Five teaching assistantships are available to 100% online learners to teach online sections of Composition (Eng 101) during the 2012-13 academic year. Preference will be given to applications postmarked by May 21, 2012. Applicants must complete and submit a cover sheet and application form in addition to the materials requested in the position description.
Money for these positions was provided through Strategic Priority Funding. Applicants must be 100% online learners, must have a master's degree, and must have experience teaching composition.
Dr. Anne O'Meara is the project coordinator and will supervise the teaching assistants. She and Dr. Roland Nord wrote the proposal for the project.
Although 100% online learners have served as graduate assistants in the English Department and in the Center for Excellence in Scholarship and Research, these will be the first 100% online learners to serve as teaching assistants at Minnesota State Mankato.
Congratulations to Sarah Johnson, winner of the Toy Wilson Blethen Fine Arts Award.
This award recognizes outstanding achievement in music, visual arts, creative writing, and theatre. Work meriting award consideration is judged to be at a level worthy of exposure in major regional concert halls, galleries, publications, and theatres.
The spring issue of Techniques was written, edited, and laid out by students in Dr. Tesdell's Technical Documentation, Policies, and Procedures (ENG 577) class.
An editorial committee solicited proposals from students in the synchronous and asynchronous classes, chose the proposals they thought were most relevant for their audience, communicated with authors of proposals, edited the articles, laid out the publication, then edited the assembled publication as a whole.
Fiction writer Danielle Evans and fiction/creative nonfiction writer Amy Bloom join the Good Thunder Reading Series on Thursday, April 12.
Evans is the author of the short story collection Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self. Her work has appeared in magazines including The Paris Review, A Public Space, Callaloo, and Phoebe, and has been anthologized in The Best American Short Stories 2008 and 2010, and in New Stories from the South.
Bloom is the author of two novels, three collections of short stories, and a nominee for both the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award. Her stories have appeared in Best American Short Stories, Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards, and numerous anthologies here and abroad. She has written for The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, The Atlantic Monthly, among many other publications, and has won a National Magazine Award.
A talk on craft will be at 3:00 p.m. in CSU Ostrander Auditorium followed by a reading at 7:30 p.m. in CSU Room 253.
Click here to learn more about Danielle Evans and Amy Bloom.
Dr. Gwen Westerman presentsDouglas R. Moore Lecture"Dena Uŋkiyepi (This is who we are): The Letters of Dakota People 1848-1864"
Dr. Gwen Westerman from the Minnesota State Mankato English Department gave the Douglas R. Moore lecture on Thursday, April 19, at 7 p.m. in the Centennial Student Union Ostrander Auditorium.
The annual Moore Lecture celebrates excellence in research at Minnesota State Mankato. This was the 38th such lectureship, and the 25th named in honor of former President Douglas R. Moore, who established the event to illuminate faculty research.
The lecture was streamed online and a recording will be available.
The MSU Department of English congratulates the following students for their excellence in the study of language, literature, writing, and/or English education.
The Jane F. Earley Award – Angela Zoller-Baker
The Harold Fitterer Award – Janelle Townley
The Marcia Thompson Award – Kelly Firkins
The Norman Adams Award – Charisse Danker
Film Studies Scholarship – William Pestka
The Raymond & Florence Sponberg Scholarship – Lindsy O'Brien
The 2011-2012 Outstanding English Graduate Student – Sarah Johnson
William A. Payne Memorial Endowment – Julianne Cooper
Youel II English Award – Maria Caridad Cruz Valadez
First Place – Samuel Watts
Second Place – Joshua Kuehn
Third Place – Alicia Armstrong
Honorable Mentions – Samuel Cook, Gabriel Wolfe, and Kayla Patterson
Open to graduates and undergraduates alike, the Robert Wright Awards competition is intended to spotlight and encourage the creative work of Minnesota State University students. Several previous winners have gone on to place book-length work with major publishers.
This year's awards were judged by Keith Ratzlaff. Mr. Ratzlaff's books of poetry are Man Under a Pear Tree, which won the 1996 Anhinga Prize for Poetry; Across The Known World; Dubious Angels: Poems after Paul Klee, based on the late drawings and paintings of Paul Klee; and most recently, Then, a Thousand Crows. He is Professor of English at Central College in Pella, Iowa.
First Place – Brett Biebel (fiction)
Second Place – Samantha Ten Eyck (poetry)
Third Place – Alicia Catt (creative nonfiction)
First Honorable Mention – Mary Eileen Sather (fiction)
Honorable Mention – Angela Mullen (poetry) & Nicholas Reller (fiction)
Undergraduates will have the opportunity to share their poems and stories on Tuesday, March 27, from 7:00 p.m to 9:00 p.m. in CSU 202.
