Seven faculty members from Florida State University have received Fulbright U.S. Scholar Awards for the 2026-27 academic year from the U.S. Department of State and the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board.

FSU’s seven scholars will travel to Japan, Taiwan, Singapore, Belgium, Vietnam and India to teach, conduct research and engage with colleagues in their fields.

The Fulbright Program is the U.S. government’s flagship international educational and cultural exchange program. Led by the U.S. government in partnership with 160 countries worldwide, Fulbright offers programs for passionate and accomplished students, scholars, teachers, artists and professionals of all backgrounds to study, teach and conduct research. Participants enrich their education, advance their careers and make meaningful contributions to communities abroad and at home.

In addition, FSU’s Vice President for Student Affairs Amy Hecht received a Fulbright International Education Administrators (IEA) Award, which supports two-week seminars for U.S. higher education administrators to learn about participating countries’ higher education systems, exchange information on best practices and explore the potential for partnerships with institutions of higher education in the host country.

Hecht will use the award in France, where she will participate in briefings, campus visits, appointments with government officials, networking and cultural activities and meetings with French international education professionals to familiarize herself with France’s higher education and research system.

The 2026-2027 Fulbright Scholars from FSU are: 

Jim Lile, a professor at the School of Theatre in the College of Fine Arts, will use the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award to teach courses about Western production practices and conduct research on Asian production methods at National Taiwan University in Taipei, Taiwan, during the spring 2027 semester. 

Lile brings 25 years of experience in live theater. He was first invited to Taipei in October 2023 to conduct a series of master classes based on his experience with the Western theatrical technical production methods used for opera, musicals, plays and dance. The short visit provided such a valuable opportunity that Lile wanted to return to Taipei to continue teaching and learning more about live performance practices in Asia.  

By focusing on the various organizational structures, training techniques and uses of text, movement and music to tell stories, Lile will explore how cultural values and traditions are reflected in technical production methods. 

“I hope to build an international network with theater designers and technicians and create long-term collaboration opportunities in Taiwan and other regional countries,” Lile said. “Taiwan’s multicultural history offers rich opportunities to study the diverse traditions and histories of Asian live performance.” 

Judith Pascoe, the George Mills Harper Professor in the Department of English in the College of Arts and Sciences, will expand on her research and teaching interests in Nara, Japan, through the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program starting in March.  

This is Pascoe’s second Fulbright award to Japan. She previously received the Fulbright Japan Lecturing Award for the 2009-2010 academic year while teaching at the University of Iowa. This experience led to her writing “On the Bullet Train with Emily Brontë: ‘Wuthering Heights’ in Japan,” an account of her quest to discover the reasons for the continuous Japanese embrace of the novel “Wuthering Heights” by Emily Brontë. 

Pascoe will teach classes and continue her research on Japanese adaptations of world literature at Nara Women’s University from March to August 2027. Her classes will draw from her experience as a specialist in nineteenth-century literature, while her research will focus on why certain works have gained popularity among youth demographics.  

“I look forward to fine-tuning the teaching strategies I cultivated for use in Japanese classrooms, to forging relationships with new Japanese colleagues and to learning about present-day Japanese challenges,” Pascoe said. “The Fulbright support for the humanities is a tremendously strong force for kindness, empathy and cross-cultural solidarity.” 

Hui Wang, an associate professor in the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering, will conduct collaborative research at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore from January to July 2027 through the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program.  

While at NTU, Wang will collaborate with colleagues on a research project focused on improving manufacturing quality control and process design in advanced production systems, particularly 3D printing.  

The project combines process simulations, sensor measurements and engineering knowledge to better understand how manufacturing conditions affect product quality. 

“Singapore provides a unique environment where advanced manufacturing and data-driven engineering innovation are closely integrated,” Wang said. “Beyond the technical research, I value the cultural exchange aspect of Fulbright very highly. I believe there is much to learn from Singapore’s emphasis on discipline, efficiency and engineering rigor, while also sharing perspectives from the U.S. research environment that encourage open discussion, interdisciplinary exploration and student-centered mentoring. 

Aleksandra Zimmerman, the Ed McIntyre Associate Professor of Business Administration in the Department of Accounting at the Herbert Wertheim College of Business, will carry out research in Antwerp, Belgium, during the fall and spring semesters.

Zimmerman will work with researchers at the University of Antwerp and Vrije Universiteit Brussel, where she will collaborate with faculty on research and engage with students and scholars on topics related to accounting and auditing, human capital and labor markets, and regulatory policy. Her research project will focus on accounting and business with a particular emphasis on issues related to emerging trends and to the accounting and auditing profession and regulation policies in a global context.

The project seeks to address how different institutional structures, cultural norms and regulatory environments influence accounting, auditing and business practices and decision making. Through collaborative research and scholarly exchange, Zimmerman aims to better understand how institutional and cultural settings shape business practices, regulation and standard setting.

“Belgium is an ideal location for this work given its central role in European regulatory and economic systems,” Zimmerman said. “I am most looking forward to the collaborative aspect of the Fulbright experience, working closely with international colleagues, engaging with students, and immersing myself in the academic and cultural life of Belgium and visiting other schools in Europe. Fulbright support is particularly important for accounting and business because these fields are deeply shaped by global economic forces and international regulation.” 

