This blog was supposed to be all about my first experience taking students on a faculty-led study abroad course called “Mexico: Cultural Exploration Beyond the Border.” I would have returned from the adventure on May 27th, and my plan was to construct this blog from vibrant, colorful pictures and fresh journal notes. Unfortunately, the coronavirus
A Shakespeare Student wrestles with the Pandemic of Selfishness
The final project for “Shakespeare In Performance” asked students to create their own “green worlds” and characters who would enter these other worlds and come out changed. Kaitlyn Cool used her project as an opportunity to think critically about the COVID-19 outbreak and the pandemic of corruption it has unleashed. She created a tyrant king,
Andrew Kruse-Ross (1977-2020)
The English Department family lost a wonderful alumnus on New Year’s Day when Andrew Kruse-Ross (graduated December 2000), died suddenly and far too soon. His wife, UM-Flint alumna Aimee Suzanne (Long), said the cause was a genetic pulmonary embolism. Andrew was forty-two years old. Older faculty may remember him as good-natured, friendly, occasionally goofy, and possessed of the most
The Pedagogy of Pilgrimage
The academic field of English literature is disappearing for lack of workers: fewer students are declaring English as a major, causing literature faculty to pick up work in other disciplines. But perhaps our field is merely going through a fallow phase. Maybe we are being called to push aside, for the time being, our books
As You Like Flint
Since the water crisis hit Flint, researchers and journalists have tried to tell Flint’s story. Outsiders have capitalized in one way or another off the tragedy that effected the city’s people. Due to many stories revolving around Flint and its misfortunes, researchers and reporters have sent out a message that plagues Flint with a bad
Melancholy & Memes
Students, are you feeling isolated, overwhelmed, swamped with reading, and even a little depressed? Robert Burton, a seventeenth-century writer, working in what he called a “scribbling age,” wrote a massive tome, The Anatomy of Melancholy, to cure his own depression. His send-up of students and scholars who sit and sit and read and read, neglecting
Amy Hartwig, 1980-2018
The English Department at the University of Michigan-Flint mourns the sudden loss of a dear colleague and friend: Amy Hartwig. There is an acute pain to this loss as Amy majored in English with a specialization in literature. Before she went on to do great things for the College, she was, in a sense, “ours.”
Two Books in Spring
Professors Mary Jo Kietzman and Fred Svoboda have new books out this year. They are The Biblical Covenant in Shakespeare (Palgrave Macmillan) and Understanding John Updike (U of South Carolina).
It’s Summer Reading Time! (if summer ever comes)
Once upon a time there was a series of blog posts that demonstrated that English Department faculty did other things besides write syllabi and take too long returning student work. Now, after far too long a break, Who Are These People, Anyway? returns with shocking revelations about what we plan to read this summer as
A Different Kind of Book-Burning
Chair’s note: The following is a guest post by Brian Gebhart, one of our majors. I think he makes a strong case for taking English Studies seriously. It is my hope that you, dear reader, will agree. When I applied to college, I had to write a number of essays. It comes with the territory,