Spring Preview

Spring flowers in Manhattan, KS (2023) Welcome to the spring semester! We hope that you are keeping warm and safe as 2024 gets underway. Here are some of the events that we're looking forward to in the months ahead. Please join us for community, creativity, and conversation! All are free but online access requires advance … Continue reading Spring Preview

The “Pretty” Trap

Photo: “Woman Putting on Red Lipstick” by Vitaly Gorbachev. Today we share the fourth of six pieces of public writing selected for publication from an assignment in ENGL 801 “Graduate Studies in English” — and the first selection from Section A of ENGL 801, taught this fall by Cameron Leader-Picone: a piece of public scholarship … Continue reading The “Pretty” Trap

What Happens to Childless Mothers?

Copies of The Lovely Bones, including the Chinese translation, "蘇西的世界," wait to be read. Today we share the third of six pieces of public writing selected for publication from an assignment in ENGL 801 “Graduate Studies in English”: a piece of public scholarship (700-1,000 words) which tailors an academic paper and its scholarly intervention of … Continue reading What Happens to Childless Mothers?

November 2023 Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity

Cover for the special issue of Unsettling Global Midwests, a special issue of American Studies with American Studies International, vol. 62, no. 3, 2023, co-edited by Tom Sarmiento.  Each month during the academic year, we assemble a newsletter of the department's recent publications, presentations, announcements, and awards. We're happy to recognize the recent successes in … Continue reading November 2023 Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity

Resting in Peace: Why Once Upon a Time in Hollywood Keeps Sharon Tate Away from the Action

Margot Robbie as Sharon Tate in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood Today we share the second of six pieces of public writing selected for publication from an assignment in ENGL 801 “Graduate Studies in English”: a piece of public scholarship (700-1,000 words) which tailors an academic paper and its scholarly intervention of 10-12 pages … Continue reading Resting in Peace: Why Once Upon a Time in Hollywood Keeps Sharon Tate Away from the Action

Mina Harker is More Than Just a Love Interest

Photo collage of letters and documents for Dracula (LegendaryTalesEdit) In ENGL 801 "Graduate Studies in English," a required course for incoming M.A. students, we have always asked our graduate students to develop an original contribution to a current scholarly conversation about a literary or cultural text. Starting in 2020, we added a final writing assignment: … Continue reading Mina Harker is More Than Just a Love Interest

Materialist Approaches in ENGL 220

Students from the K-State First Year Seminar course ENGL 220 "Fiction into Film" visit the Beach Museum to see the exhibition on "Women Artists in the Era of Second Wave Feminism" This semester, I’ve had the great opportunity to teach ENGL 220 “Fiction into Film” as a First-Year Seminar, where we read literary texts and … Continue reading Materialist Approaches in ENGL 220

October 2023 Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity

Traci Brimhall's poem "Arts & Sciences" appeared in The New Yorker   Each month during the academic year, we assemble a newsletter of the department's recent publications, presentations, announcements, and awards. We're happy to recognize the recent successes in research, scholarship, and creative activity outlined below.  Want to catch up on past successes or to … Continue reading October 2023 Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity

A Sense of Place for Midwesterners of Color: A Podcast from ENGL 650

For Fall 2023, I’m teaching ENGL 650 "Readings in 20th- & 21st-Century American Literature" as “Multiethnic Literatures of the Midwest.” Centering Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) Midwestern stories and authors, the course invites us to explore our perceptions and misconceptions about America’s heartland and to discover the rich diversity of the region. In … Continue reading A Sense of Place for Midwesterners of Color: A Podcast from ENGL 650

Recognizing Banned Books Week 2023 at K-State

Banned Books Week 2023 (Artwork courtesy of the American Library Association) Every time I find myself reading The Hunger Games I can’t help but feel inspired by the bravery and poise of Katniss Everdeen. I mean she staged an entire rebellion as a teenager. However, I didn’t know that just by reading that novel, I … Continue reading Recognizing Banned Books Week 2023 at K-State