Biwu Ma, professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry in the College of Arts and Sciences, will also travel to Belgium to conduct research at the University of Antwerp during the upcoming fall and spring semesters through the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program. He will spend the academic year merging material science and medical physics to improve how ultra-high dose rate radiotherapies monitor radiation in real-time. 

With recent advancements in FLASH radiotherapy, an emerging cancer treatment shown to reduce damage to healthy tissue while delivering high rates of radiation at extreme speeds, comes a need to create radiation dosimeters that reliably detect dosages. Ma’s work focuses on developing organic-inorganic hybrid scintillation materials to provide accurate, real-time dose monitoring and enhance treatment precision. 

“The (University of Antwerp) provides a unique environment where materials science can be directly connected to clinically relevant validation and translational research,” Ma said. “The award emphasizes the importance of international collaboration in driving scientific innovation and translating fundamental discoveries into real-world societal impact.” 

Frankie Wong, the McKenzie Endowed Professor in the College of Nursing and founding director of the Center of Population Sciences for Health Empowerment, will travel to Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, next spring to further his research at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities at National Vietnam University (VNU-USSH).

Wong, who has visited Vietnam nearly 10 times in the past decade and has previously worked in countries like China, Russia, South Africa and Tajikistan, will further his work examining HIV-related stigma intervention among high-risk men in Ho Chi Minh City, the largest city in Vietnam with the highest rate of HIV in the country. His work seeks to encourage more people to engage in HIV research, which can lead to more cutting-edge strategies to mitigate and/or prevent this global burden. 

“The Fulbright Fellowship will allow me to have an immersive experience. I believe I have the temperament, humility and appreciation of American culture to serve as an effective cultural ambassador for the U.S.,” he said. 

Paromita Sanyal, an associate professor of Sociology in the College of Social Sciences and Public Policy and research associate at FSU’s Center for Demography and Population Health, will travel to India using the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Award.

Sanyal specializes in international development, gender, economic and political sociology. Her research examines large-scale programs aimed at inducing development, women’s empowerment and financial inclusion.

As a member of the World Bank’s Social Observatory team, which is based in India and tracks projects aiming to eradicate poverty and improve livelihoods around the world, she uses her insights to understand the impact of socioeconomic interventions on women in India. She will expand upon this work during her Fulbright experience.   

Since 1946, the Fulbright Program has provided more than 400,000 talented and accomplished students, scholars, teachers, artists and professionals of all backgrounds with the opportunity to study, teach and conduct research abroad. Fulbrighters exchange ideas, build connections, and work to address complex global challenges. Notable Fulbrighters include 62 Nobel Laureates, 89 Pulitzer Prize winners, 80 MacArthur Fellows, 41 heads of state or government, and thousands of leaders across the private, public and non-profit sectors.  

More than 800 individuals teach or conduct research abroad through the Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program annually. In addition, over 2,000 Fulbright U.S. Student Program participants — recent college graduates, graduate students and early career professionals — participate in study/research exchanges or as English teaching assistants in local schools abroad each year. 

FSU faculty interested in learning more about applying for Fulbright Program funding can contact Peggy Wright-Cleveland, Director of Faculty Development in the Office of Faculty Development and Advancement, at mwrightcleveland@admin.fsu.edu or (850) 645-8202. 

To learn more about FSU’s global footprint, visit global.fsu.edu. 

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A Florida State University graduate student has been selected for a competitive arts fellowship that will support the development of a project that maps archival photos, poetry and oral histories onto neighborhoods, highlighting their historical impacts.

Christell Victoria Roach, a creative writing doctoral student in the Department of English, has been named a fellow of YoungArts, the National Foundation for the Advancement of Artists. The fellowship includes a $30,000 grant that will allow Roach to further develop her project, an augmented-reality application called OTOWN, and streamline its software.

“By merging digital humanities with community-based research, this project reimagines historical neighborhoods as interactive digital museums,” Roach said. “This project transforms specific locations into exhibits through the app’s lens. I come from a community with a rich history, and I wanted to create a space for that community to tell its own story.”

“This project transforms specific locations into exhibits through the app’s lens. I come from a community with a rich history, and I wanted to create a space for that community to tell its own story.”

— Christell Victoria Roach, creative writing doctoral student

Each year, thousands of artists from across the U.S. apply for YoungArts’ competitive grants, scholarships and fellowships, which have supported scholars through mentorship and funding since 1981. In addition to the monetary grant, fellows also have access to studio space and public presentation opportunities. This award comes just over a decade after Roach earned a YoungArts writing award, and she is the only literary arts specialist in this year’s cohort of five YoungArts fellows.

“Earning a YoungArts fellowship is a significant accomplishment that highlights the strength of Christell’s voice and the impact of her literary work,” said Keith McCall, assistant director of the FSU Office of Graduate Fellowships and Awards. “It’s an honor to have a YoungArts fellow at FSU and a reflection of the exceptional talent within the creative writing program.”

OTOWN was inspired by Roach’s hometown of Overtown, a Miami neighborhood that was once considered the “Harlem of the South,” where African American celebrities, athletes and activists such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Sam Cooke performed, spoke and competed.

“Since they weren’t permitted to sleep in the hotels they performed in on South Beach, as it was during a segregated period, they went ‘over to the town’ to be celebrated and to rest,” Roach said. “In OTOWN, I take on the role of curator and narrator to create space for these stories that started long before me.”

