Faculty News

Mary Rivkin

Dr. Mary Rivkin, an LLC Affiliate Faculty member and Chair of the Education Department, recently delivered the first lecture in the Rachel Carson Centennial Lecture Series sponsored by the U.S. Department of the Interior.  She spoke on the importance of experiences with nature for children and the increasing dangers of pesticides and chemicals.

She also spoke about a case study on a related topic at the February meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and will be speaking about related issues at the Environmental Design Research Association (EDRA) Conference in Sacramento in early June.

If you would like to know more about Dr. Rivkin's research, please contact her at rivkin@umbc.edu.

Christine Mallinson

Our new LLC Assistant Professor, Christine Mallinson, has been a very active presenter this semester. Among her recent presentations:

American Anthropological Association (San Jose, Calif.)

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"From Sociology to Anthropology in Sociolinguistic Theories of Social Class," given as part of a 13-member panel entitled, "Critical Intersections in Linguistic Research: Sociolinguistics and Linguistic Anthropology in Dialogue."

New Ways of Analyzing Variation (Columbus, Ohio)

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"Social Class, Social Status, and Stratification: Revisiting Familiar Concepts in Sociolinguistics," given as part of a four-member panel entitled, "Undoing the Divide in Sociolinguistics and Linguistic Anthropology."

"Trajectories of African American English in Appalachia, given as part of a six-member panel entitled, "Variation and Change in Appalachia" with with Becky Childs, Assistant Professor of Linguistics at Memorial University of Newfoundland.

Co-organizer and presenter of a workshop, "Sociological Theory from the Perspective of Sociolinguistic Variation," with Robin Dodsworth of the University of Maryland's Center for the Advanced Study of Language.

If you want to know more about any of these presentations, please contact Professor Mallinson at mallinson@umbc.edu.

Christine Mallinson

Dr. Christine Mallinson, LLC's new assistant profession of research methodology, opened LLC's Fall Colloquium series in October with "'Katrina That Bitch!' -- Interpreting T-Shirt Slogans in New Orleans, Louisiana, in the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina." Her provocative talk, a review of a collaborative research study, stimulated much interesting discussion. It also bore a writeup in the Baltimore Sun, which can be found here.

More more information about her research, Dr. Mallinson can be contacted at mallinson@umbc.edu.

Bev Bickel

Dr. Beverly Bickel, graduate of the LLC program and director of UMBC's English Language Center, has had an opinion piece published in the Baltimore Sun. The piece, entitled "Is dialogue dying?", can be read here.

To learn more, Dr. Bickel can be reached at bickel@umbc.edu.

Karen Carpenter

It is with great sadness that we announce the retirement of Karen Carpenter. Karen is a graduate of the LLC program who has also become a key faculty member, serving as the Chair of the Curriculum Committee, an instructor of one of our core courses, and also coordinator of this year's orientation for new students.

Although she won't be teaching classes this fall, she has agreed to teach some in the future, which is great news, since students have told me how much that have appreciated and learned in her courses. We are also grateful that Karen is going to coordinate this year's orientation. If you want to convey your best wishes to Karen, you can contact her at carpente@umbc.edu.

Piotr Gwiazda

WYPR, Baltimore's NPR station, broadcast a reading from Piotr Gwiazda's book, Gagarin Street, on January 13th. You can listen to the reading here. Dr. Gwiazda is a professor in the LLC and English departments at UMBC. He can be contacted at gwiazda@umbc.edu.

Karen Carpenter

Karen Carpenter, LLC alumna and professor, spoke January 13th at The Special Event 2006, a trade show and conference for event specialists. Her session at this Dallas expo was entitled "Use Brand to Launch, To Change, To Compete, To Grow." To find out more, contact Karen at carpente@comcast.net.

Dr JoAnn (Jodi) Crandall

Jodi Crandall was one of three invited speakers at a TESOL Symposium on English Language Teaching in Resource Challenged Contexts held in Dakar, Senegal On December 16-17, 2005. Participants from 21 countries attended the Symposium and a pre-Sympsoium Seminar sponsored by the U.S. State Department, Office of English Language Programs. While in Dakar, she was able to get together with Dr. Codou Diaw, an LLC 2003 Graduate who is currently Deputy Director for Education Program Formulation for the West and Central Africa Regions for the Japanese International Cooperation Agency, and with Dr. Omar Ka, an MLL/LLC faculty member who is in Senegal as a Fulbright Scholar.

Jodi was also a plenary speaker at the Korean TESOL Conference (KOTESOL) held in Seoul, October 14-16, where she spoke on "Writing: The Neglected Skill in EFL" and at the 35th anniversary conference of Washington, DC TESOL (WATESOL), where she provided a historical review of WATESOL and TESOL, "WATESOL and TESOL: Looking Back and Thinking Forward."

Jodi also participated in the National Literacy Summit, sponsored by the National Literacy Coalition. With Miriam Burt of the Center for Applied Linguistics, she outlined several of the most important literacy issues facing Adult English Language Learners*.

For more about Jodi, visit her website here.