The Weekly: Undergraduate News
for the week of 8/24/2020
Coming to your inbox Mondays
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From the
Director of Undergraduate Studies
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Greetings, everyone, and welcome to our first undergraduate newsletter. We’ll be sending these out every Monday as a digest of information, opportunities, and deadlines for the coming week, and a forecast of the weeks further out.
Let me begin by making a couple of introductions. Professor Rebecca Rainof, a scholar of Victorian and Modern literature, is serving as the department’s Outreach Coordinator this year; you will no doubt already have heard from her about the succès fou of the summer’s book clubs and workshops. And Kelly Lake is our new Undergraduate Administrator. She comes to us from the History Department, but she has studied and taught English and Theater, so her arrival in McCosh is a homecoming of sorts. They will each say a few words of greeting below.
I also want to call particular attention to two items later in the newsletter. The first is the English Department’s statement on anti-racism, which was written by the departmental officers and members of the faculty Executive Committee. It articulates commitments that will inform all of our work together in this demanding, and promising, time. The second is a pair of courses worth your consideration, “Latinx Autobiography,” taught by Professor Monica Huerta, and “Queer Reading,” co-taught by Professor Christina León and advanced graduate student RL Goldberg. There are places in both, and lucky the student who takes advantage.
Finally, you’ll see below, on the junior and senior calendars, an invitation to a welcome-back gathering at 5:15 this Friday. Please join us for a presentation of the summer’s work on podcasts and the Lit Review, and for some virtual mingling with fellow students and faculty. We’ll circulate a zoom invitation later in the week.
I myself am returning as DUS for the year, having served in the role a decade ago. It is a uniquely challenging moment for the department and the university. May we meet the challenges with energy and optimism. You can see a lot that you couldn’t see before, when everything is turned inside out—so we have work to do together, and now is the time to do it.
Director of Undergraduate Studies
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From the
Outreach Coordinator
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I'm delighted to be Outreach Coordinator this year. I'll be helping with programs, events, and advising that help us connect.
Please stay tuned this fall for a PU Press Workshop, a Graduate School Admissions Workshop for undergrads, a Majors Open House, as well as a Common Works Lecture and Reading Group series. The department will also be debuting a new podcast show, a lit review for showcasing student work, as well as offering a range of bootcamps, study sessions, and social hours.
If you have ideas for events, questions about how to join in, or simply would like to say hello—please don't hesitate to contact me. I'll also be having virtual tea time office hours during the term. I look forward to meeting all of you and working together.
Outreach Coordinator
Outreach Calendar
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From the
Undergraduate Administrator
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Welcome! This will be my first year with the English Department, and I am thrilled to be working with you all.
Please see me regarding your course and degree progress needs, help with S.A.F.E. funding, and any general questions about the English Department. Happy to help! You may reach me via email, phone, or zoom.
Undergraduate Administrator
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Department of English
Statement on Anti-Racism
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The Princeton English Department supports and actively seeks to promote anti-racism within and beyond our teaching and research. We join with all people of conscience in the United States and across the world in condemning the police violence that has taken so many Black lives, and we mourn the loss of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Atatiana Jefferson, Aura Rosser, Freddie Gray, Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, Tanisha Anderson, Trayvon Martin, and many, many more.
We also celebrate the potential and the power of the teaching, writing, and scholarship of faculty, graduate students, and undergraduates to dismantle racism and challenge white supremacy past and present. As critical readers of literary texts, we confront firsthand how these values are created and defended. We also have access to a vast store of rich, moving, heart-breaking, and joyful stories in which we can witness the destruction of racist practices and ideologies.
We strive for active anti-racism in our classrooms and our scholarship as a means of raising awareness and changing consciousness. We seek to investigate racist beliefs and practices with rigor and compassion. We emphasize our determination to join together in this anti-racist work—work that has too often been carried mostly by Black, Indigenous, Latinx, Asian and Pacific Islanders, and other people of color. We believe such work can be done most successfully together, in community, with freedom and shared values.
In this work we confront literary study’s long history as a prop to the worst forces of imperialism and nationalism, and its role in underwriting crimes of slavery and discrimination. Such a history compels us to continually reflect on how we read and teach literature and to actively dissociate literary studies from their colonial and racist uses. With renewed urgency, we can read the long history of dissidence and free imagination that is the best legacy of books across time and tradition. In this work we will depend upon the vast energies of writers now writing, in whose words the causes of abolition and racial justice burn with wisdom and exigency.