Through the app, users move through the Overtown neighborhood, encountering location-specific stories: They’ll hear a poem on one corner, see a historic photograph on another, and listen to oral histories connected to the ground beneath their feet. While the project initially centered around Overtown, Roach has invented a model that can be used to preserve community histories in neighborhoods across the globe.

“I’m perfecting this work to present a replicable model for engagement with personal and shared histories,” Roach said. “Through collaboration with undergraduate research assistants, the project has already expanded to other historic towns in Florida, including Tallahassee, with an exhibit near FAMU’s campus titled, ‘South of Monroe.’”

Before coming to FSU in 2024, Roach earned multiple awards for her writing. In 2022, she was nominated for an Emmy Award for her work in collaboration with South Florida’s WLRN Public Media on the duet poem “The Breaths of Our Skin,” where Roach imagines and performs a poetic conversation between writers Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes.

“Christell’s writing invites us to think seriously about homeland, legacy, record-keeping and truth,” said Christopher Okonkwo, one of Roach’s doctoral advisers and an professor in the FSU Department of English. “The questions she contemplates in her work transcend academia. They touch and connect us all while allowing us to rediscover our own history.”

Roach has been published widely, with recent work featured by organizations and in literary publications such as Poetry Magazine, the Academy of American Poets, The Atlantic and Obsidian: Literature and Arts in the African Diaspora.

“I’m doing the work I want people to learn about, and I’m creating a model that shows people how to engage their history,” Roach said. “I hope this work inspires others, and I hope foregrounding love, community, creativity and connection when engaging history creates a way of witness and testimony we once thought lost to time.”

To learn more about writing and research through the FSU Department of English, visit english.fsu.edu.

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A Florida State University faculty member has been awarded the Herralde Novel Prize, a prominent literary honor in the Spanish language, for his novel exploring the concepts of ownership and plagiarism in memory and literature.

Associate Professor of English Pablo Maurette earned the honor for his recent novel, “El contrabando ejemplar,” which translates to “Exemplary Smuggling.” The Herralde Novel Prize is given to an author for an unpublished manuscript, which is common for several Spanish-language prizes. Maurette is only the fifth Argentinian writer to have won the award and is the first FSU faculty member to receive it.

“While this prize isn’t very well known in English writing, it might be the most prestigious literary award for young authors writing in Spanish,” Maurette said. “For that reason, and since my novel competed against almost 900 other novels, I feel extremely fortunate and proud to have earned it. I also feel very humbled because some of my favorite writers in Spanish have won this prize.”

The prize was established in 1983 by Jorge Herralde, the founder and publisher of Anagrama, a publishing house in Barcelona, Spain. Each year, Anagrama publishes the award-winning novel and provides the author a monetary reward of 25,000 euros.

“El contrabando ejemplar” is Maurette’s seventh publication, joining a roster of four books of essays and two other novels. His first novel, “Il tempo è un fiume” or “Time is a River,” was a contender for the Premio Gregor von Rezzori, an Italian prize for foreign fiction.

“Writing is what I do, and it’s what I’ve done since I can remember,” Maurette said. “Prizes are important in a writer’s career as they tend to give you, at least for some time, a lot more visibility. Even if I didn’t receive any awards or recognition, however, I would continue to write as long as I live quite simply because it’s how I express myself. I feel lucky that I understood this a long time ago, and I’ve put all my energy and effort into it.”

Maurette’s novel tells the story of two aspiring writers who are close friends despite having a significant age gap. The older writer is working on a novel about Buenos Aires in the 1600s, which shaped its economy at the time with a sophisticated and clandestine trade system known as “exemplary smuggling.” When this writer passes, the younger writer steals the manuscript, determined to plagiarize it.

“Everything we write, even if we think it’s original, comes from something we’ve read and forgotten about,” he said. “Literature is a type of paramnesia, that phenomenon by which you attribute to yourself memories that happened to others. In relation to the millennia that human beings have spent on this earth telling one another stories, we need to convince ourselves that we create out of nothing, that we are original, that we own what we write. That’s very naive.”

In its synopsis of the award-winning novel, Anagrama writes, “‘Exemplary Smuggling’ questions the meaning of what is lost and what is invented. A celebration of the personal and the collective, it transforms the act of storytelling into a unique and moving literary experience. A novel that finds its place within the great tradition of the best Latin American narrative.”

The Herralde Novel Prize has been awarded in the past to a long list of distinguished writers, including Roberto Bolaño, Javier Marias, Álvaro Enrigue and Guadalupe Nettel.

“The Department of English is absolutely thrilled that Pablo has been given this wonderful award for his new novel — he’s in very elite company,” said Andrew Epstein, department chair and Caldwell Professor of English. “The Herralde Novel Prize further solidifies Pablo’s international reputation as both a celebrated novelist and a scholar of literature. We couldn’t be happier about this amazing and well-deserved recognition.”

Maurette, a native of Buenos Aires, earned his doctorate from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2013. He joined the FSU Department of English in 2019 and teaches in the department’s Literature, Media, and Culture Program. In May 2023, he worked as a writer in residence for Italy’s Fondazione Santa Maddalena, and from April to June 2024, he was a research fellow at The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens in California.

For more information about the FSU Department of English and its research and publications, visit english.fsu.edu. 