All majors and minors are encouraged to attend. Those presenting will have seven minutes to read their work.
To learn more about Sigma Tau Delta please click here.
The More Than Writing Conference and Book Fair, now in its second year, will run from March 30-31 in the Centennial Student Union Ballroom. It is free and open to the public.
Participants can attend panels on topics such as: writing humor, screenwriting, writing and the visual arts, and more!
Dennis Cass will also be giving the keynote discussion looking back on the past 20 years he's spent writing and publishing as a literary agent, journalist, critic, author, and teacher. Cass is author of the book Head Case: How I Almost Lost My Mind Trying to Understand My Brain.
To learn more about the conference and for a schedule of events, please click here.
Press from last year's conference can be read here.
Kaitlyn Elizabeth Rygwall is the Sigma Tau Delta member of the month.
Kaitlyn is majoring in Communication Arts and Literature along with Dance Education. She plans on graduating in the spring 2014 with both education licenses, and am starting to think about grad school options.
Founded in 1922, Sigma Tau Delta has over 750 active chapters and functions at the international level, sponsoring publications, programs, and events of value to the profession and teaching of language and literature.
Learn more about Kaitlyn and Sigma Tau Delta here.
Caitlin O'Sullivan, William Trowbridge, and Sharon Olds will be in residence on Thursday, March 22. A talk on craft will be at 3:00 p.m. in the CSU's Ostrander Auditorium. The authors will read from their works at 7:30 p.m.. in CSU Room 253
Caitlin O'Sullivan is in her third year of the MFA program at Minnesota State University, Mankato. She received a BA in English at Ohio State University and is the founder and managing editor of The Postcard Press.
William Trowbridge's poems have appeared in more than 30 anthologies and textbooks and such periodicals as The Gettysburg Review, The Iowa Review, The Georgia Review, Poetry, Boulevard, and Green Mountains Review. Hispoetry collections are Ship of Fool, Enter Dark Stranger, O Paradise, Flickers, and The Complete Book of Kong.
Sharon Olds is the author of eight volumes of poetry. Her numerous honors include a National Endowment for the Arts grant; a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship; the San Francisco Poetry Center Award for her first collection, Satan Says; and the Lamont Poetry Selection and the National Book Critics' Circle Award for The Dead and the Living. She is a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Science. Sharon Olds' latest poetry collection is One Secret Thing.
Click here to learn more about the featured writers.
Sigma Tau Delta will welcome new members and officers on March 14, 2012. The ceremony will take place at 4:30 p.m. and the reception will take place at 5:30 p.m. Both will be held in CSU 284.
Founded in 1922, Sigma Tau Delta has over 750 active chapters and functions at the international level, sponsoring publications, programs, and events of value to the profession and teaching of language and literature.
To learn more about Sigma Tau Delta, please click here.
The English Department has added the Teaching of Writing Graduate Certificate to its offerings.
This certificate program is designed for current and prospective teachers in middle schools, high schools, and two- and four-year colleges. The aim of the program is to aid teachers in acquiring or expanding their expertise in teaching writing.
Highlights of the program include: a 100% online learning environment, knowledgeable faculty, and flexible program requirements.
To learn more, please click here.
Undergraduates will have the opportunity to share their poems and stories on Tuesday, February 28, from 7:00 p.m to 9:00 p.m. in CSU 201.
This $1000 tuition scholarship will be given to a continuing undergraduate English major/Film Studies minor.
The applicant will be evaluated on an application letter of interest that demonstrates the student's interest in English as a major, the value of a Film Studies minor, and how the combination of the two will be used in the applicant's future career. The applicant also must demonstrate financial need.
The application deadline for this scholarship is 4:30 p.m Friday, March 16, 2012.
Please click here for more information.
The submissions deadline for the Composition Merit Awards Journal (CMAJ) is March 2, 2012. The CMAJ is an online publication of student writing from English 100 and English 101 courses. Essays of all genres and styles are welcome, but only work that has been submitted for an English 100 or 101 class will be considered for the journal.
Each year, three students receive cash prizes; the award amounts are $200, $100, and $50 for first, second, and third place, respectively. Three additional students receive honorable mentions. All six winning essays are featured in the annual CMAJ.
To learn more about the CMAJ please click here. Please contact Sarah Johnson with any questions.
