New book by Cynthia Kuhn!
April 17th, 2008
Contributor Cynthia Kuhn’s new book, Styling Texts: Dress and Fashion in Literature, cowritten with Cindy Carlson, is out now from Cambria Press:
“Covering a variety of genres and periods from medieval epic to contemporary speculative fiction, Styling Texts explores the fascinating ways in which dress performs in literature. Numerous authors have made powerful—even radical—use of clothing and its implications, and the essays collected here demonstrate how scholarly attention to literary fashioning can contribute to a deeper understanding of texts, their contexts, and their innovations. These generative and engaging discussions focus on issues such as fashion and anti-fashion; clothing reform; transvestism; sartorial economics; style and the gaze; transgressive modes; and class, gender, or race “passing.”
“This is the first academic volume to address such an extensive range of texts, inviting consideration of how fashionable desires and concerns not only articulate the aesthetics, subjectivities, and controversies of a given culture, but also communicate across temporal and spatial divisions. Styling Texts is an essential resource for anyone interested in the artistic representations and significations of dress.”
Teaching and Tae Kwon Do
March 31st, 2008Contributor Libby Gruner has an essay in Inside Higher Ed; here’s a blurb:
At first I didn’t mention it at work. I think I felt a little silly about it: a middle-aged woman — an English professor! — taking tae kwon do. But then one day a colleague asked about a small bruise on my arm and, unthinking, I told him I’d blocked a kick with my forearm. It hadn’t been a smart move in tae kwon do, but as I told him about it, I could see the respect in his eyes. I began to think I should bring in my broken boards, leave them in the office, maybe mention how easily my palm had just gone through the wood. It couldn’t hurt.
Read the rest at Inside Higher Ed!
New book by Sonya Huber!
February 21st, 2008
Opa Nobody by Sonya Huber has just been released by the U of Nebraska Press (American Lives Series, ed. Tobias Wolff) and is now available at Amazon.
It had come to this: breastfeeding her screaming three-month-old while sitting on the cigarette-scarred floor of a union hall, lying to her husband so she could attend yet another activist meeting, and otherwise actively self-destructing. Then Sonya Huber turned to her long-dead grandfather, the family “nobody,” for help.
Huber’s search for meaning and resonance in the life of her grandfather Heina Buschman was unusual insofar as she knew him only through dismissive family stories: He let his wife die of neglect . . . he used his infant son as a decoy when transporting anti-Nazi literature in a baby carriage . . . and so the stories went. What she actually discovered was that, like his granddaughter, Heina Buschman was a committed and beleaguered activist whose story echoed her own. Huber’s research not only conjured her grandfather’s voice in answer to many of the questions that troubled her but also found in his story a source of personal sustenance for herself. Based on extensive research and documentation, this story of Heina Buschman offers a rare look into the heart of the “average” socialist trying to survive the Nazis and rebuild a broken world. Alternating with his voice is Huber’s own, providing a rich and moving counterpoint that makes this deeply personal exploration of family, politics, and individual responsibility a story for all of us and for all time.
Kirkus Reviews writes, “[S]harp human insights on the omnipresent complications of living in Nazi Germany make this a worthwhile read… [A] unique, imaginative take on the family memoir.”
New Book by Jennifer Margulis!
January 24th, 2008 
Mama, PhD contributor Jennifer Margulis has a new book coming out this spring, cowritten with her husband, James di Properzio: The Baby Bonding Book for Dads: Building a Closer Connection With Your Baby.
“Many new dads have never even held a baby, or they have little or no experience in taking care of babies. Men feel apprehensive and unsure about how to interact with their offspring, especially when that offspring is a tiny bundle that weighs under 10 pounds! That apprehension, though, shouldn’t put men into the back seat of parenting, as that would be taking a step back from one of the most important experiences of life. Men need to take the initiative and create their own ways of bonding with their children, right from the beginning. Topics include newborn bonding, carrying, skin-to-skin contact, diapering, going places, napping, playing, exercising, and reading to baby. This instructive yet lighthearted text is delivered from a dad who has been there (di Properzio is the father of three), and is paired with the delightful photography of Christopher Briscoe, making this book a handy guide and a perfect gift for any new father who’s feeling a little nervous about the new responsibility in his life.”
The book is available for pre-order, and will be out in time to give your favorite dad for Father’s Day.
Lovely Lady Lumps
December 15th, 2007Read Elrena Evans’ column, “Lovely Lady Lumps” in the “Nutshell” section of the Winter 2008 issue of Brain, Child magazine. Elrena writes about the new trend in postpartum plastic surgery, with an insight into the issue from Mama, PhD contributor Jessica Smartt Gullion.
New book from Laura Levitt!