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Madelyn Luther is a dedicated pre-law student who is committed to finding the overlap between her passions for writing, climate justice and law.

Luther is the president and editor-in-chief of the Undergraduate Law Review at Florida State University, which gives students the chance to define their legal research by publishing articles in a digital journal. She played a part in renewing the status of the Review as a Registered Student Organization in 2020.

She is also working on an undergraduate thesis project for the Honors in the Major program, in which she considers climate justice through an interdisciplinary lens.

What drew you to attend Florida State University?

I attended Florida State University because I wanted to pursue law school, and I was excited at the legal, political and civic engagement opportunities in the state capital. I participated in the Girls State program in high school at FSU, and I was captivated by the campus.

The most important factor in my decision to attend FSU was the university’s world-class programs in the humanities and social sciences. I wanted to study English, and I was passionate about writing, research and rhetoric. I could not be happier with the decision I made three years ago to attend this university. I have made invaluable connections with peers and faculty at FSU’s campus.

How have your academic experiences allowed you to explore interdisciplinary studies?

My Honors in the Major undergraduate thesis project under the guidance of Tarez Graban, an associate professor of English, honors teaching scholar and director of the Rhetoric and Composition Program in the Department of English, has allowed me to explore climate discourse from an interdisciplinary lens. I am passionate that climate change must be tackled using climate science in collaboration with climate justice, spatial justice and sustainable policymaking. My thesis allows me to consider climate justice issues from a rhetorical, ethical and decolonial lens. I have engaged with qualitative discourse analysis through my thesis project, and I will present my project at the President’s Showcase of Undergraduate Research Excellence.

How have you served your community through your work?

I am the president and editor-in-chief of the Undergraduate Law Review, which I joined in the fall of my freshman year. I started as a writer and editor, and I worked my way through higher-ranking leadership positions like secretary, vice president and executive editor. I have played a key role in the organization’s growth by marketing it across campus and innovating ways to expand our reach. The Review helped me to develop my writing, editing and legal research skills and exposed me to the Bluebook legal citation style. I have made lifelong professional connections and friends through the organization, and I look forward to its continued growth during my last semester at FSU.

Where have you seen your impact on the community?

As a member of the executive board at the Undergraduate Law Review, I have furthered the organization’s mission of bringing like-minded students across FSU’s campus together to engage in legal discourse. The Review prioritizes peer education and support rather than prestige alone, values that I champion as president and editor-in-chief. My leadership played a significant role in expanding its reach across campus, which has allowed many of my peers to engage in legal research at the undergraduate level. When I joined the organization, it had lost its Registered Student Organization status, it did not have much of a following on social media, and it did not have a website or any way that students could learn more about what it was and how to join. I spearheaded marketing initiatives that grew the Review’s following on social media, re-registered it as an RSO and promoted applications to FSU students through tabling events.

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For many writers, completing a creative work involves countless revisions or even a full rewrite. Samuel Granoff, a doctoral candidate in the Department of English at Florida State University, had set aside his unfinished World War I novel until the Fulbright U.S. Student Program gave him the time, space and inspiration to start over.  

Granoff spent 10 months in France after receiving the Université Paris-Saclay Doctoral Research Award and used the time to research and rewrite the novel, which examines the experience of World War I through both contemporary and historical lenses to explore how war, memory and identity intersect across time.  

“As a writer, you often leave things in drawers and never look back at them,” said Granoff, who’s earning a doctorate in English literature with an emphasis on fiction writing. “The Fulbright has been this blessing that came down to give me another shot.” 

The Fulbright Program, the flagship international educational exchange program sponsored by the U.S. government, is designed to increase understanding between U.S. citizens and people of other countries. 

Fulbright U.S. Student Program grant recipients are selected based on academic or professional merit and demonstrated leadership potential in their fields, with the program operating in over 160 countries worldwide. 

The primary source of funding is an annual appropriation made by Congress to the U.S. Department of State Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. Participating governments, host institutions, corporations and foundations also provide support.   

Granoff knew early in his graduate studies that he wanted to pursue a Fulbright to support a work of historical fiction. He reached out to the FSU Office of Graduate Fellowships and Awards and worked with Assistant Director Keith McCall, who helped Granoff select his best work for the application. 

“We went through essay by essay, story by story, because you only get a couple pages to sell yourself to the program,” Granoff said. “Keith was really generous with his time and walked me through the entire process.” 

A few years ago, Granoff wrote the first draft of a novel set largely in Paris during WWI. After deciding to revisit it, he applied for the Université Paris-Saclay Doctoral Research Award, which supports U.S. doctoral students conducting research for their dissertations at the university, a public research institution south of Paris.   

At Paris-Saclay, Granoff conducted research at the Center for Cultural History of Contemporary Societies, a laboratory with a multidisciplinary approach to researching contemporary cultural history. 

Granoff spent time there researching and re-imagining this work, which was originally set in 1917 and focused on a soldier who had deserted his post and assumed a different identity.  

“It was a work that I couldn’t quite figure out,” he said. 

Inspired by a World War I reenactment he witnessed on one of his first days in Paris, Granoff refocused his novel to explore how war is understood through contemporary identities and decided to set the first half in 2018. 

“The best historical fiction still echoes into the present,” he said. 

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A two-time Florida State University English alumnus and recent graduate has been awarded a highly competitive early-career creative writing award from Stanford University.

