Rowan Writing Arts Events Update: Week of February 3, 2020

Breaking News:
Tentative Date, Location(s) Released for 2020 Gess Awards
Pending final confirmation, the 2020 Denise Gess Literary Awards will be presented on Thursday, April 16 during a ceremony at either the new Rowan University Welcome Center on Rowan Boulevard or the Edelman Planetarium in Science Hall. Once the details are approved, the entry submission deadline along with other salient information will be publicized. The competition, named in honor of the late Writing Arts Associate Professor Denise Gess (left), offers cash awards of $200 for first place, $100 for second and $50 for third in the categories of poetry, short fiction, and creative nonfiction. All currently enrolled Rowan undergraduate and graduate students are eligible to submit their original work for consideration and entries by the same student are allowed in more than one genre.
 
Colleague Corner:

• Popper the Poltergeist and The Greenbriar Ghost, the latest books from Megan Atwood were published on January 1. They’re both part of the Real Life Ghost Stories series. Megan has another book, Attack of the Deadly Diapers, due out in March.
• “Noise over signal: Phonography culture as participatory,” an article written by Jason Luther with Patrick Williams from Syracuse University, was published in the January issue of SoundEffects, an open-access, international, peer-reviewed sound studies journal from the Danish Research Council of Humanities and The Royal Danish Library.
• “Transnational Networks of Literacy and Materiality: Coltan, Sexual Violence, and Digital Literacy,” by Rachael Shapiro, was published in the November 2019 issue of College English. (Note: The link is to a 625-word sample.)
• Three new humor articles from Keri Mikulski hit the internet in the last few weeks: “It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like Flu Season: Holiday Songs as Heard by the Health-Anxious” on the Robot Butt website, “Quiz: Are These Family Gifts Third-Party Seller Garbage, or Legit Holiday Treasure?” from Points In Case, and “Normal Reaction to The Rise of Skywalker” from humorwriters.org, a publication of the Erma Bombeck Writers Workshop at the University of Dayton.

---

Writing Arts Winter Retreat Offers Unique Opportunities 
The success of January’s Rowan Writing Arts Winter Retreat could presage future, more robust events, said department chair Drew Kopp at last week’s department meeting. Eighteen students spent the weekend of January 10-12 at the Pendle Hill Resort in Wallingford, Delaware County, PA fully immersed in writing, reviewing, and reading their own creative works. “The only thing that could make this retreat better is making it longer,” one attendee offered, adding that they wished they could have earned more credits from an even-longer stay. Each student received one credit for the experience, but that was – judging by other comments – just one of many benefits reaped by the students. Thank you to Jade Jones for her work organizing the Retreat and for joining fellow faculty members Megan Atwood, Lanre Akinsiku, and Heather Lanier in presenting a series of fun and informative seminars on poetry, kid lit, fiction, and creative nonfiction.
 
Remembering Thomas N Bantivoglio
Rowan lost a champion of education excellence and a major financial benefactor when Thomas N. Bantivoglio died in late January at age 92. In addition to being the namesake of the university’s Honors Program, Mr. Bantivoglio was a graduate of Princeton University and Harvard Law School who worked for more than 50 years at the Haddonfield law firm now known as Archer & Greiner, P.C. He also was, his family noted in his obituary, an enthusiastic oenophile and gastrophile. 
Do you have a new publication, a reading, or any other event of interest coming up? Please let me know so I can let our colleagues know in the weekly Rowan Writing Arts Events Update newsletter. Stop by Victoria 521 or email me at [email protected] to give me the 4-1-1.
 
Access Events Update online by clicking here.
 
​Stephen A. Royek M.A.
Lecturer, Writing Arts
Rowan University
Chair, Faculty Senate Awards Committee
Lecturer Representative, Faculty Center Advisory Board
     Victoria Hall, Room 521
     Phone: 856-906-4755
     Email: [email protected] 

---