Download March 2005 - Illinois State University English Department

English Studies Association News
February/March 2005
March 2005
Welcome to a new semester of English Studies Association News! We hope this publication will
be a resource for all students of English studies, and will inform everyone about upcoming
events being sponsored by the ESA that may be of interest to you. Please feel free to contact us
at [email protected] with any questions, concerns, or ideas for upcoming newsletters. We
hope you find this informative and enjoyable!
Minutes from the last meeting
The first ESA meeting of the semester was a successful one. The bulk of the meeting was
spent brainstorming for subsequent meetings. These were some of the group’s ideas:
 Poetry Slam/Open Mic
 Resume Workshop/Uses of E-Recruiting (for those who missed it last semester)
 Faculty Presentations
 Discussion of Copyright Issues
 Joint Meeting with Adlai and/or the Creative Writing Club
 Faculty Member Panel Discussion about Pedagogical Theories
 Discussion of Values of the English Major (for those of us non-teachers who will be
defending it in job interviews)
 Mock Job Interviews with Career Services
Our Next Meeting…
Outstanding Young Alum Shadd Maruna will be addressing the English Studies Association on
Tuesday April 5. The meeting will be at 5:00 and, tentatively, in STV 401A. Check the weekly
emails from Dr. Parry for coming information and see how you can get involved in the ESA!
Registration Time is here….
Registration for the Summer 2005 and Fall 2005 semesters is rapidly approaching! Are you
ready to register??
 Meet with your advisor to map out a plan for next semester. Are you on track to
graduate? What requirements do you still have left to complete? Dr. Parry’s office hours
are posted in her weekly emails. If you do not receive this email, go here.
 Have a back-up schedule prepared, in case classes you want are already full.
 Note classes that you will need an override for—C&I 216 in the summer, ENG 300, etc.
 Know your registration date and time, and be ready to go!
English Education Corner
 Any questions about English Education? Contact Professor Eileen Bularzik, advisor to
English education majors and minors. Her e-mail is [email protected] and her phone
number is (309) 438-7383.
“Fighting the Canon”
As many of us English students have learned and discussed, most of the books we read in class
are “canonized”—that is, those authors and subjects which are deemed acceptable to study,
despite the obvious discriminations regarding race, sex, and class. Here is a list of some noncanonical books that English students have enjoyed:
 The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
 The Voyeur by Alain Robbe-Grillet
 Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung by Lester Bangs
 Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig
 Sometimes a Great Notion by Ken Kesey
Have a book of your own to suggest? Email me at [email protected]!
Book Review of the Month
Suggested by Prof. James Van Der Laan
Absolute Friends by John Le Carre
“Absolute Friends tells the story of two friends in the spy trade, Ted Mundy who works for
British Intelligence, and Sasha, a Stasi double agent who passes him information. The story
follows Mundy's life from a childhood in Pakistan, public school in England, and his adult life in
Germany. He first meets Sasha at the height of the Cold War, and their friendship continues
through the fall of the Berlin Wall to the war in Iraq. They both get involved with a
philanthropist who wants to create an alternative university to counter anti-war propaganda, but
Mundy soon discovers it's not quite what it seems. John le Carré is one of the master storytellers
of the spy genre and Absolute Friends has received mixed reviews. The New Zealand Herald
says, "This is an extraordinarily passionate novel: it's bitter about human self-deception and
hypocrisy, heart-rending about loneliness, excoriating in its denunciation of the war in Iraq and
the multiple deceptions governments and corporations practice on people."
http://www.reviewsofbooks.com/absolute_friends/
Spring is almost here… hang in there!
“Spring” by Robert McCracken
Today is the day when bold kites fly,
When cumulus clouds roar across the sky.
When robins return, when children cheer,
When light rain beckons spring to appear.
Today is the day when daffodils bloom,
Which children pick to fill the room,
Today is the day when grasses green,
When leaves burst forth for spring to be seen.