Daniel Sutter, who earned his doctoral degree in creative writing in Spring 2025, is one of 10 recipients chosen for the Wallace Stegner Fellowship at Stanford from a pool of about 2,000 applicants. The fellowship will support Sutter’s work for two years.  

“I got a phone call from a California number, and when I answered, the director of creative writing at Stanford introduced himself as Nicholas Jenkins and said ‘We’d like to see you in California. We can’t wait for you to come to Stanford,’” Sutter said. “When I hung up, it took me quite a while to realize it was a real phone call because this is such a unique, cool honor to receive.” 

Winners receive a $75,000 stipend per year to be artists-in-residence and develop their writing in the company of peers and under the guidance of Stanford faculty members. Sutter will begin his fellowship at Stanford in Fall 2025, fine-tuning his dissertation novel “Orders of Magnitude,” which he has defended, and working on his second novel. 

“This opportunity is validating of the work I’m currently doing in my writings about the Gulf Coast and has given me confidence in my projects,” Sutter said. “Earning the fellowship is also humbling because I get to work in this space alongside tremendous writers.”  

“Orders of Magnitude” takes place over the span of 20 years and follows the journey of a man trying to reconnect with his estranged daughter through the Gulf South. The novel explores significant American cultural moments, including the Iraq War, the debut of the iPhone, social media, Zika, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, self-celebrity, religiosity run amok, the evolution of political propaganda and the War of 1812. 

Sutter, from Tampa, Florida, earned his bachelor’s degree in English and creative writing from FSU in 2014 before going on to earn a master’s in creative writing from the University of New Orleans in 2018. His writings focus on respect of place, especially the Gulf Coast where he grew up.   

“I have something to say about the people of these places because I’ve spent my entire life in the region, and I enjoy exploring the Gulf as a liminal space between order and chaos,” Sutter said. “I find many people who live near the Gulf are perceived as eccentric or strange because of their alertness to extremes when, in reality, they’re actually survivalists. It’s an adventure here. A hurricane could arrive tomorrow, or it could freeze for three days in the same season. That makes for a compelling cast and stage in my works.” 

For his fellowship application, Sutter submitted two short stories. “Mantis” is about an agoraphobic son who lives with his mother in Tampa, and “Like Always Blooming” is a story about a father and daughter living in New Orleans. Sutter’s short story collection, “Like Always Blooming,” recently won the Press 53 Short Fiction Award and will be published by Press 53 in May 2026.  

In earning this fellowship, Sutter joins the ranks of Stegner Fellows with FSU ties including Associate Professor of English Skip Horack, creative writing instructor Russ Franklin, and FSU doctoral students Matthew Denton-Edmundson and Christell Victoria Roach. FSU English alumnus and Stanford professor of creative writing Adam Johnson completed the fellowship in 2001, the same year he earned his doctorate from FSU. Johnson won the Pulitzer Prize in fiction in 2013 and the National Book Award for Fiction in 2015.

To learn more about the FSU Department of English, visit english.fsu.edu.

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A scholar from Florida State University’s Department of English has been recognized for her influence in the field of Romantic-era writing and culture.

Judith Pascoe, George Mills Harper Professor of English, earned the 2025 Distinguished Scholar Award from the Keats-Shelley Association of America (K-SAA) in recognition of her careerlong excellence in scholarship on Romantic-era British literature and culture. As one of this year’s two awardees, Pascoe was honored by K-SAA in January during the 2025 Modern Language Association Annual Convention in New Orleans.

“I was surprised and pleased to earn the award, especially since previous recipients include my dissertation director at the University of Pennsylvania, Dr. Stuart Curran, who was a major champion of Romantic-era women writers,” Pascoe said.

Established in 1949, K-SAA enhances the study and appreciation of John Keats and Percy Bysshe Shelley, prominent writers during the Romantic era, which ran from the late-18th century to the early-19th century. K-SAA’s Distinguished Scholar Award honors those who have dedicated their careers to studying Romantic-era writers and culture.

“It’s very exciting for one of the department’s own to receive such a coveted distinction from an important organization in the field,” said Andrew Epstein, chair of the Department of English and Caldwell Professor of English. “It confirms Dr. Pascoe’s reputation as one of the most important and influential scholars of Romanticism.”

“The British Romantics wrote some of the most remarkable poetry and prose in literary history and their influence lives on in genres ranging from horror movies to political manifestos,” Pascoe said. “What’s more, the societal issues with which the Romantics grappled — such as racism, technologies, climate events and political revolutions — still challenge us today.”

Last year, Pascoe earned a $60,000 grant from the National Endowment of Humanities to complete her book, “Twinkle, Twinkle: Female Literary Ambition, Male Genius, and the Most Famous Poet You’ve Never Heard Of.” The project spotlights Jane Taylor, the author of “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star” and will be Pascoe’s fifth book related to British Romanticism. To complete this project, Pascoe will also draw on Strozier Library’s John MacKay Shaw Collection of Childhood in Poetry and research support provided by the George Mills Harper Professorship.

“I strive to make my research engaging and accessible to a broad audience,” Pascoe said. “In my most recent book, ‘On the Bullet Train with Emily Brontë’, which I completed as a Guggenheim Fellow, I sought to understand why ‘Wuthering Heights’ has been so warmly embraced in Japan, and also to chronicle my experience as an adult student of Japanese.”

