The YAWP: Villanova's Graduate English Program Blog

The Summer Research Grant is a wonderful opportunity for those of you hoping to work on a scholarly project over the summer. The grant funds could support: travel to archives; cover expenses associated with research projects; or simply allow you to reduce your summer work hours, giving you time to focus on your project. If you have a scholarly project for which you would like summer support, please discuss this with a faculty member in your program who will be willing to formally sponsor your effort. For details regarding eligibility requirements, application procedures, and the required cover page to be appended to any submitted proposals, please visit the “ Graduate Student Summer Research Fellowship ” found on the Graduate Studies website. The deadline for applications is Monday, January 21, 2013.

Katie has been enjoying her position as a professional tutor at Bergen Community College. Having been a Villanova Writing Center tutor, she has noticed several different challenges at Bergen's writing center than at Villanova's, but the work has been rewarding and enjoyable in its own way.

Come on up to the 4th floor of SAC to enjoy the festive holiday decorations in the English Department office!

The Villanova University-Abbey Theatre Exchange program was established in 2011, linking the University’s College of Liberal Arts and Sciences with the prestigious national theater of Ireland. As a development of this historic intellectual and artistic partnership, Villanova has announced an “Abbey Theatre Internship Grant,” which will provide a University student with the funding to travel abroad and work for the Abbey Theatre for eight weeks during the summer of 2013. In addition to bringing the finest Irish theatre practitioners to Villanova, the exchange program now provides a grant for a Villanova student to intern at the Abbey Theatre during their prominent summer season. The University’s exchange program with the Abbey Theatre has created a bridge between the renowned Irish institution and Villanova’s Irish Studies Program and Theater Department in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. The collaboration brings some of Ireland’s preeminent theatre practitioners to the Unive...

Students gathered at our annual Ph.D. forum to share some pizza and learn about the Ph.D. experience. Speakers were: Ted Howell, who completed the program several years ago and is now a Ph.D. candidate in Temple's English department; Dr. Travis Foster, who recently received his Ph.D. in English from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a specialization in American literature and joined our faculty this year; and Dr. Brooke Hunter, who recently received her Ph.D. in English from the University of Texas at Austin with a specialization in medieval literature and also joined our faculty this year. Each speaker briefly shared their perspectives on the pros and cons of pursuing a Ph.D. in English and their experiences in their programs. They also discussed strategies for choosing programs and optimizing the Ph.D. application. It was a great time for everyone. Keep your eye out for the forum next year!

Hello, my name is Mary Beth Harris, I graduated from the Villanova Masters Program in English Literature in 2011, I am currently pursuing my PhD at Purdue University, and I am a bad listener. As an M.A. student with PhD aspirations, I received a lot of good, thoughtful advice during my time at Villanova. Some of this was hard to hear because it felt like everyone was telling me what a bad idea getting a PhD was. I heard how difficult and competitive doctoral work is, how the job market is an evil no-man’s land designed by the devil himself to crush all hopes and dreams, how tenure is going the way of the dinosaurs, and how even if you are one of the lucky few to get a job that job will only continue to grind your soul into dust. Let me be clear, I am not dismissing the earnestness of this advice, nor the caring spirit in which it was offered. Moving on in graduate school is a risk, and if you want to take it seriously you need to be fully aware of these risks. More importantly, once I ...

Back on campus after a few rough days of hurricane weather, Dr. Thomas' 19th Century British Literature class is excited to get back to discussing Dickens' Hard Times .

The MLA Committee on the Status of Graduate Students in the Profession has a  website  that has much useful information for graduate students in English, including reports and studies on job placement and prospects, and a list of institutions that grant the Ph.D. in English.

Lydia's essay, "Charles Williams's Anti-Modernist Descent Into Hell" was just published in  Mythlore , 31.1/2 (Fall/Winter 2012).

Classmates Samantha (left) and Caitlin chat about Moby Dick before Monday night's Melville and Alcott class!

Two of our favorite program events are coming up in just a few months! Be sure to add these to your calendars, because you don't want to miss out: On Thursday, November 15th at 7:30 p.m. in SAC 300 , we are hosting our our annual Ph.D. forum . This event includes brief presentations by two of our faculty members who have recently received their Ph.D.'s along with one of our recent alums who is now in a Ph.D. program. As a group, we will discuss the pros and cons of pursuing the Ph.D., how to decide what programs might be right for you, how to craft your applications and personal statements, and what life is like in Ph.D. programs. There will be lots of time for Q-and-A. This event is open to all students in the program, including first-year students. Pizza will be provided. On Thursday, November 29th at 7:30 p.m . in SAC 300 , we are hosting our annual Thesis and Field Exam workshop . This event is designed to get you geared up for your thesis and field exam work. ...

