Lit Grad Liddick in Iraq

Shane D. Liddick hasn't wasted any time after graduating from SDSU last year with a Master's in English.  Since October Liddick has been on assignment in Haditha, Iraq as a reporter for San Diego Magazine, and in the last few weeks has written freelance articles for Huffington Post.  

Liddick worked a few years as sports writer and investigative reporter in Florida and Oregon before moving to San Diego where found work writing award-winning articles for both San Diego Magazine and San Diego City Beat.  

Now with a few years of training from SDSU faculty, Liddick shows his credentials in his recent articles detailing the personal accounts of men and women serving in Iraq.  Go here to access articles and photos from his recent assignment.  

Neatorama.com on Famous Author Friendships!

Click here for the skinny!

Lannan Recipient Kaminsky

Ilya Kaminsky, Assistant Professor of English and Comparative Literature, and a key member of our Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing faculty is the recipient of a $100,000 Lannan Foundation 2008 Literary Foundation Fellowship in Poetry.

The awards recognize writers who have made significant contributions to English-language literature. The fellowships recognize writers of distinctive literary merit who demonstrate potential for continued outstanding work.

Congratulations Ilya!

NEA Awards Maggie Jaffe $25,000

English department lecturer Maggie Jaffe, who is known for her courses in Latin American literature, poetry, and creative writing is now also one of our nation's 2009 NEA poetry fellowship recipients. She has been selected to received a $25,000 award from The National Endowment for the Arts.

Professor Herman Writes on the Significance of the Physical Book

You may have already read Professor Peter Herman's defense of tangible, energy independent, and timeless books in The New York Times. If not, here's another opportunity to reconsider the paper and ink bound book, irreplaceable by the digital and downloaded.

Read Kendricks Column, PHOTO OPS in the Union-Tribune!

Filmmaker, artist, photographer, writer, Film Curator of the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego and SDSU lecturer Neil Kendricks has been commissioned to write a new column, PHOTO OPS for the San Diego Union-Tribune. The column will be published every two to three months in the paper's books section. Kendricks describes it as "what I hope will be a comprehensive and engaging column for photographers and artists, photography enthusiasts and general readers alike, who share a passion for delving into the best and most innovative new volumes focused on photography-oriented issues coming from such respected publishers as Aperture, among others." In the first installment, Kendrick reviews the book "Magnum Magnum" which he explains is a a "compendium of legendary photojournalists at the top of their game."

Professor Griswold Reviews Novel for NY Times

Professor Jerry Griswold reviewed M.T. Anderson's “The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing” for New York Times' Sunday Book Review on November 7th, 2008. His review entitled "The War for Independence" compellingly synopsizes the narrative by describing both the novel's aesthetic and intellectual merits. The adolescent novel that Anderson wrote deals with racial relations in revolution era America, among other intriguing subjects. Griswold also describes the impetus inspiring Anderson's project. That is, "the 900 pages [of the volume] have essentially been a meditation on the word “liberty.” It was a term bandied about so much during the Revolution that it became meaningless."

Our First Online Poll: Spring 2009 Classes!

All,

The department messed up (the Chair!) and left a section of English 580, Writing of Poetry off the Spring 2009 list of courses! Can you assist us by taking this poll! Send the chair an email if you want to sign up for a crash list to ADD a section of 580 to the Spring 2009 list of classes!

Cast Your Vote

CRISIS CARNIVAL 2009 ANNOUNCED

The theme for the 16th annual Crisis Carnival has been decided upon, and submissions for the mid-April event are being accepted now until the end of January. Crisis Carnival is an interdisciplinary gradate student conference sponsored by our very own Department of English and Comparative Literature. With a title like THE ECSTASY OF SPEED, this year's conference promises to attract a wide range of accelerating scholars from various fields and institutions.  Hurry up and spread the word, and if you've got something that fits the bill, be sure to rush it on over before your time is up. Visit the Crisis Carnival website instantly for details and up-to-date information.

Jane Hirshfield Rocks the House at SDSU

The Director of our Hugh C. Hyde Living Writers series, the one and only Victoria Featherstone, writes in to report on the success of our last reading for 2008:

Reply-To: Victoria Featherstone
To: "Dr. William A. Nericcio"
Subject: FYI

Dear Bill,

Thought I'd pass this article along to you; I met with the reporter for the Daily Aztec, and the last Tuesday she interviewed Jane Hirshfield. Perhaps you heard that we had an SRO crowd that night in the larger space (LL108), and library personnel had to bring out two more carts of chairs. Luckily we also had many people willing to sit on the floor because that was the only available seating left. Here's the link. Of course, I'd be remiss if I didn't express my gratitude to Ilya Kaminsky and Sandra Alcosser for their support of this event.

Best,
Victoria

New Logo Test Run...

click to enlarge; comments welcome!

Charles Hatfield at SDSU, November 6, 2008 Speaking on KAMANDI!!!!