Monday, February 20, 2012

Meet Allison Belt

A profile of one of the newest members of the English Graduate Program, by Misty Wellman.

Allison, AKA Ping-pong Extraordinaire, completed her undergraduate work at Wheaton College, majoring in Sociology and English. She was born in Murfreesboro, TN, but in adulthood meandered up to Chicago, where she lived for six years and passed her time delivering babies.

She currently lives in Murfreesboro, which she proudly states “used to be the capital of Tennessee,” on a plot of ground measuring over an acre. She uses the space to raise “various vegetables, raspberries, peaches and a few pears – but no partridges.” She shares her abundant crops with “deer, fox, possums and tree rabbits” (your guess as to what those are, is as good as ours). She shares her home with cats and asks that we not hold that tidbit of information against her.

The Writing Track is her chosen path in the English program. She prefers to write creative nonfiction about gardening, birth, animals and “other filthy, wonderful things.” Lucille Clifton is her favorite anything, ever. But, she also enjoys reading Mary Oliver, Flannery O’Conner, William Faulkner, and Claude McKay among others.

Allison is currently a principal and teacher at a rural Rutherford County college-prep high school. She says she’s “very good at giving stern looks, infusing her voice with disappointment and humbling all the male students at ping-pong.” She enrolled at Belmont because “she enjoys stories, the hearing and telling of them, and one day hopes to obliterate the Oxford comma.”

Please join us in welcoming Allison to Belmont and the English Graduate Program!

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Stover Speaks!

The English Club proudly announces its second speaker in the Spring Lecture Series, a set of events designed for students, particularly English majors/minors, to see faculty's work beyond the classroom. On Friday, February 24, Dr. Andrea Stover will deliver her talk, "(Not) Fade Away: Writing the Self Through Time." Dr. Stover will discuss the benefits associated with articulating the self in a diary over time and how it provides relative comfort and a sense of authenticity for some writers, while it causes anxiety and a sense of duplicity in others. The event will run from 10:00-10:50 a.m. in 114 McWhorter Hall, and Personal/Professional Growth convo will be available. Mark your calendars now, and come out to hear Dr. Stover's engaging presentation!

Feeling Critical?

Matt Colbeck, Matt Jones, and Alex Everett are three students at the University of Sheffield who have recently established a new user-generated review site for the creative arts. The site, www.21words.net, encourages writers to post their insights about a variety of creative genres. The creators are interested in building a solid review base for films, books, music, television and games. They feel that undergraduate and graduate arts students are "best placed to provide consistent content as they are at the rockface of emerging and existing creative output." Interested in contributing? Just click the link above, sign up, and get busy reviewing. Submissions do have a strict word limit. Viva la Reviewlution!

Monday, February 13, 2012

Valentine's Bake Sale on Tuesday and Wednesday!

Please join Belmont English majors Tuesday and Wednesday (February 14 and 15) in the lobby of Massey Hall for a two-day bake sale to heighten awareness for this year's Family Literacy Day and to raise funds for Vanderbilt's Pediatric Oncology Unit. Both days, you can stop by and purchase goods baked by the majors and English professors and/or a custom written Valentine. Come satisfy your sweet tooth and contribute to two good causes!