In “The Hummingbird Cabinet: A Rare and Curious History of Romantic Collectors” (Cornell University Press, 2005), Pascoe drew on archival research to explore collecting’s role in the relationship between reader, author and authorial legacy. She wrote about collectors of birds, books, Napoleonic relics, botanical specimens, Egyptiana and fossils.

In “The Sarah Siddons Audio Files: Romanticism and the Lost Voice” (University of Michigan Press, 2011), Pascoe sought to recreate the lost voice of Sarah Siddons, a Romantic-era theater actress whose powerful performances, including as Lady Macbeth, caused audience members to faint during the time before voices could be recorded. In pursuit of this goal, Pascoe enrolled in a Voice for Actors class, collected Lady Macbeth performance recordings and started listening more carefully to the soundscape of her own life. Pascoe’s book also investigated how modern recording technology has altered the human experience of the voice.

“Recipients of the Distinguished Scholar Award like Dr. Pascoe are recognized for helping to set the agenda for the future study of Romanticism, underscoring something we’re very proud of: FSU is on the cutting edge of research in this important literary field and the humanities more broadly,” Epstein said.

To learn more about Pascoe’s work and FSU’s Department of English, visit english.fsu.edu.

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Angelina Dobbs, an IDEA grant recipient and Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP) student, uses her undergraduate research efforts to educate others about how women participated in Enlightenment ideas in the 18th century. Dobbs seeks to provide engaging and accessible course material for future students to enjoy via her podcast about Italian women’s sociability.

In tandem with her research, Dobbs has participated in the Women’s Leadership Institute and strives to create a welcoming and empowering space for women in academia.

How did you choose FSU?

Choosing FSU was not hard at all. I am originally from Denver, Colorado, and at the beginning of my college application process, I wanted to go to Boston to study. I initially applied to FSU because my twin sister, Sofie, wanted to attend a Florida university and I didn’t want to separate from her. Of course, it helped that FSU has a fantastic editing, writing, and media program, which aligned well with my aspirations for the publishing field. It wasn’t until I toured the campus in November 2022 that I absolutely fell in love with the school. I found the red brick buildings charming and the still-green plants refreshing. My tour guide’s genuine enthusiasm and stellar review sold me on the school. After hearing about the abundance of opportunities for undergraduate research, I left the tour feeling that I needed to go to FSU. As soon as I saw my acceptance letter, I made my decision. Now, I am here and I haven’t regretted my choice for a second.

How have your academic achievements shaped your journey at FSU?

In fall 2023, I joined professor Irene Zanini-Cordi’s project “Culture, Conversations, and Social Networks in 18th and 19th Century Italy” in the UROP program. Through the lens of social network theory, my research team examined how Italian salonnières influenced the growth of Enlightenment culture through their agency and contributions to art, science and literature.

My research within this project focused on how famed Venetian salonnière, Isabella Teotochi Albrizzi, used her educational connections and intellectual merit to reframe her identity into that of a respected literary critic and published author, at a time when women were unable to do so. My primary goal was to study how she successfully challenged social and literary gender norms.

What was the thinking behind your podcast?

To spread our research, my team wrote, edited and produced a podcast series, “Sip and Connect: Social Networking Italian Style,” and co-authored “Conversations that Shape Identity,” a peer-reviewed, pedagogical article for Eighteenth-Century Studies, slated for publication in spring 2025.

Our team won an IDEA grant to expand our podcast to examine how innovative technological and cultural developments in coffee culture, journalism, politics, early science, religion, fashion, social etiquette, art and opera shaped Italian sociability during the 18th century and embodied Enlightenment ideas. The podcast episodes will be used in course curriculum for a class on Italian sociability in the 18th century at FSU, taught by professor Zanini-Cordi. While our main objective with this series was to help students explore Enlightenment culture, we also learned how to conversationally engage the public with intellectual topics and use modern media to circulate knowledge.

How have you gotten involved with your community, and how has that shaped who you are?

I attended the Women’s Leadership Institute in October 2022. I wanted to meet like-minded, ambitious women and learn from mentors who could teach me how to advocate for myself as I entered the uncharted territory of academia. During this influential weekend, we discussed topics on women’s experiences in the workplace and how to approach difficulties with confidence. The Women’s Leadership Institute laid a foundation for my college experience and professional persona. I have become comfortable directing projects, using my abilities to chase opportunities I wouldn’t have previously attempted and motivating other women to do the same. This institute also sparked my interest in Women’s Studies, which has been a crucial aspect of my research.

My research projects have also worked to support the women in my close circle. My work highlights how women have historically exercised agency to accomplish outstanding achievements and contribute to the development of our modern world. By revealing and sharing the rich history of these women’s hard work, I encourage the women around me at FSU to build each other up and attempt the impossible.

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A faculty member from Florida State University’s Department of English has been selected to receive the prestigious Louisiana Writer Award, presented by the Louisiana Center for the Book in the State Library of Louisiana.

Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor David Kirby is the 25th recipient of the award, which recognizes contemporary Louisiana authors who have made outstanding contributions to that state’s literary and intellectual life through their body of work. Past awardees include writers Ernest J. Gaines, John Kennedy Toole, Elmore Leonard and Yusef Komunyakaa.

