Dear all,

      We are in the home stretch of the fall semester! I hope you all have a wonderful break and holiday. 

Accomplishments

Irene Clark’s chapter titled, “Imitation, Cultural Multiplicity, and Academic Integrity: Insights from Neuroscience,” has been accepted for publication in a book titled Academic Integrity in the Age of Diversity: Perspectives from European and North American Higher Education. The book will be published by Palgrave Press.

Audrey Thacker presented her paper, “Establishing Jewish Geographies/Unsettling Jewish Iconographies: The Synagogue as Site of Secular Lamentation in Curb Your EnthusiasmThe Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and Transparent” at the 121st annual PAMLA conference in Palm Springs in November. Audrey was also the presiding officer for a special session concerning “The Holocaust in Literature, Media, and Film.”

Kim Young has been working on a hybrid memoir/biography focused on the life and art of her late mentor, Lee McCarthy, first wife of Cormac McCarthy, and she has two pieces coming out of her research and writing. The first was published in LitHub this past November and it looks at Lee’s divorce and artistic survival in relation to the more privileged narratives coming out of the latest roster of divorce books. Coincidentally, this essay came out the day after the most recent revelations about Cormac’s underage lover, and it was included in the discourse around the women omitted from the narrative of Cormac McCarthy’s life. 
A second reported piece by Kim Young is forthcoming in January from Alta and it looks back at Lee McCarthy’s landmark first amendment battle when she was a schoolteacher in Central California, one that resonates with a painful relevance in this current moment of book banning and erasure of history. 
Kim’s poetry chapbook, The Universal Rabbit, was a semifinalist for YesYes Books 2024 Vinyl Chapbook prize.