Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Winter 2007

Hello, MELUS Members,

Welcome to the Winter issue.

We are still utilizing the blog format to provide a more dynamic publishing environment for the sharing of announcements and information among MELUS members. The NewsNotes archive is still located on the main page for the e-publication: http://www.marshall.edu/melus/newsnotes/ We will continue to house materials such as meeting minutes and registration forms on this page.

With the blog format, users may also post items and comments for others to view and/or may post time-sensitive items such as CFPs or job announcements. Please limit comments to topics relevant to MELUS or NewsNotes. The editors reserve the right to edit or delete postings.

If you have questions feel free to contact Dr. Katharine Rodier, Professor of English & Director of Graduate Studies, Marshall University, 1 John Marshall Drive, Huntington WV 25755-2646, rodier@marshall.edu or Dr. Monica García Brooks, NewsNotes Technical Editor and Associate Dean of Libraries, Marshall University, brooks@marshall.edu. If you would prefer to receive NewsNotes in print copy or in another format, please contact Monica.

posted by MELUS News Notes at 4:53 PM | 0 comments   

Announcements

A DRAFT version of the Program for the MELUS 2007 Conference (Fresno, California) is available on the MELUS Website. Please go to www.melus.org and click on the "Conferences" link. Please note the times of our plenary speakers: Luis Valdez, Lillian Faderman, Wendy Rose, and Shirley Lim.

Please send Program corrections, typos, etc., by 2/2/07 to melusfresno@cvip.net with a cc. to chengc@csufresno.edu. Please note that many panels do not have Chairs. These are designated
"TBA" (to be arranged/announced). So if you or anyone you know is willing to chair a session, please let us know at the addresses above.

Thanks--and see you in Fresno!
C. Lok Chua & Lejla Tricic for the MELUS Fresno Committee

National Association for Ethnic Studies, Inc.
35th Annual National Conference and Summit
State University of New York, New Paltz
March 22– 24, 2007

“AMERICAN VALUES” AND THE CHALLENGE TO HUMAN RIGHTS: ETHNIC AND RACIAL DIMENSIONS"

The National Association for Ethnic Studies invites you to join us at our 35th Annual National Conference for a discussion on the argument over “American values.” American values are being recreated: who is doing the redefining and why? Who is framing the argument and who is being framed?

The conference will create a lively forum for the discussion of issues related to ethnic communities, for example: race relations in the Pacific Rim, ethnic voices in literature, art and music, transforming communities, transnational communities, intermarriage, language, bisexual/transgendered/gay/lesbian communities, scientific communities, environmental racism and city planning.

SUMMIT
The Status of American Education and the Role of Ethnic Studies: Beyond the Matrix of Ethnic Studies

Plenary Sessions and Roundtables will focus on (re)creating/(re)thinking a shared vision for the future of ethnic studies. We are looking for position papers that will help identify the issues today and help to rethink the field. Presentations will be considered for a special edition of Ethnic Studies Review.

For more information about the conference and summit, including registration and membership, travel and lodging options, or about NAES generally, please visit http://www.ethnicstudies.org

"New York City: Global Village"Third Annual Interdisciplinary Conference at New York Institute of Technology (NYIT) - March 9, 2007 - New York Institute of Technology Conference Facility - 16 West 61st Street (between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenue) 11th FloorNew York, NY 10023

The New York Institute of Technology announces its third interdisciplinary conference, “New York City: Global Village,” which will address the role of New York City as a site of international exchange in culture, technology, tourism and other fields. The conference, as in past years, will draw scholars from around the country and world for panel discussions, featured speakers, and lively conversation.

The Keynote Speaker for 2007 is Professor Saskia Sassen, the leading theorist of globalization and its impact on cities. She is the Ralph Lewis Professor of Sociology at the University of Chicago and Centennial Visiting Professor at the London School of Economics. Professor Sassen’s books have been translated into thirteen languages and include The Global City: New York London Tokyo (Princeton, 1991) and Digital Formations: Information Technologies and New Architectures in the Global Realm, (Princeton, 2005).

This year's conference will also feature a multimedia performance of Crossing the BLVD with Judith Sloan and Warren Lehrer. Crossing the BLVD is a cross-media project that documents and portrays the largely invisible lives, images, sounds and stories of new immigrants and refugees who live in the borough of Queens, New York, the most ethnically diverse locality in the United States.