The award holds special significance for Kirby, a poet and author who was born and raised in Louisiana, on a small farm outside of Baton Rouge.

“There’s a sense of joy that’s almost unimaginable in receiving this award because that’s where I grew up. To be recognized by the place you grew up, that’s elemental, that’s foundational.”

— David Kirby, Department of English professor

“There’s a sense of joy that’s almost unimaginable in receiving this award because that’s where I grew up,” Kirby said. “To be recognized by the place you grew up, that’s elemental, that’s foundational. It gets back to mythology and legend — I’m being honored by a state that I was born into, I didn’t yet know who I was or have anything to say. I grew up all around it and thought that was the world until I found out that there were actually other states, other people.”

The Louisiana Writer Award is the latest in a lengthy list of honors Kirby has achieved during his more than five decades at FSU. Some of his most notable achievements include a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, a W. Guy McKenzie Tenured Professorship, a College of Arts and Sciences Teaching Award, four University Teaching Awards, two Teaching Incentive Program Awards, four Pushcart Prizes, a Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Fellowship, an FSU Distinguished Teacher Award and the Florida Humanities Council’s Florida Lifetime Achievement Award for Writing.

Kirby, the author of nearly 40 books to date, is also a National Book Award finalist. His latest publications include a collection of poetry titled “The Winter Dance Party: Poems 1983-2023,” and a textbook titled “The Knowledge: Where Poems Come from and How to Write Them,” which took Kirby just six weeks to complete.

“I thought about all of the syllabi, I had all of the exercises, all the prompts, all the speeches I’d given, and I just cracked my knuckles,” Kirby said. “It was the easiest thing I did. So, these two books were kind of my whole life in 600 pages.”

In 2020, the David Kirby Fellowship within Creative Writing was organized to honor Kirby’s 50 years of teaching at Florida State. The fellowship was endowed and today supports the general needs and priorities of the university’s creative writing program, including providing stipend supplements and funding graduate student travel to conferences and invited lectures.

“This Louisiana Writer Award is one in a long line of accolades and, as a Louisiana native, is surely of special importance to David,” said Sam Huckaba, dean of the FSU College of Arts and Sciences. “It is a pleasure to congratulate him. The Louisiana Writer Award is meaningful, prestigious and another reflection of the high-quality scholarship flowing from the college and the Department of English.”

Kirby will accept the award Saturday, Nov. 2, at the 2024 Louisiana Book Festival in downtown Baton Rouge, Louisiana. The festival marks its 20th anniversary this year, with more than 200 authors and presenters taking part. The official artwork for this year’s festival, “Come to Find Out” by Louisiana artist Kelly A. Mueller, also features an ode to Kirby’s body of work.

“When we first began discussion about the design for this year’s Louisiana Book Festival, conversations quickly centered on the fact that I regularly include projected text in my work,” Mueller said. “Here, we saw it as an opportunity to celebrate this year’s recipient of the 25th Louisiana Writer Award, David Kirby. In the image, a writer sits quietly working at a window at dusk, while the surrounding cypress swamp comes to life.”

Excerpts from some of Kirby’s poems with a Louisiana connection can also be seen within Mueller’s artwork, including “Come to Find Out,” along with numbers commemorating the 20th book festival, the 25th Louisiana Writer Award, and the 40 years of Kirby’s poems featured in “The Winter Dance Party.”

Kirby will also be honored at the Senate Chamber of the Louisiana Capitol by Lieutenant Governor Billy Nungesser during his visit.

“David Kirby has never forgotten where he came from, which is obvious in his work, with Louisiana often his inspiration,” Nungesser said. “He’s the type of author the Louisiana Writer Award was established to recognize – not only for his poetry, but David also moves effortlessly among genres.”

Although Kirby has returned to Louisiana many times since his childhood, each return, he said, is uniquely inspiring.

“My parents are no longer living and the farm I grew up on has drastically changed,” Kirby said. “So, in many ways, it’s a world I don’t recognize. But I’ll walk down the street and hear someone speak in the kind of dialect heard only in that part of the world, or I’ll run into an old classmate, and just like a special effect in a movie, I kind of bounce back through time. That’s where poetry comes from — that conversation between here and now, between the present and the past.”

To learn more about Kirby’s work and the FSU Department of English, visit english.fsu.edu.

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UPDATE (10/24): The scheduled conversation between Giovanni and Moten on Oct. 11 will be rescheduled for a later date. Details will be provided as they are available.

Florida State University’s Civil Rights Institute (CRI) — in partnership with the Department of English, the Frances Cushing Ervin Chair in American Literature, and the African American Studies Program — presents a two-day intergenerational dialogue about the future of Black artistic expression and activism.

“Going to Mars with Nikki Giovanni and Fred Moten” will take place Oct. 10-11 across multiple locations and is free, accessible and open to the public.

Moten, a MacArthur Foundation Fellow and distinguished professor of comparative literature and associate chair of performance studies at New York University, will share his knowledge and converse with Giovanni about her legacy and that of the generation of writers who emerged with her from the era known as Black Arts Movement (1965-1975) during the main event of the two-day dialogue.

“‘Going to Mars with Nikki Giovanni and Fred Moten’ furthers the institute’s mission to commemorate, celebrate and study the U.S. Civil Rights Movement; promote justice and equality at FSU and in communities where we work and serve; and produce scholarship and creative activity that recognizes the importance of civil rights for all people,” said Ted Ellis, director of the CRI.

