What Do English Professors Do All Day, Anyway?

Have you ever wondered what English professors do 'behind the scenes' when they're not rhapsodizing about Shakespeare, or grammar, or postmodern film? Where do professors go when they're not teaching? A storage closet in Horace Mann? I remember a student, years ago, being shocked when she ran into me in Oklahoma City: "how did you get here?" she gasped. She just couldn't imagine me existing in the same universe as her (possibly because of my height). 

Yes, professors travel and shop and do all the kinds of things that students do. But they also rigorously engage in scholarship to put their hard-earned PhDs to use. Below are some of the activities (but not all!) that English professors have been engaged in throughout 2019--though not everyone had time to respond.  If you have any questions or interest in any of the projects listed below, please contact the professor and ask: they would LOVE to tell you all about it. Trust me. We really would. :) 

Dr. Steve Benton (PhD Univ. of Illinois-Chicago, 2008)

I was on a “Mediating Theater” panel at the Literature/Film Association conference in Portland, Oregon in September,  the 11th year in a row that I have made a presentation at this annual conference.  My presentation--"All About Eve Reborn, Once: Stage, Screen, and National Theatre Live"--was about the production we screened at ECU on September 3rd and which we will feature again for OLAF in November.

Dr. Megan Donelson (PhD Middle Tennessee State University 2018)

 I attended the Rhetoric Society of America Summer Institute at the University of Maryland, where I participated in a workshop called “Neurorhetorics’ Materialities,” in which we discussed the developing discipline of neurorhetorics.  Although the definition of ‘neurorhetorics’ depends on who you ask, its focus tends to be the potential areas of research where neuroscientists and rhetoricians might productively collaborate. It also includes topics like applying rhetorical lenses to the texts that circulate in the medical world, considering how scientific concepts are explained/translated to the public, etc.

I presented at the conference of the Assembly for Expanded Perspectives on Learning (part of NCTE) in Estes Park, Colorado.  My presentation was “Crossing the Line: Emphasizing the Threshold for First-Generation College Students.” It’s a more flexible and laid-back academic conference featuring presentations on everything from experiential learning to community-based pedagogy to dance in the language-learning classroom.

Dr. Murphy and I attended a presentation at North Central Texas College just last week and heard a presentation on rhetorical listening and cultural logics by Krista Ratcliffe (a big name in comp rhet!). 

I just returned from the convention of the Rocky Mountain MLA in El Paso, where I presented “Threshold as Frontier: First Year Composition for First Generation Students.”  El Paso is lovely and I learned quite a bit about the border (literally and figuratively) and about comp pedagogy and academic publishing. 

Joshua Grasso (PhD Miami University, 2006)

I recently published articles on Mary Wollstonecraft's "Travels to Denmark, Norway, and Sweden," William Congreve's "The Old Bachelor," and Samuel Johnson's "The Vanity of Human Wishes" for The Literary Encyclopedia (litencyc.com). Additonally, I have an article pending for Oklahoma Humanities Magazine entitled "Roads Go Ever Ever On: Why You Can Go Home Again in Fantasy Literature." 

I'm also an active SF/F writer, and I've recently published stories in these magazines/anthologies: "Her Mother's Eyes," Red Planet Magazine, "A World Without Dragons" The End of the Dragons Anthology: Chipper Press, 

"The Most Perfect Creation of the Divine Katosha," Welcome to the Alpaca-Lypse Anthology: Midnight Writer's Press, "Barbarians in the Boudoir," Broadswords and Blasters 10, and "Strangers in the House," Apparition Lit on-line (flash fiction). 

Presentation-wise, I recently gave a HEAD Talk (H.umanities E.nlighten A.nd D.elight) for the Oklahoma Humanities Council's 2nd Annual Curiosity Fest at the OCU College of Law. My presentation was "Metaphors of the Past, Prophecies of the Future: The Importance of Speculative Literature." I also regularly contribute to the Ada Public Library's Let's Talk About It Oklahoma series, which is a community book club followed by dinner and discussion. Most recently I presented on Weir's The Martian (July) and Robinson's Forty Signs of Rain (October) 

Dr. Ken Hada (PhD University of Texas-Arlington, 2000)    

Selected Publications: 

Not Quite Pilgrims (Chicago: Vacpoetry)
The Way of The Wind (2nd Edition) 

“Growing Pain” & “Train” Oklahoma Humanities Magazine. Fall/Winter 2019, 22-23.

