News
August 2008
Upcoming Talk
On Thursday October 9th, 2008, the Children’s Literature Program speaker series continues with a talk by Professor Karen Sánchez-Eppler, professor of American Studies and English at Amherst College. She is the author of Dependent States: The Child’s Part in Nineteenth-Century American Culture (University of Chicago Press, 2005). Her talk will trace how American children have historically recycled literary materials such as The Swiss Family Robinson for their own creative purposes.
Please come! The talk will take place at 4:00 p.m. in CL 501.
New Core Course Offered
The Children's Literature Program is delighted to announce the addition of a new “core” course, EngLit 0655: Representing Adolescence. This class will be offered for the first time in Spring 2009. Certificate students now have a choice between taking either “EngLit 0562: Childhood’s Books” OR “EngLit 0655: Representing Adolescence.” (Whichever one you don’t take can then be taken as a Category One elective, if you like.)
We hope that this course will enhance our Program’s appeal to all you students out there who are considering careers in secondary education! We would like to see more of you in our classes.
Congratulations to Anna Redcay!
The Children's Literature Program is delighted to announce that Pitt graduate
student Anna Redcay, a PhD candidate in the English Department, has won the 2008
Graduate Student Essay Award, a national prize awarded annually by the Children's
Literature Association. Ms. Redcay received her prize and presented her paper-
entitled "Winnie-the-Pooh and Reality, Too: Why A. A. Milne is Not the End of an
Era"-at the Children's Literature Association Conference in June 2008.
Our Children's Literature Program was very well represented at this conference,
since Pitt undergrad Paige Carlson was also on hand to receive the Carol Gay Award
for the best undergraduate paper of the year, and Pitt graduate student A. Robin
Hoffman presented her work on Edward Gorey and chaired a panel that featured Pitt
professor Marah Gubar, Director of the Children's Literature Program.
Congratulations to Anna and Paige for their prize-winning work!
Prize Winners Announced
The faculty and staff of the English Department and the Children's Literature Program congratulate the winners of the Best Undergraduate Essay in Children’s Literature contest for 2008:
Mariko Turk, First Prize, for “Imposition, Resistance, and Transformation: Postcolonial Theory and 17 Things I’m Not Allowed to Do Anymore”
Paige Carlson, Honorable Mention, for “Harry Panoptic: The Boy Who Saw”
Jeffrey Connelly, Honorable Mention, for “Sex Education: Hogwarts as a Genderizing Institution in Harry Potter”
Vincent D’Alesio, Honorable Mention, for “Constructions of Childhood and Peter Pan”
Congratulations to all participants!
April 2008
Calling all Harry Potter Fans
On Thursday April 3, 2008 Professor Laurie Langbauer from UNC-Chapel Hill will speak on “Fantasies of Children’s Literature. July 23, 2008 s Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events. Please come! The talk will take place at 4:00 p.m. in CL 501.
Celebrate your certificate!
If you are about to graduate with a Children’s Literature Certificate, please come to a party on Friday April 18th at 3 PM in CL 512.
This event will honor the winners of this year’s Undergraduate Children’s Literature Paper Prize, but it is also meant to celebrate the achievements of all of our certificate students.
Any student working toward the certificate is welcome to attend. Food and drink will be served. Please join us!
Summer sociology course
If you’re around this summer, consider taking Kimberly Creasap’s SOC 0438: Sociology of the Family, offered during the first summer session.
This course fulfills the “Category 2” elective requirement, and it sounds like a lot of fun. Here’s how Dr. Creasap describes it: “This course is an introduction to the Sociology of Families, an area of sociological inquiry that has traditionally focused on the nuclear family model.
“This course will provide an alternative approach, by which we will examine the many different forms that contemporary families take in 21st century societies. The primary goal of this course is to give students an opportunity to engage with key issues, questions, and debates related to contemporary families in various cultural settings.
“Significant emphasis will be placed on examining family through the lenses of gender, race, class, sexuality, and nationality.”
If you have questions about this course, contact her at kac130@pitt.edu.
Congratulations to Paige Carlson!
The Children’s Literature Program is delighted to announce that Pitt undergrad Paige Carlson has won the Carol Gay Award, a national prize given annually by the Children’s Literature Association for the best undergraduate paper on children’s literature.
Paige’s winning paper was entitled “Harry Panoptic: The Boy Who Saw.” She was nominated by Dr. Lori Campbell, and has also studied with Kerry Mockler and Courtney Weikle-Mills.
You may recall that Pitt undergrad Carolyn Blythe Giles won this award last year, so the Pitt Children’s Literature Program must be doing something right! Congratulations, Paige, on this great honor!
NEW TALK SERIES - The Children’s Literature Program is delighted to announce two upcoming lectures in our brand new talk series. Alok Yadav will give a lecture entitled "Reading Kipling's Kim: Ideological Criticism and the Literary Artifact" at 2 PM on Wednesday January 23rd in 501 CL. And Professor Laurie Langbauer from UNC-Chapel Hill will speak at 4 PM on Thursday April 3rd, also in 501 CL (topic TBA).