UPDATE (10/24): The scheduled conversation between Giovanni and Moten on Oct. 11 will be rescheduled for a later date. Details will be provided as they are available. Giovanni and Moten will engage in a formative conversation about their work in poetics, film, theory, music and other art forms inside academe and around the globe at 6 p.m. Oct. 24 at the FSU Student Union Ballroom E (75 N. Woodward Ave., 2nd Floor).

“Championing a revered icon whose poetry, prose, and music have remained an American mainstay for the past six decades, the event aims to mirror the conversation that then-28-year-old Giovanni had in 1971 on the PBS program “SOUL!” with then-47-year-old literary titan James Baldwin who dubbed her ‘the Princess of Black Poetry,’” Ellis said.

Moten, a National Book Award finalist for his 2014 poetry collection “The Feel Trio” and winner of a host of awards for his literary scholarship, will deliver the talk “a forward thrust of blackness” about Giovanni’s work at 3 p.m. Oct. 10 in FSU’s Conradi Theatre (Williams Building, 631 University Way, Room 123).

The screening of “Going to Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project” at 7 p.m. Oct. 10 at Challenger Learning Center is sold out.

For the full schedule of events and more information, visit cosspp.fsu.edu/cri/going-to-mars/.

For more information about FSU’s Civil Rights Institute visit cosspp.fsu.edu/cri.

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The Florida State University Department of English is one of eight academic units nationwide to be recognized this year for its dedication to career preparation by the Modern Language Association, the most prestigious professional organization for the study of literature and language.

FSU’s English department is featured as a case study in MLA’s “Report on English Majors’ Career Preparation and Outcomes,” and the department’s internship program was recognized for its strength, the ways its internships prepare students for careers and for the opportunities it provides undergraduates to apply what they’ve learned in the classroom to real work environments.

“It is extremely gratifying to see the success of our department and our students recognized in this report, so that peer institutions may look to us as a model,” said Molly Hand, director of the internship program and associate lecturer in the Department of English. “The report in general is an extraordinarily validating confirmation regarding the success not only of our English majors at FSU but of English majors nationwide.”

The internship program began as a curricular requirement of the editing, writing and media major (EWM) in English when the major launched in 2010. In 2018, further program refinements ensured students were optimally prepared for internship opportunities and could connect this experiential capstone for the major with both their academic work and career planning. While the semester-long program is required for EWM majors, it is also open to any English major. Students are not placed in internships, but the program, along with FSU’s Career Center, provides valuable resources for helping students identify opportunities that align with their interests and career goals.

“It is extremely gratifying to see the success of our department and our students recognized in this report, so that peer institutions may look to us as a model. The report in general is an extraordinarily validating confirmation regarding the success not only of our English majors at FSU but of English majors nationwide.”

— Molly Hand, director of the internship program and associate lecturer in the Department of English

Gabriella Paez, who currently works as associate manager of school and library marketing at the publishing company Penguin Random House LLC, earned her bachelor’s degree in EWM in 2019 and was among the first to take part in the newly revised internship program.

“The internship program was hands down one of the best things I experienced at Florida State,” Paez said. “My internship, which was for the communications team in the FSU College of Arts and Sciences, instilled a confidence in me that I highly doubt I would’ve otherwise had. It helped develop a sense of the value of my degree and how it could be applied. I learned how to make the most of one-on-one meetings with my managers, and I had some pretty amazing additions to my portfolio and résumé.”

While careers such as K-12 education, publishing and academia are closely associated with the major, an English degree provides a solid foundation for diverse careers in various fields. English majors go on to law school, the arts sector and arts administration, marketing and advertising, nonprofit and public-service positions, the tech industry, business school, health care-related fields, politics, sports reporting and more.

“This report debunks a lot of persistent, negative myths about majoring in English — especially that it isn’t practical or useful,” said Andrew Epstein, department chair. “It proves that majoring in English does lead to meaningful, fulfilling, stable and well-paying careers.”

Among many examples of career success are FSU English alumnus Barry Jenkins, who has earned three Academy Awards and received his bachelor’s degree in creative writing alongside a bachelor’s in cinematography and video and film production in 2003. Jeremy Willis, a senior editor at ESPN, graduated from FSU in 2004 with two bachelor’s degrees, one in English and one in sport management. FSU English alumna Wendy Clark, who earned a degree in creative writing, is among the most well-known leaders in marketing around the world.

“English degrees confer so many career skills — sophisticated writing and editing, interpersonal communication, the ability to work collaboratively,” Hand said. “Curiosity, care and attention to detail are also important skills developed in this field of study.”

Today’s employers expect new graduates to come on board with work experience, and internships, such as copywriting, managing social media, and generating media for law firms, ad agencies, magazines, university offices, television stations and more, are an important means of gaining an edge on other candidates. Program interns apply and further develop their knowledge and skills in a professional environment while learning about themselves and the kind of environment in which they would like to work.

“The messages that this report from the MLA relays are very important for administrators, governors and other leaders to understand: It shows that a wide range of careers and professional fields consistently hire English majors for the skills and abilities they develop through the study of writing, literature, language and culture,” Epstein said.

To learn more about the FSU Department of English and its internship program, visit english.fsu.edu.

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