Aiden James Kosciesza  is now Coordinator of Program Assessment and Evaluation at  Harcum College

The annual Kephart lecture in the History department will be given by Greg Grandin this year and is titled “Fast Fish, Loose Fish: Freedom and Slavery in Herman Melville’s America.” Prof. Grandin will look at the 1804 slave ship uprising that became the inspiration for Melville’s novella “Benito Cereno.” The lecture is Tuesday, Oct. 2,at 7 p.m. in the Villanova Room of the Connelly Center, and those who will attend should register. Students, faculty, and other guests can do so online here . Greg Grandin is the author of a number of prize-winning books, including most recently Fordlandia: The Rise and Fall of Henry Ford’s Forgotten Jungle City (Metropolitan 2009). A finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in History, as well as for the National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award, Fordlandia was picked by the New York Times, New Yorker, Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune and NPR for their “best of” lists, and Amazon.com named it the best history book of 2009.

Congratulations to Joseph Hoffman for receiving the Graduate Studies Service Award for his work as co-editor of the Graduate student journal CONCEPT! We add our thanks to that of Dean Adele Lindenmeyr for Joseph's contributions to the intellectual community here at Villanova. Click here to view CONCEPT's website.

Congratulations to Joseph Hoffman for receiving the Graduate Studies Service Award for his work as co-editor of the Graduate student journal CONCEPT! We add our thanks to that of Dean Adele Lindenmeyr for Joseph's contributions to the intellectual community here at Villanova. Click here  to view CONCEPT's website.

George presented his paper entitled "Toy Guns: Agency, Performativity and Resignation in Pádraic Ó Conaire’s  Exile " at Notre Dame's Hybrid Irelands Conference on Friday, March 30, 2012.

Cynthia presented at the spring conference on Critical Theory, “Principles of Uncertainty,” at the CUNY Graduate Center. Her panel was labeled "Shifty Subjectivities: Race, Gender, and Contingent Imagery in Popular Culture" and consisted of three interlocking papers that explore the uncertainty created/perpetuated within 21st century popular culture, discussing the ways in which intersectional identities are constructed and informed by/through ideology, culture, and power. Her paper entitled “Cultural Miscegenation in Mansbach’s Angry Black White Boy” focused on Adam Mansbach’s protagonist, Macon Detornay, as a white boy who authentically reflects and refracts his abiding identification with Hip Hop Culture. One result of his embrace of Hip Hop culture is Macon’s ultra-identification with blackness, uncertainly construed in a world where even in his most earnest desires to deconstruct whiteness, it is black identity that is repeatedly over-determined. Hip Hop culture presents...

Karen presented a paper entitled " 'A Bomb in Gilead': Biblical Subversion in Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale" at this year's Elizabeth Cady Stanton Conference.

Ben recently traveled to  Manchester, UK to present his paper entitled "Between Critics: Dorian Gray and the Phallosocial Intellect" at the University of Salford's "Extremity and Excess" Graduate Conference.

Congratulations to Grace Oh, Alexandra Edwards, and Afton Woodward for their recent publications in Concept, Villanova's graduate journal! Grace's essay, entitled "The Reconstitution of Sisterhood in Augusta Webster's 'A Castaway,'" was published in both the printed and on-line forms of the journal.   Alex's essay "'Proper for a Lady's Brush': The Visual Arts in the Work of Louisa May Alcott," and Afton's essay, "'His Blood is Infected': Transmission of Disease and Wealth in Dickens's Bleak House," are both in the online version.

Ryan presented at three conferences this semester: Oklahoma State University's Frontiers and Borders Conference in Stillwater, OK; The 15th Annual Conference for the Association of the Study of Law, Culture, and the Humanities in Ft. Worth, TX; and The National Popular Culture & American Culture Association's National Conference in Boston, MA. He also has two forthcoming publications: "Effaced and Eroticized: Revealing and Refiguring Child Witnesses" will appear in the Fall 2012 issue of  Law and Literature  (Vol. 24, Issue 3), published for Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University, by the University of California Press. "Ishmael's Impersonal Narration: Queer Style in  Moby-Dick " is forthcoming in Jan Van Eyck Akademie's  Issues in Contemporary Culture and Aesthetics .

Rebecca presented her paper entitled “Castles and chimeras” in the New World: Creating the American Gothic in  Edgar Huntly " at the April 2012  Shifting Tides, Anxious Borders,  Binghamton University's annual graduate student conference in Transnational American Studies.

Rebecca Wilson and Kathleen Hynes, along with professional tutor and Villanova alum Juliana Morro, facilitated a round-table discussion entitled: "After Hours: How Special Events Extend Writing Centers’ Reach" at the 23rd Conference of the Mid-Atlantic Writing Centers Association (MAWCA) in March 2012.

Check out Marc Schuster's new novel,  The Grievers.  Schuster's second novel is a darkly comic coming of age story, in which a Charley Schwartz tries to help his  alma mater  plan a memorial service for a deceased high school buddy who committed suicide. Amid various problems that arise from the school, his friends, and the planning process, Schwartz attempts to set his world right and keep everything from unraveling.   The Grievers  is   available now on your Nook and Kindle and will be in print this May from The Permanent Press.

