne Yang.

______________________________

Special Issue Details
Perhaps because it is a term not always treated with respect in the
academy, “justice” is used frequently but rarely defined. Much goes
unsaid about what is meant by justice, but when considered from the
perspectives of different communities and their concerns, justice
takes on varying and sometimes contradictory meanings. Justice for one
group may mean greater integration and mobility within a nation-state
whereas for another group that definition may be regarded as
problematic.
This special issue considers possibilities for contingent
collaborations and highlights important departures which emerge when
we theorize deeply what justice wants. Authors will consider the
imperatives and aims of justice by attending to the roots of
injustice, the contours of theory and knowing, and pathways to justice
within their intellectual traditions.
Prior to publication, authors will share abstracts/outlines and be
encouraged to identify points of saliency and divergence in ideas and
aims. Questions pertaining to the roles of the state, citizenship,
representation, voice, sovereignty, recognition, reconciliation, and
futurity might thread through each of the papers, as authors theorize
what justice wants.
Consider the following questions (but please don’t necessarily use
them to organize your paper)
1. Please say a few words about the intellectual/political
tradition/approach that you will engage in the paper. Of course, you
are invited to address one or several.
2. (Considering the history and radical futurities of these
intellectual traditions) What does justice want? What are the
imperatives and aims of justice?
3. What are the roots of injustice?
4. What contours of theory and knowing are relevant?
5. What are the salient pathways to justice?
6. What are the roles of (select whichever apply/appeal) the state,
citizenship, representation, voice, sovereignty, recognition,
reconciliation, theories of the future?
7. What are some of the incommensurabilities between these desires of
justice, and the desires of justice from other standpoints,
traditions/approaches?
8. What questions do you have for other authors who will write for
this special issue?

 

______________________________

 

Essay Submission Guidelines
Essays (between 6,000 and 10,000 words) should be prepared according
to the most recent edition of the Chicago Manual of Style using
endnotes and submitted electronically to justice@criticalethnicstudies.org.
Author’s names should not appear on manuscripts. Instead, please
include a separate document with the author’s name, email, work
address, the title of the article, and abstract (150 words) with your
electronic submission. Authors should eliminate any self-identifying
information (such as notes or credits). References to the author’s
work should be in third person.

 

KSU Visiting Instructor in American Ethnic Studies

KANSAS STATE UNIVERSITY is pleased to announce they are accepting applications for a visiting instructor in American Ethnic Studies with an emphasis in African American, and/or American Indian and/or Indigenous Chican@ Studies. Click here for more information and to apply.