“In Kyoto” Red Earth Review Vol VII, July, 2019, p.15-16

“Rim Shoals in the Dark” Red Earth Review Vol VII, July, 2019, p17

“What Gandhi and Christ Have Over Me” Red Earth Review Vol VII, July, 2019, 18

“Basket of Peaches” Tulsa Voice vol. 6 no. 14, July 2019, 23

“Speaking” & “When I Have Fears” & “Would Woody Recognize Us?” Speak Your Mind: Poems of Protest & Resistance. Woody Guthrie Poets, 2019, Dorothy Alexander ed. 74-76

"The House on Mango Street". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 13 June 2019

Selected Presentations: 

“Not Quite Pilgrims” Oklahoma Book Festival OKC Sept. 21

“The River White” Ozarks Creative Symposium West Plains, MO. Sept. 19-20

“The River White & Workshop” Kansas Authors Club, Wichita, KS. Sept. 14

“Featured Author” Everett Poetry Series. U of Oklahoma (Mainsite Gallery), Norman. Sept 10 (7:30 pm)

Workshop at Norman North High School, Sept. 10 (10 am)

Workshop at Norman High School, Sept. 10 (1pm)

Presentation at Dr. Hill’s Class at OU, Sept. 10 (4:30 pm)

Invited Poet: “Writers for Migrant Justice” – Commonplace Books, OKC, Sept 4

“A Long Walk To Water” Ada Public Library, August 22

Feature Guest Poet: Brewery Nonic, Menomonie, WI, July 25

Three poems: Woody Poets, Woody Guthrie Center, Tulsa, OK, July 14

Dr. Errol King (PhD University of Arizona 2012) 

'Designing High-Impact, Interdisciplinary Courses.” Spanish, ESL & World Language Teacher Symposium. Fort Smith, AR. 2019.

“Go Fetch a Midwife: Safeguarding Male Honor.” Association for Hispanic Classical Theater (AHCT) Spanish Golden Age Theater Symposium. El Paso, TX. 2019.

The El Paso symposium was held in conjunction with the 44th Annual Siglo de Oro Theater Festival at the Chamizal National Memorial on the US/Mexico border.

Dr. Jennifer McMahon (PhD University of Buffalo 1997)

This past week, Dr. McMahon presented a paper at the 4th Annual International Conference on Gender and Sexuality at the University of Central Oklahoma (October 3-5). Her paper was titled, “Rebellious Bodies: Challenging Oppressive Ideals of Femininity in Hairspray, Polyester, and Cry-Baby.” The paper examines the ideals for feminine beauty that dominate mainstream media. As most of us will attest, female leads in Hollywood movies have a predictable profile: thin.  McMahon’s paper discusses the work of philosopher, Susan Bordo, who asserts that American culture elevates an ideal of thinness that is so extreme it is pathological. Bordo’s work calls attention to what she calls the “anorexic aesthetic,” and encourages individuals to produce alternative models that celebrate a healthier standard. McMahon’s conference paper looks at the way in which three John Waters films do precisely this. 

Her paper analyzes Hairspray (1988), Polyester (1981), and Cry Baby (1990), and argues that rather than the reproduce the reductive standard of feminine beauty that prevails in mainstream media, these films to encourage viewers to see feminine beauty and sexuality in diverse forms.

Dr. Robin Murphy (PhD Bowling Green University 2007) 

I’ve done some manuscript reviews for Computers and Writing and The JUMP (an undergraduate publication--jumpplus.net), as well as worked on ECU's Guide to Writing revision. 

I also am going to present in November at the Feminism(s) and Rhetoric(s) Biennial International Conference.  My talk is called “Problematizing Shame in the Name of Decorum”.  