The Good Thunder Reading Series welcomes Samuel Ligon and Kristin Naca. They will be in residency from Tuesday, February 14th to Friday, February 17th.
Samuel Ligon is the author of Drift and Swerve, a collection of stories, and Safe in Heaven Dead, a novel. His stories have appeared in The Quarterly, Alaska Quarterly Review, StoryQuarterly, Noise: Fiction Inspired by Sonic Youth, Post Road, New England Review, Gulf Coast, Other Voices, and elsewhere.
Kristin Naca's first collection of poems, Bird Eating Bird, was selected for the National Poetry Series mtvU Prize in 2008 and appears with Harper Perennial. The collection was a finalist for the Audre Lorde Prize and Lambda Literary Award.At 10:00 a.m., from Tuesday to Friday, they will each offer a writing workshop; prose in CSU 202 and poetry in CSU 203.
At 10:00 a.m., from Tuesday to Friday, they will each offer a writing workshop; prose in CSU 202 and poetry in CSU 203.They will lead a discussion on the craft of writing 3:00 p.m. in Centennial Student Union Ostrander Auditorium. At 7:30 p.m., in CSU Room 253, they will read from their published work. All events are free and open to the public.
Join Professors Heather Camp and Jennifer Veltsos on Monday, February 6th for "Interviewing for Teaching Positions/Preparing Teaching Demonstrations".
This session offers tips on interviewing for teaching positions and on preparing for the “teaching demonstration” that occurs during the campus interview phase of the job search.
Undergraduates and graduate students are welcome!
This workshop will take place in AH 302 from 12:00 p.m. to 1:00 p.m.
Jenny Rodgers is the Sigma Tau Delta member of the month.
In addition to completing her undergraduate studies this year she is also planning on completing an ultra marathon!
Founded in 1922, Sigma Tau Delta has over 750 active chapters and functions at the international level, sponsoring publications, programs, and events of value to the profession and teaching of language and literature.
Learn more about Jenny and Sigma Tau Delta here.
The Good Thunder Reading Series welcomes nonfiction writer Bronson Lemer, poet Matt Mauch, and fiction writer Christine Stark.
Christine Stark is an award-winning writer and visual artist whose work has been published in numerous periodicals and anthologies, including: The Florida Review, Feminist Studies, Poetry Motel, Hawk and Handsaw, Birthed From Scorched, Hearts To Plead Our Own Cause, and Primavera. She is a co-editor of Not for Sale, an international anthology on sexual violence. She is a 2009 Pushcart Prize nominee in fiction and a 2010 Loft Mentorship winner. Stark teaches writing at Metropolitan State University.
Matt Mauch is the author of Prayer Book (Lowbrow Press 2011) and the chapbook The Book of Modern Prayer (Palimpsest Press). His poems have recently appeared or are forthcoming in Salt Hill, NOÖ Journal, DIAGRAM, The Journal, Willow Springs, The Squaw Valley Review, The Los Angeles Review, Sonora Review, and elsewhere. Mauch teaches writing and literature in the AFA program at Normandale Community College, and also coordinates the reading series there.
Bronson Lemer grew up in North Dakota and served for six years with the North Dakota Army National Guard that included deployments to Kosovo and Iraq. His essay “The Mustache Race” was published in the Random House anthology Twentysomething Essays by Twentysomething Writers, and his essay “Olympic Hopefuls” received honorable mention in the Association of Writers and Writing Program’s 2007 Intro Project.
At 10:00 a.m. they will meet with the local writing community for Q & A in CSU 238. At 3:00 p.m. in the Centennial Student Union Ostrander Auditorium, they will lead a discussion on the craft of writing. At 7:30 p.m. in CSU Room 253, they willread from their work. All events are free and open to the public.
Join hosts Benjamin Allocco, Amy Fladeboe, and Josh Kohman every Thursday at 10:30am for the Weekly Reader on KMSU 89.7 "The Mav".
The Weekly Reader showcases readings and discussions on craft with authors from the local, state, and occasionally national levels. Writing genres typically discussed include (but are not limited to)- fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, journalism, screenwriting, songwriting, comedy writing, and more. Tune in and discover the writing talent and creative ideas flowing from people all around us.
Podcasts from prior shows are available on the KMSU Weekly Reader website and on iTunes .
You can also stay current with the latest information on the Weekly Reader Facebook page.
April 12 Good Thunder Reading Series Talk on Craft-CSU Ostrander Auditorium- 3:00 p.m.
Reading-CSU Room 253-7:00 p.m.
Amy Bloom Fiction
Danielle Evans Fiction
