The Scarlet Newsletter – Page 14 – Department of English

Continuous Learning: An Interview with Abraham Smith

April 23, 2015

As an MFA student at The University of Alabama, Abraham Smith spent his time honing his craft as a writer. Now, as an Instructor in the Department of English, Smith says he continues to learn every day. When he’s not in the classroom teaching, Smith can be found writing. With plenty of publications under his belt, including four books of poetry, Smith practices what he learned while a student at UA. Recently, I sat down with Smith to chat about […]

The Language of Writing: An Interview with Kevin Waltman

April 23, 2015

The office hours start early for Kevin Waltman. He leaves Coker, Alabama at the crack of dawn and arrives on campus in time to enjoy a silent office on the second floor of Morgan Hall. He prepares for his classes and even writes a few more pages in his novel Slump, the second in his Young Adult series. His commute to campus may seem long, but his journey away from his native Indiana was longer and ultimately triggered teaching and […]

An Interview with Professor Emily Wittman

April 23, 2015

Dr. Emily Ondine Wittman is an Associate Professor in the Department of English at The University of Alabama. She is the Director of the Program in Comparative and World Literature, has served as a Distinguished Teaching Fellow in the College of Arts & Sciences from 2010 to 2013, and was the recipient of the university-wide Outstanding Commitment to Teaching Award in 2010. She got her B.A. in Philosophy at Yale and her Ph.D. in Comparative Literature at Princeton. A prolific […]

Spring 2015: Masthead

April 23, 2015

The Scarlet Newsletter is a production of the Department of English at The University of Alabama. “An Interview with Professor Emily Wittman” By Ashlynn Long “The Language of Writing: An Interview with Kevin Waltman” By Melissa Pollard “Continuous Learning: An Interview with Abraham Smith” By Alice Deters “UA Crimson Spotlight: Get to Know Professor Jennifer Drouin” By Ty Pulliam “Another Great Year Learning Teen Shakespeare” By Claire Gallo “Brian Oliu: English Instructor” By Jack Sewell “Hali Felt: English Professor” By Nicole […]

What We’re Reading

November 27, 2014

Ray Wachter After teaching the EN 102 “Advancing Mind & Body” course several years in a row, I became interested in researching and writing a general nonfiction book about the mind-body connection. Since then, my reading has expanded into some really fun areas. My first new author in this realm was Bruce Lipton, a former academic who taught Cell Biology at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine. I’m really fascinated by his theories of “epigenetics” and its implications for […]

What We’re Writing

November 27, 2014

Albert Pionke Of late, I have been writing about two mid-nineteenth-century novels: the first is a book that almost no one has ever read, William North’s The City of the Jugglers (1850); whereas the second is one that almost everyone has been assigned to read, Charles Dickens’s Hard Times (1854). The first imagines a commodities market for human souls leading to a writers’ strike that precipitates the fall of the British government. The second, written in the context of an […]

The Robert Milton Young Memorial Lecture

November 27, 2014

In March, The University of Alabama Department of English hosted the Robert Milton Young Memorial Lecture, a bi-annual lecture that pays tribute to Dr. Robert Young, a beloved professor who passed away in early 2010. This year’s speaker, Dr. Robert Reid-Pharr (photo above) presented his keynote lecture at The University of Alabama on “Pagan Spain.” The organizer and host of the Robert Milton Young Memorial Lecture, Dr. Yolanda Manora, was a colleague and friend of Dr. Young. She offers a […]

Such Sweet Shakespeare: UA’s Shakespeare and American Integration Symposium

November 27, 2014

Last November, The University of Alabama played host to the “Shakespeare and American Integration” a symposium linking two topics that, at first glance, may seem dissimilar through an unlikely musical commonality. I had the opportunity to sit down with Professor Sharon O’Dair, director of the Hudson Strode Program and organizer of the symposium, for an enlightening discussion of the event. Could you briefly describe the symposium? “Shakespeare and American Integration” began a discussion that we hope will continue about how […]

Sally Rodgers: MFA Candidate

November 27, 2014

Sally Rodgers, a graduate student from Tuscon, Arizona, pursuing her MFA in Poetry discusses her time here at UA. Through her work with the university’s Writers in the Schools program she is able to share her passion for English with the children of the Tuscaloosa community. During her undergraduate career, Sally switched majors from Linguistics to Philosophy, before beginning her MFA program in English and Creative Writing. Sally really enjoys working with children in helping them to expand their writing […]

Shakespeare in Our Backyard

November 27, 2014

The Rude Mechanicals combines the famous workings of Shakespeare with the warm and open summer evenings of The Park at Manderson Landing to create a one of a kind live show for Tuscaloosa residents. The Rude Mechanicals were formed in 2003, by then directing graduate student Andre LaSalle and Tuscaloosa News journalist Mark Hughes Cobb who both shared the same passions for writing and Shakespeare. They set out with the intention of only producing one show that summer, A Midsummer […]