Category: News

English Department Inaugurates Holloway Postdoctoral Fellowship in Poetry and Poetics

The English Department has recently launched the Holloway Postdoctoral Fellowship in Poetry and Poetics, a one-year position for recent PhDs that allows them to further both their creative and critical projects. This year we have three Fellows: Margaret Ronda, Jessica Fisher and Jeremy Ecke. In what follows, the three poet-scholars talk about their current projects, the importance of this Fellowship and what makes Berkeley an especially rich place to write poetry and criticism.Read full post…

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Wheeler Hall Protest, A message from Department Chair Samuel Otter

On Friday November 20th, Wheeler Hall, the home of the English Department, was the scene of protest, as students took over classrooms on the second floor, and of a standoff between police and demonstrators across barricades in front of the building. The day was tense, and there were outbreaks of violence but, it appears, no major injuries. There will be inquiries into the use of force by the police. The following links to The New York Times, the San Francisco Chronicle, and the Daily Cal (with photos and video) provide details about the day’s events.

New York Times article

San Francisco Chronicle article

Daily Cal: Wheeler Hall Occupation Ends Peacefully

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A Conversation with David Corvo ’72

CorvoOn Monday, November 9, the English department continued its series, “Conversations with Distinguished Alumni,” in a discussion with alumnus David Corvo ’72, who is currently the Executive Producer of the prime time news magazine Dateline NBC. He was joined by Department Chair Sam Otter and Professor Namwali Serpell, who spoke with him about the the relationship between his study of English at Berkeley and his success as a broadcast journalist. [Read full post…]

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“Robert Burns, 1759-2009: A Colloquium”

Graduate student Catherine Cronquist Browning attended the colloquium the English Department hosted to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the poet Robert Burns’ birth. What follows is a short summary of the day.

Five leading scholars in the field of Scottish Romanticism, Leith Davis, Janet Sorensen, Steve Newman, Ian Duncan, and Carol McGuirk, delivered current work on Burns to an audience of assorted faculty, graduate students, undergradutes, and other members of the department community. In fact, Wheeler 300 was packed full of eager listeners, with those who came later finding seats on tables and the floor to enjoy the rich program!

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Commencement Address by Nuruddin Farah: “A Fork in the Fork of the Footpath”

farahNuruddin Farah—among the foremost of contemporary African writers, author of numerous novels including the trilogies Variations on the Theme of An African Dictatorship and Blood in the Sun, and recipient of the 1998 Neustadt International Prize for Literature—delivered this year’s English Department commencement address at the Greek Theatre on May 16. You’ll find the text below the fold.

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