For the schedule and registration, please visit the conference website: http://iris.nyit.edu/~tnauheim/nycgv/

Job Advertisement

Managing EditorUCP III – Writer/Editor IIMELUS: Journal for the Society of Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States The University of Connecticut, Department of English seeks candidates for the position of Managing Editor for MELUS, the journal for Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States.

This position assists in the management, editing and formatting of the journal. Other duties include: writing decision letters to authors, checking submissions to ensure they do not contain plagiarized material; verifying that topics and issues are appropriate for the journal; proofreading, copy-editing, checking citations and using computer databases; creating PDF documents, spreadsheets and other computer documents; serving as a resource and responding to inquiries, contacting journal evaluators and authors, processing claims and subscription requests and performing related duties as required. May also supervise student workers. For more information about MELUS go to: http://english.uconn.edu/affiliated_programs/melus_docs/melus.html . Minimum Qualifications: Bachelor's degree in Journalism, English, Communications or related field OR equivalent combination of education and experience; one year writing experience appropriate to English department; good writing and grammatical skills, as demonstrated by writing samples including ability in editing, proofreading and copy-editing; excellent organizational skills including ability to meet deadlines, carry assignments through to completion and take initiative; good communication and interpersonal skills. Preferred Qualifications: MA in English, Journalism, Communications, Editing or Related Field; familiarity with research databases: MLA, World Cat, etc; knowledge of MLA style, background in editing; familiarity with multiethnic literature of the US or American Literature; excellent computer skills including experience with Word, Adobe, Access and Outlook. Individuals with PhDs will also be considered. This is a one-year position with possible annual renewal. Salary is $32,000-$36,000 and includes full benefits (medical, union, etc.). This is a full time (35 hour per week) job. Submit a complete application, including cover letter, CV or résumé, three letters of recommendation (with full contact information) and evidence of editing experience (such as an edited publication or a detailed description of your role on a particular editorial project) to Robert Tilton, Head, Department of English, MELUS Search, 215 Glenbrook Road, U-4025, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, 06269-4025.

Review of applications will begin February 19, 2007 and will continue until an appropriate candidate is selected. The University of Connecticut actively solicits applications from minorities, women, and people with disabilities. Search # 07U. For more information contact: Martha.Cutter@uconn.edu

posted by MELUS News Notes at 4:44 PM | 0 comments   

Book Announcements

bookimage2AfroAsian EncountersCulture, History, PoliticsEdited by Heike Raphael-Hernandez and Shannon Steen, foreword by Vijay Prashad and afterword by Gary Okihiro336 pagesPaperback $24.00Hardcover $75.00.
"As fresh and exciting as it is important. This crucial book changes the conversation around American Studies and Ethnic Studies in key ways, challenging scholars to light out for previously-uncharted places on our mental maps in which borders are interrogated and challenged, alliances forged through imagined communities, commerce, popular culture, or politics are investigated and probed, and questions that are simultaneously new, and half a century old, are revivified. This volume, the first interdisciplinary anthology dealing with AfroAsian encounters, stands to become a landmark work in the field." —Shelley Fisher Fishkin, Stanford University
How might we understand yellowface performances by African Americans in 1930s swing adaptations of Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado, Paul Robeson's support of Asian and Asian American struggles, or the absorption of hip hop by Asian American youth culture?
AfroAsian Encounters is the first anthology to look at the mutual influence of and relationships between members of the African and Asian diasporas. While these two groups have often been thought of as occupying incommensurate, if not opposing, cultural and political positions, scholars from history, literature, media, and the visual arts here trace their interconnections and interactions, as well as the tensions between the two groups that sometimes arise. AfroAsian Encounters probes beyond popular culture to trace the historical lineage of these coalitions from the late nineteenth century to the present.
A compelling foreword by Vijay Prashad sets the volume in the context of the Bandung conference half a century ago, and an illuminating afterword by Gary Okihiro charts the contours of a "Black Pacific." From the history of Japanese jazz composers to the current popularity of black/Asian "buddy films" like Rush Hour, AfroAsian Encounters is a groundbreaking intervention into studies of race and ethnicity and a crucial look at the shifting meaning of race in the twenty-first century.

