English Department

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The English Department offers a major in English with five concentrations (literature, writing, creative writing, secondary education with certification in English, and prelaw studies) and a minor in English. Within the English Department, the Writing Program offers instruction in college-level academic writing.

Our mission statement is as follows:

We, faculty and students together, are a community of writers and readers.  We recognize the importance of writing across the curriculum and across all four years of college and beyond. 

Writing is the one process that all academic disciplines share and that is present in all work environments. Strong writing skills benefit our graduates in every career path and in every future course of study.

We recognize that writing is a complex activity: cognitive, spiritual, social, emotional, and political. Writing can inform, persuade, protest, and inspire.  Writing can change people’s minds.  Writing can change you, and it can change the world.

Writing is also a skill that entails learning and practicing techniques, becoming conversant with conventions, and both offering and responding to constructive criticism. The study and practice of writing develop habits of mind that include critical thinking, self-awareness, and self-reliance. Engaging readers’ interest is paramount in all forms of writing.  Towards that end, clarity, correctness of grammar, and effectiveness of organization are essential. 

Writing is a process of discovery. In academic writing, research is essential to that journey.  Research illuminates ongoing conversations and rich traditions, which we join and advance through our academic writing.

In the study and creation of literature, reading and writing are fundamentally interconnected.  Literature is a living tradition in which we are active participants as readers, critics, and creators. Wide, deep reading enriches our imaginative writing.  Attention to elements of literary craft enriches our critical writing. 

Reading literature well is a complex skill that rewards us with greater pleasure as well as richer understanding.  There is always more to be discovered about works of literature that have entered the “canon.”  We welcome our students’ original insights about these works, and we encourage you to advocate for serious critical attention to works not yet in the canon. 

Valuable ideas emerge from collaboration as well as from individuals.  In our writing classes, literature discussions, and creative writing workshops, we test our ideas in order, as a group, to produce new knowledge.

Department Faculty

Professors

Madison Smartt Bell (fiction), Mary V. Marchand (American literature, American Studies, literary theory), Elizabeth Spires (poetry), Michelle Tokarczyk (academic writing, poetry, creative nonfiction)

Associate Professors

Kathy Flann (fiction and nonfiction), Jeffrey Myers (Shakespeare, Renaissance English literature), Antje Rauwerda (British literature, postcolonial studies), Angelo Robinson (American literature, African American literature, American studies), Arnold Sanders (Medieval English literature, academic writing, literary theory), Juliette Wells, chair (18th- and 19th-century English literature, the novel, Jane Austen)

Assistant Professors

Johnny Turtle (creative and critical writing, multiethnic literature), Phaye Poliakoff-Chen, director of the Writing program (academic writing), Barbara Roswell (academic writing), Bill U’Ren (creative writing)

Writing Fellows

Mina Brunyate (academic writing), Susan Garrett (academic writing, linguistics), Laura Orem (academic writing)

Lecturers

Elizabeth Leik (academic writing), Mary Reisinger (academic writing), Charlee Sterling (academic writing), Kate Welch (academic writing), Mary Jo Wiese (academic writing).

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