The third annual Thesis/Field Examination Symposium will take place on Saturday, April 14th, from 10:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. in the Devon Room in the Connelly Center . This event is an opportunity for students who are completing the program to present to each other their research, while also giving first-year students a sense of the  projects that are undertaken as master's theses and field examinations. We hope to have two consecutive one-hour sessions, in which students offer ten-minute presentations of their research. The event is structured so there is plenty of time for comments and questions by audience members and other presenters. Copious amounts of delicious gourmet coffee will be served before and during the event, and after the second session, there will be a catered lunch. Please email Dr. Hicks if you would like to present your research at this event, or if you would like to attend as an audience member. Please RSVP by Monday, March 26th.

Mark your calendars for the 2012 Luckow Graduate Alumni Event on Monday, March 26th at 7:30 in SAC 300! The Graduate English Program and the Luckow Endowed Chair of English will present a panel of three of our recent graduate English alumni, who will discuss academic career options for those with an M.A. in English who choose not to pursue a Ph.D. The three panelists are: Jana Llewellyn '06, who will discuss her experiences teaching at both community college and a local private high school; Jamie Berg '09, who will discuss her work for the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, where she began as Assistant to the Senior Vice Presidents and was recently promoted to Budget Officer; and Kelly Vass '11, who works as an academic advisor at Drexel. This event is intended to give you many perspectives on ways to capitalize on your degree in the job market. Each panelist will give a brief presentation on their work and how their master's degree has contributed to their career path, an...

The IRISH SEMINAR 2012: Contemporary Irish Theatre June 11 – June 29, 2012 The 2012 University of Notre Dame IRISH SEMINAR convenes a sterling cast of international experts, scholars and practitioners to explore contemporary Irish dramatic and theatrical landscapes and discern current patterns of dramaturgy in culturally and theatrically significant plays written in and about Ireland since 1980. This three-week series of presentations, seminars and workshops offers participants an opportunity to partake in seminars, lectures and workshops at the world famous Abbey Theatre with world renowned academics, scholars, directors, actors, critics and reviewers. Among the topics to be discussed are: patterns of history and memory, use of meta-theatre, the enabling and disabling uses of myth, and the role of narrative and monologue in contemporary Irish theatre. Click here to view the Seminar website for more information on admission, accommodations and fellowships. The deadline fo...

Dr. Gavin Wilk, a former Villanova student, will be on campus on February 20th to deliver a talk entitled “Resolute revolutionaries: Joseph McGarrity and the militant Irish republican networks in the United States, 1922-1940.” He has just completed a Ph.D. in history and used the Villanova Special Collections for his dissertation. Dr. Wilk will discuss Joseph McGarrity's leadership of the US-based republican organization, Clan na Gael, the local and national organizational structure of the Clan in Philadelphia and the U.S. He will explore McGarrity’s strong ties with Irish Republican Army veterans who had emigrated to the US after the Irish Civil War, and will include stories of leading Irish republicans in Philadelphia and New York. In addition, the discussion with detail McGarrity's involvement with the Irish Hospitals Sweepstake as well as his major role in an IRA bombing campaign in England during 1939. Dr, Wilk will also describe the resources used for his research...

If you are interested in  films, books, music, television and games, check out this new user-generated review site, 21words . Three English Literature research students at the University of Sheffield have recently established the site and are encouraging budding writers to post their creative insights into a chosen genre within a strict word limit. Click here to view the site.

Mark your calendars for this spring's career fairs! Arts and Business will be on Tuesday, February 7th in the  Villanova Room from 1-5 p.m . Science, Engineering and Technology will be Wednesday, February 8th in the Villanova Room from 1-5 p.m. This year’s fair is drawing employers in record numbers (70+ for Arts and Business, 40+ for Science, Engineering and Technology), all of whom will be in attendance to speak with students about opportunities at their organizations. Click here to see the list of attending employers Both career fairs are open to ALL MAJORS and CLASS YEARS, so if you are looking for an internship, full time job, or just want to connect with employers – you should not miss it!

Award winning poet CD Wright will be on campus this Thursday, February 2nd to kick off Villanova's 14th annual Literary Festival. Wright's reading is free and open to the public and will begin at 7 p.m. in the Connelly Center Cinema. A reception and book signing will follow. We hope to see you there! Click here for more information on the 14th Annual Villanova Literary Festival.

Don't forget to RSVP by January 25 for the Graduate Student Council's Winter Social. This year's event will take place at 8 pm in the East Lounge, Dougherty Hall . All graduate students over 21 are invited and may bring a guest (also over 21). Be sure to bring your wildcard for admission. Drinks, light snacks, and music provided. Click here to view the flyer