In this Issue
Chairs'
Messages
50th
Anniversary
Kick-Off
Project
Profile:
Dr.
Diane
Jakacki's
PhD
Project
Faculty
Profile:
Professor
Neil
Randall
Chairs' Messages
50 Years Ahead: English at Waterloo - Fraser Easton
Research and teaching in English Language and Literature is now 50 years old at Waterloo. It is astonishing to think how far the Department has traveled since it started as part of an upstart regional university in the 1960s. As the distinguished Miltonist Gordon Campbell, this year's Arts in Academics award winner in English, observed at the Department's 50th anniversary BBQ in September: given that thousands of universities were founded in the 1950s and 1960s worldwide, why is it the case that Waterloo, of all of them, is now knocking on the door of the top 100 in the world? (That's top 100 out of about 20,000 total today.)
Perhaps one answer lies with the larger University of Waterloo embrace of innovation, something that the current push into digital media in English reflects. But what I personally learned at our fall gathering was just how much this embrace of innovation is a part of the Department's history. It precedes our new digital MA, it precedes our unique PhD, and it precedes our BA in rhetoric and professional writing and our MA in rhetoric and communication design. Some date it to the time when English decided in the 1970s to embrace UW's Co-op system. As one retiree tells it, this innovation was a huge plus for English students, particularly for the women in that era just looking to enter the workforce in large numbers. And Co-op has attracted many talented students since, as George Elliot Clarke, a Governor General's Award winner for poetry, and Scott Wahl, a Vice President at Research in Motion, are happy to attest.
Congratulations to Shelley Hulan and her team for launching our anniversary year with such verve. With almost 150 attendees, the BBQ was a great success, bringing together current faculty with retirees (including Walter Martin, who arrived at UW in 1962), alumni from across the years, and special alumni guests such as George Elliott Clarke and Gordon Campbell. Among the amusing thoughts that some of the 1960s graduates shared was that they left a campus full of muddy construction over 40 years ago, only to return to the same thing in 2010.
There are many upcoming events to celebrate this anniversary year, as well as a website, Facebook page, and Twitter feed. I hope to see many more alumni in person over the course of the year, as well as to read your profiles on our 50th anniversary website.
Finally,
a
word
about
our
colleagues:
this
year
English
welcomes
two
new
faculty
members:
Winfried
Siemerling,
a
specialist
in
Canadian
literature
in
a
North
American
context,
and
Jay
Dolmage,
a
specialist
in
rhetoric,
composition,
and
disability
studies.
We
also
welcome
two
new
staff
members:
Jennifer
Crane
in
our
undergraduate
office,
and
Fiona
McAllister
in
our
graduate
office.
Welcome
all!
What's New at St. Jerome's - Norm Klassen
Carol Acton and Stan have recently returned to the classroom after useful sabbaticals. Carol pursued a research agenda that includes representations of trauma by medical personnel working in war zones, while Stan lectured on postmodernism in Venezuela. At present Ted McGee and Tristanne Connolly are busy with full-year sabbatical projects of their own, while Lindy Ledohowski is on leave to develop several book projects related to English language Ukranian writing. Veronica Austen, a recent graduate from the doctoral program at the University of Waterloo, has ably stepped in as our interim Canadianist. She has poured her abundant energy into the St Jerome’s Reading Series, which I’m happy to report boasts another full slate of excellent readers this year, beginning with Richard Cumin on Thursday 14 October, 4:30 pm and including Kathleen Winter, longlisted for this year’s Scotiabank Giller Prize for her novel Annabel (2010). Why not check out the full line-up by clicking here (the Reading Series website) or here (the Reading Series blog)? With a palpable excitement in our classrooms, engaging work being done by the members of the department at the various stages of their academic careers, and the ongoing stimulation of The New Quarterly and the Reading Series, the study of English at St Jerome’s continues to be lively.
50th Anniversary Kick-Off - Shelley Hulan
A heartfelt thank you goes out to everyone who attended the Department’s barbecue on September 17th, which was an enormous success. The barbecue kicked off a year of celebrations marking our Fiftieth Anniversary at the University of Waterloo. The day began very cold, but as the afternoon approached, the sun broke out, and the gathering was held outdoors next to Hagey Hall as planned. More than 140 people, approximately 100 of them alumni and retired faculty, attended the event. Many others who no longer live in Ontario responded to our telephone and email invitations with regrets that they would be unable to attend but we hoped the Department would hold more of these get-togethers in the future. Attendees ranged from current undergraduate and graduate students to grads of ’67, of the first Rhetoric and Professional Writing cohort in 1984, and some of the very first hires ever to teach in the English Department. Professor Gordon Campbell (BA ’67 Leicester), recipient of the 2010 Achievement in Academics Award, spoke to the assembled crowd. After the barbecue, distinguished alumnus and poet Dr. George Elliott Clarke read from his new book of poems.
From left to right: John Ryrie, Judi Jewinski, Gordon Campbell, George Elliott Clarke, Warren Ober.
To browse photos of the event please visit the Fiftieth Anniversary website.
Project Profile - Dr. Diane Jakacki's PhD Dissertation
Diane is also interested in multimedia theory and design, and the challenges inherent in adopting humanities computing methods for pedagogy and research projects. She has recently published an article in Early Theatre about The Spanish Tragedy, and co-authored a chapter in Digitizing Medieval and Early Modern Culture with Professor Christine McWebb (of UW's French department) on developing digital research tools for the Roman de la rose. She is currently at work on an edition of the Tudor interlude The Play of Wit & Science, which is scheduled for publication in Spring 2011.
In August Diane drove south from Waterloo to begin a Marion L. Brittain postdoctoral fellowship in digital pedagogy at Georgia Tech. The fellowship requires that she teach three sections of first-year composition each term while engaging in a rigorous program of seminars in pedagogy, research and professionalization with a cohort of seventeen other fellows hailing from postgraduate institutions throughout North America. This term her courses involve the theme “The Cult(ure) of Celebrity: Developing a Discourse”; using multimodal artifacts available in real time, she is encouraging her students to become more discerning critics of the sometimes overwhelming stream of information and entertainment to which we are subjected.
Faculty Profile - Neil Randall
I started off teaching first-year essay writing, Canadian Literature, and one of my long-running favourites, Forms of Fantasy. In a year, I would make contact with the fantasy author Guy Gavriel Kay, then with only one novel to his publication credit, and begin the equally long-running trend of inviting him to my classes to talk to my students – it was inspiring (for both me and the students), and that experience to start inviting many other people to speak with my students: novelists, poets, musicians, and (increasingly over the years) people who had jobs to offer. Sometimes those were great classes, sometimes simply chaotic, but it’s one of two elements of my teaching that I wouldn’t change if given a do-over. The other is that nobody has ever seemed afraid in my classes to jump into the discussions, change the topics to suit current interests, and offer strongly held and forcefully articulated positions. When my classes fail, it’s usually because I haven’t done what it takes to generate that crucial give-and-take.
For my students today, much has changed. I’m part of a group of people in the department committed to researching and teaching digital media in its many guises, and that means a classroom with lots of computers, lots of advanced software, and lots of new teaching challenges. For students, it means largely project-driven courses, and some of these projects have true real-world implications. My role is less to teach than to provide the environment in which these projects can created and critiqued, and to provide contacts with the experience to help students figure out the best ways to do what they’re trying to do. But then, that’s not different at all, come to think of it. The phrase we’ve longed used here is theorized practices, and while theories changes, practices change, and the tools that go with them change, the idea remains a good, solid basis for a continually evolving set of programs. And one – I have to say – that I’m continually honoured to be part of.
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