Newsletter, 15 April 2005
- Faculty News
- GARNETT COHEN
- Garnett has been invited to conduct a workshop on "Shifting genres" at Northwestern University 2005 Summer Writer's Conference, and to give a reading at the Author's Sala in San Miguel Allende in July. Her short story that appeared in the Blue Earth Review won second place in their Flash Fiction Contest. She also organized a panel, "The Examined Life: Reading and Writing Personal History and Memoir," which has been accepted for the MMLA in November. Her own paper presentation will be "Writing the Places We've Left Behind." ROSE BLOUIN, MARK WITHROW, and TOM NOWROCKI will also present papers on the panel.
- AMY HAWKINS
- This past Friday, Amy presented at the MELUS Conference. She delivered a piece called, "And to think I once lived near Middlesex Street..." as a part of the queer caucus and roundtable discussion: What a Difference a Queer Makes: Post-Identity Pedagogy and Ethic Studies. Also, this June three Sharing Cultures members from South Africa will be here. They will be presenting with our team at the CASTL Institute here at Columbia College and at Computers and Writing in Palo Alto, at Stanford.
- DOUG REICHERT POWELL
- Doug presented a paper at the College Education Association, 3/31-4/2, on a panel chaired by Garnett Kilberg Cohen titled "Regional Literature in the Classroom." This weekend, Doug has been invited to participate in a roundtable on"Appalachia and the Media" at the 20th Anniversary Symposium of the Center for Appalachian Studies and Services at East Tennessee State University.
- BRENDAN RILEY
- Brendan presented a research/art project at the National Popular
Culture Conference in mid-March 2005. To see portions of his
presentation and the art project, visit:
http://www.curragh-labs.org/random/
- TONY TRIGILIO
- Tony was one of the featured readers at a book release party for the poetry anthology, /America Zen/, at Village Books in Bellingham, WA, on April 1. His poem, "Special Prosecutor," was nominated by /Rhino/ magazine for a Pushcart Prize and an Illinois Arts Council Literary Award. His poem, "Soldier, 1942," also was nominated by /The Spoon River Poetry Review/ for an Illinois Arts Council Literary Award.
- DAVID TRINIDAD
- David spent his spring break giving two poetry readings in New York City: one in the KGB series in the East Village and one in the Segue series at the Bowery Poetry Club. David reports that it poured rain both days he read, but that didn’t seem to stop people: both events were well attended. For the Segue reading, A Rest Press published a beautiful chapbook, that includes an excerpt from a long poem David’s working on. While in New York, David was also interviewed by Nathan Kernan for a biography of James Schuyler, which he’s writing for Farrar, Straus & Giroux. Schuyler, a preeminent New York School poet, was a friend of David’s. People can also find David’s “Nature Poem,” in the new issue of Shiny magazine.
- STAN WEST
- Stan will deliver the keynote address at THE SOCIAL EYE OF THE ARTS COLLOQUIM this June. His presentation, “The Social Eye of Chicago” will bring together his commitment to scholarship and teaching.
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Tech/Ped Corner
Who are you (on the web)?
If you've ever Googled yourself (looked up your name on Google), you may have discovered your dopplegangers on the web. Mine, an Irish "engaging Scouse raconteur"comedian with an apparently "assertive, but amiable style" regularly competes with me for the top rank. I wish _I_ were a Scouse raconteur.
When a colleague, a student, or a friend looks for you or your work, can they find you on the web? Joel Achenbach notes that Google has become "a utility, a basic piece of societal infrastructure like the power grid, sewer lines and the Internet itself." With this ubiquity, it behooves us all to consider our place on the web.
Columbia provides resources for instructors interested in developing websites
for themselves. First, both full-time and adjunct faculty can request web
space on work.colum.edu here:
http://www.colum.edu/info/website/facultyrequest.html
Once you have your web space, there are numerous ways to create and post your
site. Below is a short annotated list of resources:
NVU, is an open source, cross-platform, WYSIWYG editor much like DreamWeaver
or Frontpage. You can use it to create websites that look great without
having to know all the code or technical stuff that has usually been a
requirement. Free for download at:
http://nvu.com/index.html
A tutorial for using NVU:
http://www.thesitewizard.com/gettingstarted/nvu1.shtml
Columbia also offers tips and resources for web design:
http://www.colum.edu/info/website/instructions/resources.html
Filezilla, an open source FTP client that allows you to move your files back
and forth between your home computer and the school server. Free for
download at:
http://filezilla.sourceforge.net/
To get some direct help, check out the Center for Instructional Technology's
series of workshops:
http://cit.colum.edu/workshops.html
If you are interested in doing an English-department-specific workshop for creating homepages, let me know.
Once you've built your website, how can you insure your reign at the top of
the Google search results? Ivan Brunetti has compiled a list telling you how
to make your site more search-engine friendly. I've posted the list here:
http://www.englishdepartment.org/search_ideas.html
For myself, I create a link at the bottom of each of my pages (http://www.curragh-labs.org/) that links back to my homepage with my name. Doing so keeps me ahead of my jesting counterpart. As always, if you have questions or concerns about web space or any other technological concerns, I would be happy to answer them.
See you next month!
Brendan
Department newsletter compiled by M. Killian McCurrie.
