Work Sighted is a monthly newsletter published by the Humanities divison that fosters and supports the literary culture at and around Norwich University.
Sigma Tau Delta Begins Fund Drive for Greek Insignia
Members of Sigma Tau Delta, the national honor society for English majors and minors, are raising money to have the organization’s Greek emblem cast in marble to mark the entrance to Webb Hall. Read more »
Death, the Maiden, and Batman
I’m an English major, and (please don’t tell anyone) I like comic books. I like them for a lot of reasons, and I feel compelled to form an elaborate argument for the literary and social value of the “graphic novel,” or why pop-lit should be considered a legitimate field of study, but then I wouldn’t really be explaining why I like them. No, I wouldn’t be saying that I really like them because they’re primarily concerned with sex and violence, and the point at which the two will inevitably intersect. I wouldn’t be explaining that contemporary audiences find sex and violence to be the most entertaining topics to read, write, or talk about, and that anyone who’s ever seen a couple hours of Fox News can tell you that. And I certainly wouldn’t be saying that if given a choice between Batman and Beowulf, I’d take Batman every time. Read more »
The Teaching Chronicles: It’s No Nine to Fiver
Fourteen weeks have passed since I began student teaching and the expectations that I had at the start are gone and have been replaced by new ideals. As with all expectations, reality doesn’t always fulfill them. When I began student teaching I optimistically believed students would have a strong degree of self motivation. I was one of those naïve teachers who thought that when a student realized that their academic progress was poor, they would in some way attempt to improve it. Read more »
What Do English Minors Do?
My middle school field trips gave museums an unfortunate reputation. While my classmates and I would file into one, gray haired old ladies would tell us not to touch the displays and gave boring lectures. My job at the new Norwich Sullivan Museum and History Center, however, has given me a whole new perspective. For starters, the facility is filled with tons of questions, a few answers, and even more stories. My boss is Marielle Fortier, the registrar. She’s 28, listens to Bob Marley, and loves maps, so she’s the furthest thing from a gray haired old lady. Plus, she knows everything! Read more »
Olmstead Allows Travel Beyond the Material World
Whether it’s the undergraduate foreign language requirement, the service learning semester in Tanzania, or the study-abroad program, Norwich is trying to internationalize its students. Given the state of the world, it’s not hard to understand why Americans need to gain first-hand experience of life beyond the borders of the United States. An Olmstead Grant allowed me to spend two weeks in a cultural immersion program in the Republic of Macedonia. It was the most profound experience of my life and confirms the importance of one of Norwich’s goals—that its students leave the country and experience difference. Read more »
Spanglish, Chinglish, Franglais, Denglisch, Europanto? Get the Global Mindset
Our world is becoming ever more inter-connected. Manufacturing, trade, job markets, politics, military operations, evolving languages, cultures, monetary systems… globalization has already had a significant impact on our everyday lives, and I foresee its influence on the lives and careers of current students increasing geometrically in the years to come. Read more »
Pop Peach Holds Court in University’s New Sullivan Museum & History Center
Arthur Wallace Peach, founder of the NU English program, figures large in the university’s new Sullivan Museum and History Center. To the left, on page four, is the panel outlining his multi-faceted tenure at Norwich. Below is a photo of the campus in 1918, the same year Peach was presented with the trophy bearing his name when the school’s football team won the state championship. Both Peach (top row) and Harold “Doc” Martin (bottom row) are circled. Martin was the first African American to enroll as a student at Norwich. Read more »
Graphic Communication in Advanced Composition
The assignment that provoked Mitchell Clapp and Christopher Genetti to generate “The Norwich Language” was relatively routine for Advanced Composition (EN203). We read and discussed several texts that addressed non-verbal communication such as body language, facial expressions, clothing, and the veiling (literal and figurative) of faces. One was a graphic short story about women in Iran who had to wear a veil and whose freedom was very restricted. Read more »
Birding with Romantics Inspires Series of Ornithological Odes
English Romantic Literature (EN372) students have studied the poems of several poets who have written about the song birds that have inspired them. William Wordsworth’s “To the Cuckoo” addresses the bird as a “blithe new-comer” in the first line and a “blessed bird” at the end. We did not know what an English cuckoo sounded like, so we listened to its song on a British Museum recording. We also read Percy Byshe Shelley’s “To a Skylark” while listening to the sky lark and, of course, John Keat’s “Ode to a Nightingale” while listening to the nightingale. Read more »
When Government Tortures: Pegasus Players’ Maiden Rises to a Difficult Production Challenge
Norwich University’s Pegasus Players brought a difficult production to life last month in Dole Auditorium. The play that stirred the campus and brought hundreds of students together to explore the ramifications of government sanctioned torture was Ariel Dorfman’s Death and the Maiden. Although short, the work is packed with challenges to the ideas of justice and revenge. The protagonist, Paulina, has been tortured and raped under the auspices of a dictatorship in an unnamed country, fifteen years prior. Now settled in a beach house with her attorney husband she becomes confronted with her painful past by an unexpected visitor, who she believes to be the man who raped her during her imprisonment. Ironically, the visitor has helped her husband roadside with a flat tire and is brought home by him as a welcome guest. Thrown into this pot of coincidence is the fact that Paulina’s husband, Gerardo, has been recently appointed to a Truth Commission to investigate the crimes of the dictatorship. A Truth Commission that will never prosecute anyone, because no names will come forth from it, only findings of crimes committed. Read more »
Faculty Research Figures in Kreitzberg Library Celebration
Faculty research across the academic disciplines was celebrated in Kreitzberg Library for five days in mid-October. The following are contributions from the Department of English. Read more »
Pop Peach Again Makes Vermont Historical Society News
Arthur Wallace Peach was featured in the spring 2006 issue of the Vermont Historical Society’s news quarterly, In Context, reprinted below with permission. In the “From the Director” column, VHS Director Kevin Graffagnino, explains how the party marking Peach’s 120th birthday, hosted last February by the NU Department of English, prompted him to investigate Peach who also served as director of the VHS upon his retirement from teaching at NU. Read more »
Say What? Globish and Europanto?
Although the Oxford English Dictionary legitimizes 615,000 words as English, “Globish” only has 1500. Why? Because Globish is not a language. According to its “inventor,” Jean-Paul Nerriere, Globish is a tool that an English speaker can use when trying to communicate with a non-English speaker. Globish has an English vocabulary, but also relies on gestures and repetition in order to make sense. For more, on Globish, consult Nerriere’s website www.jpn-globish.com. Read more »
Spanglish: It’s Not English and It’s Not Spanish but It is American
As the Latino population increases in the United States, those whose first language is Spanish have created an “in between” language that bounces off both English and Spanish called Spanglish. Read more »
Ice Fishing, Cottage Dinner, “Dumper’s Dialogue,” and the Blond in the Back Row—The Story Behind the Photo
That’s me in the front row, just turned fourteen, looking considerably more upright than I should. My hands are folded in the manner prescribed at the time. I’m happy to recall my mother’s suggestion that I wear black socks for the class picture. It’s eighth grade graduation, St. Margaret Mary Class of ’61, and all of us (including the guy who sat a year later with the Class of ‘62) are smiling.Read more »
Spot the Professor
A girl in this photograph eventually became a faculty member in the NU English Department. Guess which girl and which faculty member and send an e-mail to pferreir@norwich.edu. Please, responses only from undergraduate English majors and minors. For the answer to last month’s Spot the Professor, as well as to find out the winner and the story behind the photo, turn to page twenty-seven. Read more »