Heike Raphael-Hernandez is professor of English at the University of Maryland in Europe. She is editor of Blackening Europe: The African American Presence. Shannon Steen is assistant professor of theater, dance, and performance studies at the University of California at Berkeley. Vijay Prashad is author of Everybody was Kung Fu Fighting: Afro-Asian Connections and the Myth of Cultural Purity. Gary Okihiro is author of Common Ground: Reimagining American History.
Purchase This Book NYU Press, Champion of Great Ideas for 90 Years838 Broadway, 3rd flr, New York, NY 10003-4812


Maria Mazziotti Gillan: Essays on Her Works, a book edited by Sean Thomas Dougherty, has just been published as part of the Writers Series by Guernica Editions of Toronto, Canada.
bookimage1
Cultural activist, teacher and editor Maria Mazziotti Gillan is one of the leaders of the multicultural turn in American poetry. She is a professor of poetry and director of the creative writing program at Binghamton University-SUNY, and the founder and executive director of the Poetry Center at Passaic County Community College in Paterson, NJ. Gillan is the editor of the Paterson Literary Review and the author of eight books of poetry, including Italian Women in Black Dresses. Her next book, All That Lies Between Us, is due out in early 2007.

In a personal yet critical essay, Maria Mazziotti Gillan’s daughter, Jennifer Gillan, exhumes the role of kin and kinship networks in her mother’s poetry. Tony Vallone explicitly examines the Italian-Americanness of Gillan’s prosody and childhood, while Joe Weil attempts to place Gillan’s work in relation to a number of schools of American poetics, political ideologies, and autobiography. Rachel Guido DeVries articulates the Italian-American feminist ingredients of Gillan’s poems, and editor Sean Thomas Dougherty reads her work through contemporary theories of whiteness, class formation and resistance.

Sean Thomas Dougherty is the author of six books of poetry including Night Shift
Belonging to Lorca. He lives in Erie, Pennsylvania and teaches in the BFA program for Creative Writing at Penn State-Erie.

For further information, contact Maria Mazziotti-Gillan at 973-684-5904 or visit the website at www.english.binghamton.edu/cwpro and www.pccc.edu/poetry.

A pioneering look at the influence of Cuban-American culture—beyond Miami.CULTURAL EROTICS IN CUBAN AMERICARicardo L. OrtízUniversity of Minnesota Press 328 pages 2006ISBN 0-8166-4795-X hardcover $72.00ISBN 0-8166-4796-8 paperback $24.00

Looking beyond South Florida, Ricardo L. Ortíz addresses the question of Cuban-American diaspora and cultural identity by exploring the practices of smaller communities in such U.S. cities as Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York. Highlighting various forms of cultural expression, Cultural Erotics in Cuban America traces underrepresented communities' responses to the threat of cultural disappearance in a hegemonic U.S. culture. Focusing on artists who have had an ambivalent, indirect, or nonexistent connection to Miami, he presents close readings of such novelists as Reinaldo Arenas, Roberto G. Fernández, Achy Obejas, and Cristina García, the playwright Eduardo Machado, the poet Rafael Campo, and musical performers Albita Rodríguez and Celia Cruz.
For more information, including the table of contents, visit the book’s webpage:http://www.upress.umn.edu/Books/O/ortiz_cultural.htmlSign up to receive news on the latest releases from University of Minnesota Press:http://www.upress.umn.edu/eform.html

An original study of the place of elegy in American literature and culture.AMERICAN ELEGY: The Poetry of Mourning from the Puritans to WhitmanMax CavitchUniversity of Minnesota Press 336 pages 2006ISBN 0-8166-4892-1 hardcover $67.50ISBN 0-8166-4893-X paperback $22.50

American Elegy reconnects the study of early American poetry to the broadest currents of literary and cultural criticism. Max Cavitch begins by considering eighteenth-century elegists such as Franklin and Bradstreet. He then turns to elegy's adaptations during the Jacksonian age. Devoting unprecedented attention to the early African-American elegy, Cavitch sees in the poems the development of an African-American genealogical imagination.“Page by page, American Elegy restores what has long been considered a moribund poetic and cultural form to vivid and affecting life.” —Michael Moon“A provocative treatment of the elegy in America, prodigiously researched and beautifully written. Cavitch unearths a history rarely told, as he recreates the vanished literary culture of mourning.” —Colin Dayan