Simon Gikandi (Chair)
Sophie Gee (Associate Chair)
Eduardo Cadava (Director of Graduate Studies)
Jeff Dolven (Director of Undergraduate Studies)
and members of the Executive Committee:
Diana Fuss
Christina León
Paul Nadal
Sarah Rivett
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- Aug. 24, at 7:30 am Undergraduate Academic Year Sign-In Period
- Aug. 27, at 6:30 am Undergraduate Add/Drop BEGINS
- Aug. 28 at 5:15 - 6:00 pm Welcome Event (Zoom)
- Aug. 31 at 8:00 am Fall 2020 Semester BEGINS
- Sept. 7 - Labor Day - Classes Meet as Scheduled
- Sept. 11 at 11:59 pm Undergraduate Deadline to Add/Drop without Fee
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- Aug. 28 at 5:15 - 6:00 pm WELCOME EVENT (Zoom)
- Sept. 10 at 4:30 pm Juniors Meet with DUS (Zoom)
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- Aug. 28 at 5:15 - 6:00 pm WELCOME EVENT (Zoom)
- Sept. 10 at 5:30 pm Seniors Meet with DUS (Zoom)
- Oct. 1 - Topic Sheet Deadline. Guidelines found here
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NEW & EXCITING DEPARTMENT NEWS: |
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Keep your eye out for the Lit Review
and Podcasts!
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THERE'S A NEW CALENDAR AVAILABLE:
Access Princeton's Virtual Activities Calendar
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Access Nassau Street Sampler's Schedule HERE
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FALL 2020 COURSES TO CONSIDER |
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ENG 408/ GSS 415/ AMS 418:
Queer Literatures:
Theory, Narrative, and Aesthetics
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ENG 408/ GSS 415/ AMS 418:
Queer Literatures:
Theory, Narrative, and Aesthetics
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This course will read from various trajectories of queer literature and engage "reading queerly" across race, gender, ability, class, and geography. We will consider the etymology of queer and think through its affiliate terms: lesbian, gay, bisexual, and trans. How are such narratives encounters with power that are historically situated in relation to the national formations, carceral states, and racial capitalism?
ENG Major Distribution Area: Difference & Diversity. Questions should be directed to caleon@princeton.edu.
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Princeton University Library to launch Study-Browse Service on August 10
Princeton University Library (PUL) will launch a new service, the PUL Study-Browse Service, beginning Aug. 10 with a pilot at Firestone Library. Through an online reservation system, Princeton University students and faculty with an active PUID will be able to book a seat in a designated Library location for a specified period of time. The Library remains closed to the public and other patrons. The start date of the Study-Browse Service at branch libraries and Special Collections will be determined within the coming days. Access to Special Collections is not available at this time. More information.
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Book Pickup and Digitization
Additionally, the Princeton University Library is offering new services to give you access to library materials while the library buildings are closed: book pickup and digitization.
NOTE: The Library is preparing for an anticipated increase in requests for digitized materials needed for teaching in the fall. Please keep this in mind when requesting digitization of research material.
When you search for a title in the library Catalog (https://catalog.princeton.edu/), the record for a printed book will show a new button called Request Pick-up or Digitization for all materials in Firestone and branch libraries that are available for pickup and digitization.
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When you click the button, you will be asked to login with your Princeton netid.
Successful login will take you to a second screen:
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If you choose Digitization Request, you will be routed to the Article Express interface. From there, click “Logon to ILLiad”. This will open a new page; from there, click “Submit Request”. The digital scan will be sent to your Princeton University email.
If you choose Request this item, you will receive an email confirmation that the pickup request has been received. When the item is ready for pickup, you will receive an email alerting you when to stop by the appropriate library during pickup hours. You can retrieve the item just outside the library doors. The exact location may vary across buildings. All locations have relevant signage in place.
Because this service is now available, our access to the HathiTrust Emergency Temporary Access Service (ETAS) has been discontinued. The more limited access to HathiTrust we enjoyed prior to the shutdown remains available.
Please let us know if you have any questions about this process. And, as always, we remain at your service for any purchase requests or research assistance.
Have Questions? Please contact our librarian:
(609) 258-3296
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Department of English
22 McCosh Hall
Princeton, NJ 08544
(609) 258-4061
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