Syracuse University English Department

Check out the Blake Archive's recent interview with our own Professor Mike Goode! This is a significant honor among scholars of Blake, so we are quite proud. Then put the link to the interview (in the email below). You can use the photos below in some sort of half and half screen split. Click here to read: https://blog.blakearchive.org/2020/10/13/qa-mike-goode/

Our own PhD candidate Aley O'Mara is presenting their work in a novel roundtable discussion next week! Thus far, there has been little-to-no work in premodern asexuality studies, even as asexual identity, theory, and scholarship are at the forefront of contemporary gender and sexuality studies. This roundtable, the first of its kind, seeks to change that. This event is free and digital. Registration is required to attend. We will have live closed captioning throughout the ev...ent. Link in bio to sign up!

Check out the Film Club's scheduled screenings for October! This Sunday, October 11th, join us on Zoom at 2 p.m. for a screening of Billy Wilder's Classic 1950s film, "Sunset Boulevard." This film has all makings for the perfect chilling Halloween movie night - murder, spooky mansions, glimmering Hollywood studios, and a slow descent into madness. The second screening is a Halloween double-feature taking place on November 1st. First join us on Zoom at noon for a showing of 20...19's Academy Award winning film, "Parasite," directed by Bong Joon Ho. This critically acclaimed film has been praised as one of the best films to air in the past decade and is guaranteed to make you laugh, cry, and keep you at the edge of your seat. After taking a short break, join us for the second screening beginning at 2:30 p.m. of "The Lighthouse," starring Robert Pattinson and Willem Dafoe in a shadowy exploration of isolation, interpersonal tensions, and insanity. Following the second screening will be a discussion about both films and what it means for a film to be "horror" movie. Email [email protected] to be added to the Film Club email list and receive all updates and screening Zoom links! See more

Cornell’s Fall 2020 Barbara & David Zalaznick Reading Series: At Home presents Craft Talk by M. Evelina Galang | Writer & Activist Thursday, October 15, 2020, 7:00 p.m. EST! This event is free and open to the public! M. Evelina Galang has been named one of the 100 most influential Filipinas in the United States. She is the author of the story collection Her Wild American Self, novels One Tribe and Angel De La Luna, and is the editor of Screaming Monkeys: Critiques of Asian ...American Images. Among her numerous awards are the 2004 Association of Writers & Writing Programs (AWP) Prize for the Novel, the 2007 Global Filipino Literary Award for One Tribe, the 2004 Gustavus Myers Outstanding Book Awards Advancing Human Rights, and a myriad of others. During this virtual event, Galang will provide insight into the research processwith a glimpse into Galang's newest manuscriptand explores the importance of doing research when writing fiction. To attend this virtual event go to: https://www.ecornell.com/keynotes/overview/K101520a/

TOMORROW: Join us for the third Raymond Carver guest reading of the Fall 2020 semester! Tune in at 4p.m. for a Q&A session with guest author, Janice N. Harrington, followed by the reading at 5p.m. Janice N. Harrington grew up in Alabama and Nebraska, which frequently serve as a setting in her poetry and children's books. Her poetry books have received numerous awards and appear regularly in American literary magazines, and her children's books have been ranked in TIME Magazine's top 10 children's books. Today, Harrington works as a public librarian and teaches in the creative writing program at the University of Illinois. We are so happy to have you, Janice!

Looking to volunteer in the local Syracuse area? SU is partnering with the Boys & Girls Clubs of Syracuse; La Casita; Mercy Works at the Vision Center; The North Side Learning Center, and the YMCA to connect K-12 & early college students in the Syracuse area with remote tutors for one-on-one and small-group subject area support. We understand that this is a difficult time for everyone as we are all trying to support our families, friends, neighbors and colleagues, yet, if you have time to connect with these struggling students in these challenging times, your help is much appreciated and is sure to go a long way. Attached is the Remote Tutoring Volunteer Form: https://docs.google.com//1FAIpQLSc5OF6lCKbsh-BbV/viewform Contact the emails listed in the flyer with questions!

