News

Written by Emily Madsen: The Department held its annual English Majors Reception and Awards Ceremony on May 4, 2014. Here is a list of the winners!

Written by Karen Knipschild: Join the Department May 16, 2014, as it celebrates its graduating seniors. 3-5:30 p.m. at the Lowell Inn and Conference Center, 610 Langdon Street.

Written by Emily Madsen: The feature from our spring edition of Annotations that received the largest number of responses by far was the piece on Helen C. White. Many alumni wrote in to tell us about their wonderful interactions with Professor White, and to recount memories of her influence in the Department. We’ve excerpted some of them here.

Written by Emily Madsen: Following our spring edition of Annotations, we received a number of requests that we identify the other members of the faculty in the 1922 photograph of the Department on Bascom Hall’s front steps.

Written by Vanessa Lauber: Brontë Mansfield (’15) spent the summer working with Prof. Susan Bernstein, cataloging the images from an original copy of Dickens’s Our Mutual Friend. Learn more about her time in Special Collections.

Written by Prof. Caroline Levine, Department Chair: The UW-Madison English Department has an unusual new strength. We boast a number of faculty working in the cutting-edge world of “Digital Humanities.” These professors invite students to think about writing as a kind of “design-thinking”; they ask them to think critically about the history of media, and they work with them to develop new media fluencies. In recognition of this departmental strength, we have established two prizes, both of which have been made possible by alumni gifts: outstanding digital media projects by an undergraduate and a graduate student.

Written by Prof. Caroline Levine, Department Chair: When new faculty arrive at the University of Wisconsin on the tenure track, they know that they have to finish a book in five years. And not just any book. It has to make a serious contribution to knowledge, passing through a rigorous process of peer review and earning acceptance at one of the top-ranked university presses. These books allow the English Department to maintain our world-class research profile. This past year’s annual fund paid for two of our star new faculty to make progress in their research.

Written by Prof. Caroline Levine, Department Chair: In the fall of 2012, the English Department’s Annual Fund subsidized a group of undergraduates to see a play they had studied, August Wilson’s Jitney, at the Court Theatre in Chicago.

Written by Prof. Caroline Levine, Department Chair: Since the English major is huge and doesn’t always feel like a cohesive community, MUSE is a really important vehicle for building undergraduate community. And MUSE has been just terrific.

“The Great Gatsby,” by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is one of English professor David Zimmerman’s favorite novels. In advance of the May 10 release of Baz Luhrmann’s new film, Zimmerman shares insights about the book and its characters, as well as the song (see below) he plays to his students about the beautiful illusions of the infamous Jay Gatsby.