Alemán publishes chapter on teaching nineteenth-century US Latino/a literatures

Jesse Alemán’s chapter, “Recovered and Recovery Texts of the Nineteenth Century,” leads off Latino/a Literature in the Classroom: Twenty-First-Century Approaches to Teaching, edited by Frederick Luis Aldama and recently published by Routledge. The essay is a scholarly piece on teaching nineteenth-century US Latino/a literatures, surveying major texts to be included in the classroom, presenting approaches to themes, genres, and authors that structure the Latino nineteenth century, and most importantly, arguing for a different model of teaching American literary history to be inclusive of early US Latino/a print cultures.

Christine Beagle awarded A&S Dissertation/Thesis Completion Award for Summer 2015

Christine is a Rhetoric & Writing PhD candidate completing her dissertation, "The Chicana Speaks: Dolores Huerta and the Chicana as Rhetor".

Faculty and Graduate Student Appearances in Fall 2013

September

Jonathan Davis-Secord. "Exploitation of Compound Frequency in Old English Style." Studies in the History of the English Language. Brigham Young University. Provo, UT: September 26-28, 2013.

October

Lisa Myers. "Music Theory and Performance in the Middle English Breton Lay Sir Orfeo." Southeastern Medieval Association. Appalachian State University. Boone, NC: October 3-5, 2013.

Association for the Arts of the Present (ASAP). Wayne State University. Detroit, MI: October 3-6, 2013.
W. Oliver Baker. "Meth, Rural Whiteness, and the Ozarks: Neoliberalism and the Great Recession in Winter’s Bone."
Ann D’Orazio. "Save Our City: Transmetropolitan and the Antihero Citizen."
Stephanie Spong. "'Affection Would Be Revolution Enough': Public Eroticism and the Re-Imagined Love Lyric in Bruce Andrews' Designated Heartbeat."

Western Literature Association. Berkeley, CA: October 9-12, 2013.
Erin Murrah-Mandril. "Preserving the Ghosts of the Alamo: Adina de Zavala's History and Legends."
Melina Vizcaino-Alemán. "Critical Regionalism and The West: Intersections of Architecture and Literature in the Southwest."
Julie Williams. "Western Writing and Wheelchairs: Embodiment and Ability in Women's Writing about Place."

Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association. Vancouver, WA. October 9-13, 2013.
Doaa Omran. "(Re) Defining Islamic Terrorism: A Middle Eastern Perspective."
Erin Woltkamp. "Performing the Discourse of Power: Breaking Away From the Madwoman in the Attic Through Discursive Tactics in Villette."

Natasha Jones. "Social Justice as Technical Communication Pedagogy." Council for Programs on Technical and Scientific Communication (CPTSC). Cincinnati, OH: October 2013.

November

Daoine Bachran. "Being (post)Human: Mechanization, Militarization, and Human Rights in Chicana/o Science Fiction." American Studies Association Annual Meeting. Washington D.C.: November 21, 2013.

Kathleen Washburn. "Modern American Indian Literature: Early Twentieth-Century Texts and Contexts." The Newberry Library Colloquium. Chicago, IL: November 13, 2013.

Michelle Kells & La Voz Newspaper "Civil Rights Turns 50"

Michelle Kells forwarded this article from the Denver newspaper "La Voz" today "Civil Rights Act Turns 50." This is an important historic moment in U.S Civil rights history. The reporter has an insightful recognition of the role/significance of this legislation for women and Latinos (and especially women of color). From the article:

“We could not have endured much longer had the ’64 signing not occurred,” says University of New Mexico historical writer and English professor Dr. Michelle Hall-Kells. The massive and growing resistance to the status quo, including Freedom Summer, was not going away. “It pressed LBJ into doing the right thing.”

Hall-Kells says too many of the epic gains that resulted from the Civil Rights Act are today taken for granted. “I can’t imagine a 2104 without a 1964 moment,” says the UNM professor.” Without those formative policy changes our civic imagination would be so limited.”

Perhaps the biggest gain, Hall-Kells says, have been in gender equality. Women a half century ago were simply not part of the discussion in terms of career opportunities. Today, while still not exactly equal partners in many fields, woman have climbed to the top in finance, politics, science and technology and so many other disciplines once the sole purview of men. But much work remains. “The groups that are still struggling and have not benefited are women of color. There is a lot of unfinished work.”

http://lavozcolorado.com./detail.php?id=7533

La Voz  Bilingue (Denver, CO) 

A thank you to Christine Sierra for connecting La Voz reporter Ernest Gurule with me last week for an interview on Good Friday and including Latinos and women under the rhetorical umbrella of 1964 Civil Rights Act stakeholders.