December 7th, 2007Temple University professor Laura Levitt’s new book, American Jewish Loss After the Holocaust (New York University Press) is out now; Laura’s Mama, PhD essay, “On Being Phyllis’s Daughter: Thoughts on Academic Intimacy,” is based on a chapter from the book. Here’s a small taste:
On the one hand, my mother adhered to the norms of mothering that defined her early 1960’s generation. Although she was educated and worked as a teacher before she had children, she left her job when my brother and I were very young, and did not go back to teaching for almost five years.
But on the other hand—this is not exactly where I wanted to begin. I wanted to start by saying that my mother, like me, played with dolls. Her favorites, so she tells me, were paper dolls. She spent long days as a little girl cutting out various outfits, experimenting with how they looked. I think about my mother playing with paper dolls when I think about her accounts of what she did during her long days at home with me as a young child. For my mother, staying at home was not easy. She loved teaching, and regretted giving up her job when I was born.
I have few memories of my mother at home with my brother and me. I have memories of playing with friends and a spattering of memories of other adults, but I do not have any clear memories of my mother. What my mother tells me is that she spent a lot of her time cleaning and ironing my various outfits and dressing me up in them. I cannot help but imagine that, in part, my role was quite similar to that of her paper dolls. She did the labor in order to get my clothes ready for me to wear, and then spent her days putting them on and taking them off me. What I recall are itchy crinolines and a longing to take them off, and short lacy socks that needed to be pulled up over my heels again and again. I think I sensed, even then, that my mother was not particularly happy staying home.
Not surprisingly, it was when my mother returned to work that my most vivid memories of her began. My mother’s passion for her work was contagious. I imbibed it. I fell in love with her students and her colleagues, their stories, their intrigues, and always my mother at the center of all of this story telling. Over the years, my specialized knowledge of my mother and her life at school has enabled a kind of intimacy between us. It allows me to share a part of her life, as we communicate through the mediation of other people and their stories. Not unlike a beloved text, these stories have enabled my mother and me to connect in ways that seemed to foreshadow the kinds of academic intimacy I now share with many of my own students. My mother and I have always communicated most profoundly in this way, and this is very much the kind of intimacy I know best in my own life.
New Column
September 14th, 2007Mama, PhD co-editor Elrena Evans debuts her Literary Mama column this week, Me and My House, which offers a look at her experiences mothering — as a Christian, as a feminist, as someone who can never seem to find the perfect pair of jeans. Look for “Me and My House” every month at Literary Mama.
New Fiction by Elrena Evans
August 13th, 2007Mama, PhD co-editor Elrena Evans’ story, “The Journey Home,” has been published by Literary Mama. Here’s an excerpt:
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It was day two of the journey home, and I missed Miriam. On the way to Yerushalayim for the Feast of the Passover our families had walked together, her friendship a welcome comfort on the dry, dusty road. But Yosef, her husband, had been eager to get back home to Nazerat, and my little ones were moving more slowly each day. “Go on ahead,†I’d finally told Miriam, midmorning on the first day after the Feast. “I’ll bring Yeshua back when we get to Nazarat. Or whenever I run out of food.â€
Miriam had laughed. Her eldest son, Yeshua, was my eldest son David’s constant companion. The boys were inseparable, so much so that when I looked at my family I either saw three children, or five. If Yeshua wasn’t around, neither was David.
One, two, three, four, five, I counted in silent rhythm as we walked, one, two, three, four, five. Five children. All present, all accounted for.
I paused for a moment on the dusty trail. Thoughts of Miriam slipped from my mind as I realized my feet were tired, my arms sore, and my overnursed breasts like smoldering coals beneath my dusty robe. One, two, three, four, five, I counted again. One, two, three, four, five.
I arched my back, shifted my daughter’s weight from one hip to the other. But as I moved her she awoke, instantly hungry, and began frantically searching for my breast. I sighed and called to my husband.
“Ba’al, we need to stop. Zahara needs to feed again.â€
He looked at me. “Why can’t you just feed her as we walk?â€
I closed my eyes and counted four breaths before I answered. It was useless getting angry with him, he’d never nursed a baby. He couldn’t understand. Once again, I missed Miriam.
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Click on over to Literary Mama to read the rest!
New Book by Susan O’Doherty
July 18th, 2007Mama, PhD contributor Susan O’Doherty’s new book, Getting Unstuck Without Coming Unglued: A Woman’s Guide to Unblocking Creativity “is
a practical and accessible guidebook to help women overcome creative blocks.” I’m looking forward to reading it (and hoping it has a bit of advice for when it’s the kids’ building blocks impeding my work!) Watch for a review at Food for Thought.
New Book by Julia Lisella
July 17th, 2007Mama, PhD contributor Julia Lisella has published a new poetry collection, Terrain, a book “suffused with quiet rhythms: of birth and death, of pain and healing, of turbulence and calm. She maps a wide terrain indeed, and her haunting music touches both the ear and the heart.” Order it online from WordTech editions.
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