For more information, including the table of contents, visit the book’s webpage:http://www.upress.umn.edu/Books/C/cavitch_american.htmlSign up to receive news on the latest releases from University of Minnesota Press:http://www.upress.umn.edu/eform.html

Permeable Border: The Great Lakes Basin as Transnational Region, 1650-1990, John J. Bukowczyk (Wayne State University), Nora Faires (Western Michigan University), David R. Smith (University of Michigan), and Randy William Widdis (University of Regina)
Permeable Border: The Great Lakes Basin as Transnational Region, 1650-1990 (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press and Calgary: University of Calgary Press, 2005), won the 2006 Albert B. Corey Prize, awarded biennially by the American Historical Association and the Canadian Historical Association for “the best book on Canadian-American relations or on the history of both countries.” The award was formally presented at the annual meeting of the American Historical Association on January 5, 2007, in Atlanta. The book is available in the U.S. at http://www.upress.pitt.edu/BookDetails.aspx?bookId=35542 and in Canada at http://www.uofcpress.com/1-55238/1-55238-216-8.html
John J. Bukowczyk
Professor of History & Editor, Journal of American Ethnic History
Department of History
3094 Faculty/Administration Bldg.
Wayne State University
Detroit, MI 48202

posted by MELUS News Notes at 4:17 PM | 0 comments   

Call for Submissions

Teaching Material Culture

The editors of transformations seek articles (5,000 – 10,000 words) and media reviews (books, film, video, performance, art, music, etc. – 3,000 to 5,000 words) that explore the significance and uses of material culture in a variety of contexts, pedagogical—from the classroom to the museum—and disciplinary—literature, women’s and gender studies, anthropology, folklore, history, psychology, sociology, art, photography, geography, religion, working-class studies, ethnic studies, cultural studies, science, and others. Essays should raise questions concerning, for example, authenticity, art, craft, tradition, community, or authority in relationship to the teaching of material culture Multidisciplinary approaches that focus on—or include—discussions of non-Western cultures are especially encouraged. Autobiographical criticism, narrative scholarship, photo-essays, and experimental work are welcome.

Topics might include: teaching material culture in K-12 and higher education; museums and the appropriation and transformation of material culture; gender and technology; the politics and pedagogy of the archive; material culture and folklore; artifacts and identities; material culture and family/domesticity; food rituals/celebrations; the transmission of material culture in diasporic communities; history and interpretation of public spaces; intersections and manifestations of identities; clothes, costumes, fashion, and body politics; religious practices; music and performance; practices and politics of memorializing; the material construction of public events; make-overs and reality television; class and taste; globalization, tourism, and transnationalism.

Send a hard copy in MLA format (6th ed.) and a 250-word abstract to: Jacqueline Ellis and Edvige Giunta, Editors, Transformations, New Jersey City University, Hepburn Hall Room 309, 2039 Kennedy Boulevard, Jersey City, NJ 07305 OR email submissions and inquiries to: transformations@njcu.edu. Email submissions should be sent as attachments in MS Word or Rich Text format. For submission guidelines go to www.njcu.edu/assoc/transformations.

DEADLINE: 1 March 2007


ML: Journal Cover Art Recommendations: Ethnoscapes: An Interdisciplinary Journal on Race and Ethnicity in the Global Context

I am writing on behalf of the editorial staff at Ethnoscapes: AnInterdisciplinary Journal on Race and Ethnicity in the Global Context tosolicit cover art recommendations for our two upcoming issues: “Race andCoalition” and “Transnational Migration, Race, and Citizenship.” We arelooking for visual artists (in any genre) who may be/are working withthese themes. The journal will have international and online circulation,so this would be a great opportunity for the artist. Any information youhave to offer would be greatly appreciated.Best,Melanie MaltryAssistant Editor, EthnoscapesThe Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and EthnicityThe Ohio State University
mmaltry@kirwaninstitute.org

Melanie MaltryAssistant Editor, EthnoscapesThe Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and EthnicityThe Ohio State University
mmaltry@kirwaninstitute.org

posted by MELUS News Notes at 4:11 PM | 0 comments