Vol. 43, No. 3 - April 2010

These are just a few highlights of all the Department of English has going on. To read the full version click here!
Enjoy!
-Your Department of English Family

The Night Andrews Students Spent on Stage
By: Jordan Arellano

  

    This semester, select students from Andrews University signed up for a class like no other. For these dedicated students the entire first half of the semester has been filled with dialogues, practices, long classes, and extra studying. No, they aren’t biology majors; they are the cast and production team of The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail, a play based on the life and philosophies of Henry David Thoreau. 
     Taught and directed by English professors Bruce Closser and Gary Gray, this dedicated group was willing to tackle a project that was sure to be a wonderful experience for the participants and the audience. 
     A stellar cast took the stage Thursday night, March 8, at Burman Hall chapel with individuals such as Brian Urias, Molly Schuster, Judy Clippinger, Fred Guerrero, Bryan Szaflarski, Rebecka Noble, Katherine Paul, Brandon Easton, J.J. Paquette, Clifford Allen, and with Jay Oetman playing Thoreau. There was also a vital group of backstage participants who did lighting, costumes, and makeup. Rebecka Noble, an actress in the play as well as the student director, said, “It's been a great experience--there's nothing like the allure of the stage and the bond one forms with the other actors.” Bryan Szaflarski, an actor, said, “I don’t know if I would do a project like this again. I would have to have a lot of interest in it after realizing the true time and work involved in a project like this.” Szaflarski added considerable humor to the play as Thoreau’s lightly educated cellmate. 
     Unfortunately, due to illness of the actor playing Thoreau, the last two performances of the show were postponed. They have now been condensed to one performance, Sunday, April 11, at 7 p..m., once again in Burman Auditorium.

A special thanks to James Gigante for the great composite picture.

Nu Sigma's Poetry and Jazz Night
By Christine Lairson and Samantha Snively

     At seven p.m., Monday, March 1, 2010, around fifty students crowded into the upstairs of the Honors Forsyth House for a student poetry reading and jazz night during Andrew’s Creative Arts Festival Week. Although the lights were a little too bright, people dressed too colorfully (everyone knows poets wear black), and there was an absence of mood-setting smoke, students still gave the appearance of sophistication expected at a poetry reading.
     The program opened with a few musical selections by “Cardinal Number,” a jazz trio including Jasmine Zork, Stephen Zork, and Dr. Moncrieff. They played relaxing jazz music, the bass, keyboard, and mellow vocals sounding like something straight out of a coffee shop.  Then came the poets, some of whom were required to read for class credit, some of which read just for fun, all reciting their own works.
     Arianna Lashley opened the program with her pieces “Social Butterfly” and one untitled poem. Krystal Greene read her poems “I Am Not in Love With You” and “One Misery Way, Despair Road.” Greene cleverly said, “Although the things I say or do/imply Mr. and Mrs. me and you/I am not in love with you,” in her poem “I am not in Love with You.” She was followed by Lydia Weiso’s “Silence.” Drew Tetz (pictured right) performed several of his humorous poems next, including “How to Be a Punk,” and “First Kiss,” which is about “dying in a hideous ball of fire.” Stephen Gardner read “To a Chemist” and “Samson’s Enemies.” Christy Eisendrath read “Hope” and “Off to College,” and then Theron Caulkins performed “Sitting on a Dresser” and “Footloose.” Fay White read “That Obia Woman,” and explained that an obia woman is something akin to a witch or sidekick. Myles Compton finished off the first half of the program by reading his works “The Spring” which was “inspired by a very bad spring break trip,” and “Boxes.”
     Cardinal Number then played three more songs: “Pennies from Heaven,” “Unforgettable,” and “Give Me the Simple Life.” Tiffany Evering (above left) was next to read, beginning with an explosive, “I AM WOMAN,” also the title of her poem. Makyba Breezie read “Life Science,” and then Hannah Delucah read “So This Is Berrien Springs,” written in the style of Ted Kooser’s poems, and also “Spent,” and “President’s Day.” Catherine Tetz read two structured poems entitled “Martyrdom” and “Rationale,” and Eric Eskildsen recited his poem “Fall.” Carolyn Davis finished the program of student poets with her extended metaphor “Paperback Soldier” and a poem inspired by the Olympics, “The Double McTwist 1260.”
     The evening concluded with a guest poet, Joseph Greig, who has been associated with the English Department for a very long time. He claims that his poetry is all true, he “just fictionalizes it to make it more real.” He read his poems, “Self-Revelation” and “Change of Venue,” which were quite humorous, followed by “November Tryst” and “Meditations on a Fire Pit.” When asked where he gets his inspiration, he replied, “dreams, contemplation and observation, and quite a lot of sitting in deer stands in the fall.”

Graduating Student Hired by SAU
By: Amanda Jehle

     I never planned to teach college. In fact, I never really planned on going to grad school. It almost seems like I ended up at Andrews by accident.
     During the last semester of my senior year of undergrad, I wasn’t sure what to do after graduation. So when I heard a professor from Andrews was visiting, I thought it wouldn’t hurt to talk to him. Dr. Moncrieff told me all these wonderful things about the MA in TESL and gave me a cool mug. So I decided it wouldn’t hurt to fill out an application. Then I had to take the GRE, which did hurt a little. But when I found out that Andrews would give me a nice scholarship based on GRE scores, I thought I might as well get my Master’s.
     So two years later, I’m again nearing graduation. But this time I know what I’m going to do next: I will be teaching composition and ESL classes at Southern Adventist University. I can’t think of a job I would be more excited about doing right now! I’m so thankful that I ended up at Andrews, where I was able to gain the knowledge and teaching experience that made it possible for me to get a job that I know I will love.
     It might seem like a haphazard path led me here, but I believe that God was guiding me all along. And I know He’ll go continue leading me at Southern, inside and outside of the classroom.