Rivera Lands Tenure-Track Job

ALS PhD candidate in English, Díana Noreen Rivera, has accepted a tenure track job as an assistant professor of English at the University of Texas, Brownsville, for an advertised position in American literature to begin Fall 2014. The inaugural CRS Torres Fellow and a current Mellon Fellow, Noreen is also a native of the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas—she received her BA and MA from UT-Pan American, so her return to UT-Brownsville is the perfect position for her to take after she defends her dissertation in July. Congratulations!

Vicente Ximenes Reception, Friday March 28th

We hope that you can attend the Dr. Vicente Ximenes reception this Friday March 28th at the Chicana and Chicano Studies and Southwest Hispanic Research Institute building at 1829 Sigma Chi Rd NE from 3pm-4:30 pm. There will be food and drink and a memorial arranged for Dr. Ximenes. The reception is sponsored by UNM's Chicana and Chicano Studies Program, College of Arts and Sciences, Department of English Language and Literature, and Southwest Hispanic Research Institute. 

For more information about Dr. Ximenes, to pay tribute to his legacy, or to donate to the Vicente Ximenes Scholarship in Public Rhetoric and Community literacy, visit http://www.unm.edu/~wac/scholarships/vicente-ximenes-scholarship.html.

Center for Regional Studies Hector Torres Fellowship

The Center for Regional Studies and the English Department at the University of New Mexico announce the Center for Regional Studies Hector Torres Fellowship for Fall 2014-Spring 2015.

The Center for Regional Studies Hector Torres Fellowship supports graduate research and scholarship in the English Department directly related to the late Dr. Hector Torres’ fields, as well as the mission of the Center for Regional Studies. These areas include Chicano/a literary and cultural studies; theory (i.e. Marxism; post-structuralism; deconstruction; psychoanalysis; and globalization); film studies; and scholarship related to the mission of the CRS (including history; archival research; literature; and other interdisciplinary fields related to New Mexico, the US-Mexico borderlands, and the greater southwest).

The award amount ranges from $10,000 to $15,000 a year, depending on availability. Renewal is not automatic. The Fellowship is housed in the English Department but sponsored by the Center for Regional Studies. Fellowship funding pending final budgetary approval.

Qualified graduate student applicants must meet the above criteria; be graduate students in good standing (3.0 GPA or better); maintain full-time graduate student standing during the tenure of the award; and complete a CRS application, which includes a letter of intent; transcripts; resume; two letters of recommendation; and proof of enrollment. Preference will be given first to advanced doctoral students (post-exams); doctoral students in coursework; and advanced MA students. Highly qualified applicants to the English doctoral program in American Literary Studies will also be considered for the fellowship for recruitment purposes.

Submit all inquires and all application materials (in hardcopy) to Dr. Jesse Alemán (jman@unm.edu), Professor, Department of English.

Deadline: 5pm, April 4, 2014

Todd Ruecker Signs Book Contract

Over the break, Professor Todd Ruecker signed a book contract with Utah State University Press for his book tentatively titled High School to College: The Journeys of Latinas and Latinos Writing Across Institutions.  The book is based on a year and a half study of 7 Mexican American students transitioning from high school to a community college or university and explores the role writing and extracurricular factors played in their transitions. Its anticipated release date is early 2015.

Rivera Garners UNM-Mellon Fellowship

ALS PhD candidate in English, Díana Noreen Rivera, has been awarded a UNM-Mellon Doctoral Defense Preparation Fellowship to facilitate the completion of her dissertation, “Remapping the U.S. Southwest: Early Mexican American Literature and the Production of Transnational Counterspaces (1874-1958).” Her study argues that early Mexican American writers offer an alternative paradigm of transnationalism for understanding the literature, culture, and geography of the U.S. Southwest as it has been imagined in Anglo American cultural production about the region. Dr. Jesse Alemán, ALS coordinator, directs the dissertation.

Funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the highly competitive UNM-Mellon awards dissertation fellowships in the humanistic social sciences across ten UNM departments to senior doctoral students working on studies relevant to Latino/a or Native American communities. This is the first year that the English Department’s ALS program has been included in the qualified field of humanistic social sciences at UNM designated by the Mellon Foundation. The six-month award is meant to assist in the completion of the dissertation by providing a $12,500.00 stipend; tuition remission and health care coverage; and a $500.00 professional development or research support fund.