Joining Nicotra’s Enculturation discussion of public shaming as epideictic practice, this presentation will discuss epiplexis or “shaming” strategies to complicate and challenge activist acts with decorum or propriety.  My connection here will rely on material(ed) resistance rhetoric, which is easily feminized - consider the knitted hats of the Women’s Marches.  Feminist rhetorical style is ripe with epiplexic practices and acts of decorum; therefore, feminist activist strategies and those materials produced in participatory practices can teach us to challenge shame through decorum.

Dr. Rebecca Nicholson-Weir (PhD Purdue University 2012)

This fall I am continuing my research related to a book in progress on African American newspaper comics, Origin Stories: The First Black Superheroes and the Golden Age of Comics (the working title, it may change). This project started back in summer 2017, but while I've been on sabbatical I've been doing archival and microfilm work on the Chicago Defender, Los Angeles Sentinel, New York Amsterdam News, and other African American newspapers between 1930-1950. I am giving a talk at SCMLA at the end of October in Little Rock, Arkansas related to that research entitled “The Bronze Bomber: Los Angeles Sentinel and the First African American Superheroes in the Golden Age of Comics.” 

This January I will be teaching a 4000 American Lit Seminar "Harlem Renaissance and Beyond," and we will be looking at the role of the African American press in there too as part of a digital humanities unit I am developing, as well as working with students to learn more about art and culture of African American Modernism from the 1920s to 1950s. In February 2020 I will be giving a talk on this work at the Ada Public Library as part of African American History Month. In late Spring/Summer 2020, I am hoping to take a research trip to the Shomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in NYC to work in their special collections.

Dr. Sarah Peters (PhD Texas A&M University 2009) 

On October 24 I am presenting a paper titled  “‘Ever Living, Ever Dying, Ever Alive!’: Choctaw Epistemology in LeAnne Howe’s Shell Shaker” at the South Central Modern Language Association conference in Little Rock. I am presenting on a panel about 21st century reinventions of detective fiction, and my paper explores how Shell Shaker presents a murder mystery that operates outside the genre conventions of detective fiction, as well as the tradition of Native American detective characters, because it relies on Choctaw ways of knowing and underscores the importance of tribal specificity in works by Native American authors.

I'm also leading a book discussion on November 12 at the Ada Public library. I am hoping to bring together members of the community and ECU students to discuss Sarah Smarsh's Heartland. That book was this year's Honors Summer Read, and my Comp I students have also read it this semester.

Dr. Mara Sukholutskaya (PhD Kiev State Univ of Linguistics 1989)

1.       Organized the following cultural and educational activities:

a.       Swan Lake Ballet (Moscow National Ballet Company) for the Russian students,

Armstrong Auditorium, January 2019

b.       Study Abroad trip to Russia- May 14-May 31

c.       Opera Golden Cockerel (OU Production), September 2019;

d.       Secured finances for the ECU screening of the Anna Karenina musical, Moscow  Operetta Theatre, February 2019;

e.       Uncle Vanya (Vakhtangov Theatre production), Harkins Theatre,Oklahoma City, March 2019;

f.        The Man from La Mancha  for the Spanish class, ECU, February 2019;

2.       Moderated a panel on Methods of Teaching Russian at the CARTA Conference, Albuquerque, April 2019;

3.       Presented on the benefits of the Educational Quartet Game at AATSEEL Conference, New Orleans, February 2019;

4.       Judge for the National Russian Essay Contest;

5.       Advised Tyler Gifford on his paper at CARTA;

6.       Russian Club sponsor

7.       Honors Society “Dobro Slovo” cosponsor;

8.       Submitted a paper proposal for the Russian Language conference in the Pushkin Institute, January 2020

9.       Submitted an article ‘Russian Language in Oklahoma” for publication by thr Pushkin Institute, Moscow. Don’t remember other things.

10.   Advising 3 students on their papers at CARTA, in April 2020.

Dr. Mark Walling (PhD Oklahoma State University 1994) 

Dr. Walling has recently published "The Year I Lost My Ass" in The Del Sol Review, issue 24 of Del Sol Review: http://delsolreview.webdelsol.com/#

He has also published, "Say It," in the magazine, Spitball. It appeared in the Spring 2019 special Black Sox Issue and is told from the point of view of Kate Jackson, the wife of Shoeless Joe Jackson. Spitball is a print only magazine (but you can snag a copy here: http://www.spitballmag.com/Store)