Eleven graduate students from the English Department at California State University, Fresno are heading for the Multiethnic Literature of the U.S. Conference in April but nine will first present their papers on campus from 11 a.m.-4 p.m. on Friday, March 27, in Peters Business Building, Room 194.

The Fresno presentations, “A Century of Asian American Literature,” are free and open to the public.

“Attendees may offer questions or comments or just come and show your silent support for these students who will be giving Fresno State high visibility at this year's MELUS,” said Dr. James E. Walton, chair of the English Department.

Heading to the national conference April 2-5 in Spokane, Wash., will be Jocelyn Stott of Clovis, Miriam Fernandez of Kerman; Eric Malinowsky of Long Beach; Georgia Williams of Fresno; Kristin FitzPatrick of Royal Oak, Mich.; Darby Cogburn of Kerman; Jasmine Armstrong of Lompoc; Chris Estep of Fresno; and Sallie Perez Saiz of Fresno. Also going to Spokane but not presenting locally are Krystal Lake of Fresno and Jane Jeffers of Gaithersburg, Md.

All but Estep and Perez Saiz are enrolled in English professor Dr. Samina Najmi’s "Asian American Literature" graduate seminar last spring.

Najmi’s students were required to send an abstract of their paper to one of three, high-profile national conferences. Out of 14 students in the seminar, nine abstracts were accepted by the prestigious MELUS conference – an unusually high number for one class, Najmi said. Estep and Perez Saiz submitted their abstracts on their own but have been invited to participate in the March 27 campus presentations.

“I have never seen such a bumper crop at any other school where I have taught or studied,” Najmi said.

MELUS's selection process is non-hierarchical, meaning these students competed with established scholars and professors in the field of multiethnic literatures, Najmi explained. Nor were their abstracts part of panel proposals – which are more easily accepted – but were individual submissions, she said.

MELUS was founded in 1973 to expand the definition of American literature through the study and teaching of Latino American, Native American, African American, Asian and Pacific American, and ethnically specific Euro-American literary works, their authors and their cultural contexts.

 

Schedule

“A Century of Asian American Literature”

Fresno State presentations - March 27, 2009

Peters Business Building, Room 194

 

11 a.m. – 12:15 p.m. – Reconsidering Onoto Watanna’s The Heart of Hyacinth-I

• Jocelyn Stott, “Just Passing Through: Textual, Sexual, and Racial Artifice in The Heart of Hyacinth.”

• Miriam Fernandez, “Oppression of Self and Culture: Race, Gender, and Cultural Imperialism.”

• Eric Malinowsky, “How the East was Won: Western Influence in The Heart of Hyacinth.”
   

 

12:30 – 1:30 pm – Reconsidering Onoto Watanna’s The Heart of Hyacinth-II

• Georgia Williams, “The Mirroring of ‘Other’: Self/Other Reflections.”

• Kristin FitzPatrick, “Interdependent Identities in Watanna’s Hyacinth and Mitsuye Yamada’s Camp Notes.”

 

1:45 – 2:45 p.m. – Bearing Witness for Hmong, Chinese, and Japanese America

• Darby Cogburn, “The Power of Silence in Kao Kalia Yang’s The Latehomecomer.”

• Jasmine Armstrong, “Bearing Witness, Reclaiming Painful Narratives: The Poetry of Chinese-American Detainment and Japanese American Internment.”

 

3 – 4 p.m. – Theorizing Race in Literature and film

• Chris Estep, “Born Free: The Polycultural Animal in Madagascar.”

• Sallie Perez Saiz, “Nepantla, The Bridging of Female Archetypes: From Pre-Columbian Song to Contemporary U.S. Latina Poetry.”

Related link:
English Department
MELUS