Rivera was born and raised in the Rio Grande Valley of South Texas and received her BA and MA at the University of Texas-Pan American. She credits her passion for Mexican American literary study to her parents and grandmothers, who shared family stories of life in the U.S.-Mexican borderlands and beyond. Her publications include “Third Space Resistance in Américo Paredes’s With His Pistol in His Hand: A Defense of Nuevo Santander” (forthcoming) in Recovering the U.S. Hispanic Literary Heritage Volume IX; “Reconsidering Jovita González’s Life, Letters and Pre-1935 Folkloric Production: A Proto-Chicana’s Conscious Revolt Against Anglo Academic Patriarchy” (2011) in Chicana/Latina Studies Journal; and “Dime con quién andas”: Toward the Construction of a Dicho Paradigm and Its Significance in Chicano/a Literature” (2008) in the Journal of the American Studies Association of Texas. She’s the recipient of the American Association of University Women Santa Fe scholarship, the Office of Graduate Studies Earickson Trust award, the New Mexico Folklore Scholarship, and she was the English Department’s inaugural Center for Regional Studies Hector Torres fellow.

Jesse Alemán delivers the Hutchins Lecture at UNC-Chapel Hill

On November 17, Dr. Jesse Alemán delivered the Hutchins Lecture at UNC-Chapel Hill’s Center for the Study of the American South. Named after James A. Hutchins, a UNC alumnus, and generously funded by the Hutchins Family Foundation, the Hutchins lecture series invites researchers to UNC to present their scholarship to mixed public and academic audiences as a way of fostering communication between faculty, students, and community members. Dr. Alemán was invited to present “Loreta Janeta Velazquez’s Civil Wars as a Cuban and a Confederate” after his research was featured in the PBS film, Rebel, and his edition of The Woman in Battle was required reading for an English doctoral seminar on the global south. Dr. Alemán’s lecture focused on how the Civil War serves as a backdrop for the “internal civil wars” between gender, sexual, linguistic, religious, and national identities that forge Velazquez’s emergence as a nineteenth-century US Latina.

http://south.unc.edu/category/hutchins-lectures/

JFK article in ABQ Journal

The JFK anniversary article by Deborah Baker is featured on the front page of the ABQ Journal Sunday 11/17/13 edition (including notes from Michelle Kells' interview with reporter Deborah Baker last week re: Viva Kennedy and the emergence of Latino vote).

This is a significant moment in Mexican American (pre-Chicano Movement) history.

Here's an article from Albuquerque Journal I thought you might like: http://www.abqjournal.com/302733/news/jfks-tragic-end-still-resonates-in-nm.html

Erin Murrah-Mandril speaks on "Ghosts in the Archive: Recovering the Work of Adina De Zavala" Wednesday, Nov. 13, 12:00 noon

The Feminist Research Institute is proud to host the FRI Research Lecture Series:

"Ghosts in the Archive: Recovering the Work of Adina De Zavala"
Erin Murrah-Mandril, Department of English 

Wednesday, November 13, 12:00 – 1:00 
SUB Luminaria 

http://femresin.unm.edu/events/2013/11/murrah-mandril/

Should you have any questions, please feel free to contact us at femresin@unm.edu or visit us on the web at http://femresin.unm.edu.

Christine Garcia named CRS Fellow

Christine Garcia, PhD Candidate in Rhetoric and Writing, has been named the Center for Regional Studies Fellow for Chicana Studies for both the 2012-2013 and the 2013-2014 academic years. During her tenure as fellow, Ms. Garcia has assisted in the drafting and implementation of an IRB approved study on Community Based Learning and has been an integral part of the planning of a symposium honoring Chicana Studies students' writing. Her work as CRS fellow has supported the research and writing of her dissertation on the rhetoric of civil and labor right's activist Dolores Huerta.

Todd Ruecker publishes in the Journal of Hispanic Higher Education

Professor Todd Ruecker has the lead article in the latest issue of the Journal of Hispanic Higher Education: http://jhh.sagepub.com/content/current

The article is "High-Stakes Testing and Latina/o Students: Creating a Hierarchy of College Readiness," Journal of Hispanic Higher Education, October 2013 12: 303-320, first published on July 4, 2013 doi:10.1177/153819271349301.

This article examines how high-stakes testing policies can constrain the way teachers at predominately Latina/o high schools teach literacy and subsequently influence the success of Latina/o students at college. It is based on a year and a half study of seven Latina/o students making transition from a high school to a community college or university on the U.S.–Mexico border.