With October just one day away, fall is certainly upon us! Make sure to eat all your favorite pumpkin treats, enjoy the changing colors, and while your at it, send in your favorite fall poems! These poems can be from your favorite poets, OR original pieces - we love sharing the amazing work from our students, MFAs, and faculty members. DM all pieces to the department's Instragram account! Happy fall!

Thank you to Deb Oiln Unferth for being our latest guest a part of the Raymond Carver Reading Series! This six time author discussed her passion for animal rights as well as her new book which takes place on mars and asks the moral questions surrounding the recreation of extinct animals. She then read an interrogation scene from her latest novel Barn 8, a phenomenal story of two rogue auditors from the US egg industry that attempt to steal a million chickens in the middle of the night. Again, thank you Deb for an incredible reading and conversation! To attend our next Raymond Carver event on October 7th, check out: https://thecollege.syr.edu//creative-writing-mf-program/r/

Beginning tomorrow is the 18th annual SU Human Rights Film Festival! Each film will be available to stream for 24 hours via the suhrff.syr.edu website, with a live zoom Q&A with the listed filmmakers. An syr.edu email is required for login access due to film distribution agreements. This is an incredible film screening celebration you won’t want to miss - a huge thank you to all that could make this weekend possible, we can’t wait! @suhrff

TOMORROW: Join us for the second Raymond Carver Reading of the semester! Tomorrow's featured writer is Deb Olin Unferth. Unferth received her M.F.A. at SU and has since published six fiction & non-fiction books and has had her work published in Harper's, The New York Times, Vice, The Paris Review, and several others. She has received several honors for her work, including the Guggenheim fellowship. Today Unferth is an associate professor of creative writing at University of Texas at Austin and is an advocate for prison reform. Tune in at 4p.m. tomorrow for a Q&A session, followed by the reading at 5p.m. Looking forward to seeing you there! Photo by Nick Berard

With the SU Human Rights Film Festival a little over a week away, the SU English media interns spoke with one of the festival’s co-directors, Professor Roger Hallas, about the film industry and how it is adapting to today’s world in the wake of COVID-19. Hallas explained how the pandemic forced him and co-director Professor Tula Goenka to rethink this year’s festival. Switching to an online format meant considering how effectively the selected films could be screened on a sma...ller format and how to keep the festival free for students while honoring arrangements with the films’ distributors to limit access to campus only. He went on to describe how filmmakers in general are facing budget cuts, postponed production or shut-downs, and issues with distribution given theaters and venues are currently unavailable. While streaming services are capitalizing on this shift in production and distribution, Hallas explained that art house movie theaters, independent film companies, and institutions that support film will struggle to survive in the COVID recession. Stay tuned for more updates about the SUHRFF and get excited to see how our hardworking professors have adjusted to today’s pandemic to provide students with an incredible screening experience

Thanks to Kaveh Akbar for an incredibly insightful discussion and kicking off the Raymond Carver Reading Series. During the Q&A Akbar discusses how he can only use the English language to write his poems but the language is filled with corrosive and coercive words. He read some of his poems, one of them being The Miracle about a prophet in Islam who was fasting in a cave when the Angel Gabriel came to him and said, READ! To quote Akbar, The poem serves the show the percipitating fate of our religion is literacy. Thanks to Akbar for such an interesting discussion and beautiful reading! To be apart of future Raymond Carver Reading got to https://thecollege.syr.edu//creative-writing-mf-program/r/

Introducingggg.... Conversations Across Cultures: a series of biweekly interviews & discussions with film & media scholars, artists and programmers from across Central NY! Reach out to Leah Shafer ([email protected]) with any questions and access to the zoom link!

In this third week of school, we would like to commend all the hard work our professors and staff are doing to make sure students have the safest and most educational experience possible. Today, we highlight Professor Will Scheibel who has converted his Interpretation of Film class (ENG-154) to be completely online. All lectures are asynchronous and discussion sections are held over zoom. Currently, the class is discussing mise-en-scène and cinematography (elements of visual style). Check out the attach slides Professor Scheibel shared from his most recent lecture on Black Panther and Rachel Morrison's cinematography. Thank you Professor Scheibel for continuing to make such an interesting and exciting class so accessible to students!