LITERATURE REQUIREMENT - The Children’s Literature Program is pleased to announce that beginning in Fall 2008, “EngLit 0560: Children and Culture” will fulfill the General Education requirement for Literature (LIT; sometimes also referred to as “Lit One”). Please encourage your friends who are not enrolled in the program to consider taking this course to fulfill their LIT requirement!
September, 2007 – The Children’s Literature Program is delighted to announce that Pitt undergrad Carolyn Blythe Giles has won the Carol Gay Award, a national prize given annually by the Children’s Literature Association for the best undergraduate paper on children’s literature. Carolyn presented her winning paper—“Perpetuating Inequality Through Special Education in Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key”—at the Children’s Literature Association’s annual conference at Christopher Newport University in June 2007. Congratulations, Carolyn, on this great honor!!!
April, 2007 – If you’re around this summer, consider taking Dr. Jane Feuer’s six-week, first summer session course EngLit 1480: YOUTH FILM. This course fulfills the Category 1 elective requirement, and it sounds like a lot of fun. Here’s how Dr. Feuer describes it:
“From Wild Boys of the Road in 1933 to High School Musical in 2006, Hollywood has made films about teenagers. This course will look at the best, the most compelling and the most controversial of them, concentrating on the 1950s, the 1980s, and the 1990s to the present. We will compare “girl teenpics” and “boy teenpics,” look at gay and lesbian teen films, and at African-American ones. At the end of the course, we will consider television’s treatment of teenagers. Films/programs to be screened may include: Rebel Without a Cause, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Clueless, Dazed and Confused, Heathers, Dawson’s Creek, My So-Called Life, Buffy, Freaks and Geeks, Veronica Mars, and others.”
April, 2007 - The faculty and staff of the English department and Children's Literature program want to congratulate the winners of the Best Undergraduate Essay in Children's Literature contest for 2006-
7/23/08
ong>Emily Chiarizio - First Prize (Tie) - $150 for
"Fruit and Honey”
Carolyn Blythe Giles - First Prize (Tie) - $150 for
"Perpetuating Inequality Through Special Education in Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key”
Mariko Turk - Honorable Mention - $100 for
"Sleeping and Waking in Nicholas Nickleby and ‘The Chimney Sweeper’”
Katie Tighe - Honorable Mention - $100 for
"The Blurring of Sexual Norms and the Liberation of Sexual Identity in Boy Meets Boy”
Congratulations to all participants!
March 2007 -
Children's Literature Awards Ceremony - This year's prize for the Best Undergraduate Essay on Children's Literature will be awarded at a ceremony at noon on Friday April 20th in the English Department seminar room in 526 CL. Pizza will be served. All students planning to earn a Children's Literature Certificate are welcome to attend. Please join us!
Children's Literature Category 2 Elective - If you still need a Category 2 elective in order to fulfill your children's literature certificate, and you are interested in multicultural literature, consider taking Professor Amanda Thein's course next fall: IL 1246 “Theory & Practice: Multicultural Literature.”
Professor Thein says, "This course will focus on teaching diverse literature in K-12 classrooms. We’ll read several literary texts and also read pedagogical theory about how to implement texts in the classroom. It would be a fun course for anyone who’s thinking about teaching English or anyone in the Children’s Lit program. I've opened 10 slots up to undrgraduates. Feel free to give out my email to anyone who would like more information".
Contact Information:
Amanda Thein, Ph. D.
Assistant Professor of English Education
University of Pittsburgh
athein@pitt.edu
June, 2006 - Certificates will be mailed out in late July 2006 to those students who have recently graduated and have successfully completed the course work and requirements necessary to earn a Children's Literature certificate.
April, 2006 - The faculty and staff of the English department and Children's Literature program want to congratulate the winners of the Best Undergraduate Essay in Children's Literature contest for 2005/2006. They are:
Chad B. Allen - First Prize - $250 for
"No Sense Makes Sense: The Reason Behind the Nonsense of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"Margot Canfield - Honorable Mention - $100 for
"The Danger of Obsessive Relationships in The Birchbark House"Evan Berry - Honorable Mention - $100 for
"Alex: A Child Who Kills"
Congratulations to all participants.
April, 2005 - The Children's Literature Program is pleased to announce the winners of The Best Undergraduate Essay on Children's Literature for 2004/2005. They are:
Michael-Lynne Tallon - First Place for
her essay "The Princess Diaries: Disney's Role in the Culture Industry" written for Eng Lit 0560 Children and CultureJaclyn Logue - Honorable Mention for
her essay "The Power of Transparency in Enders' Game" written for Eng Lit 1645 Critical Approaches to Children's LiteratureCarolyn Anton - Honorable Mention for
her essay "Picture Books vs. Comics - are they One and the Same, are they Valuable?" written for Eng Lit 0560 Children and Culture
Congratulations to all participants.
Events
TBA