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Lauri Ramey
Professor
College of Arts and Letters
Department of English
Office: A 613 Engineering & Technology Building
Phone: (323) 343-4165
Fax: (323) 343-6470
Email: Lramey@calstatela.edu |
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RESEARCH AND TEACHING INTERESTS
African diasporic literature and culture, especially African American and Black
British; lyric poetry and poetics; modern and contemporary British and American
literature and culture; formally innovative, inter-media and cross-genre writing and art; canon formation and
marginalization; literature and art in society and community; creative writing
pedagogy; creative writing in multicultural environments; creative nonfiction; and the intersection of creative and critical writing and thought.
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CURRICULUM VITAE
Full Curriculum Vitae
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COURSES
Courses that I teach at the undergraduate and graduate levels include African Diasporic Poetics of Space, The African American Poetic Tradition, Black British Writing and Culture, International Modernism, Poetry as Difference, Poetry Writing, Creative Writing, Contemporary Poetry, Modern Poetry, The Writing Process, and Creative Nonfiction.
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EDUCATION
Ph.D. English
- The University of Chicago
M.A. Creative Writing and English
- The University of Chicago
B.A. Creative Writing
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SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
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M.Phil/Ph.D. STUDENTS
Wayne Thomas: PhD in Creative and Critical Writing, Cardiff University (2007). Dissertation: The Welsh-American Nexus in Best Intentions discusses my short stories in the light of modern and contemporary Welsh writing in English. Central to my discussion is the view that my work has been enriched by both Welsh and American writers, most notably Gwyn Thomas and Raymond Carver. I am currently working on a collection of personal essays called
Besides Drinking and a Little Carpentry? I am an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing
at the Open University in Wales.
Lisa Mansell, Ph.D. in Creative and Critical Writing, Cardiff University
(2007). Dissertation: The Form of the Fix:Transatlantic Sonority in the Minority. An interrogation of oral and sonic traditions in minority Anglophone literatures, especially Anglo-Welsh and African-American literatures. A shared point of identification manifests through collective positions of 'sonic' tradition (a more linguistically acrobatic and/or musical bias than more general notions of 'oral tradition'). Amid minorities, figures of canon also enter the dialogue in the bardic spectre of Shakespeare (Chapter 1) and the deeply perma-critical pulse of Aristotle (Chapter 4). These canonical figures demonstrate a minority slant on the dominant world that beholds notions of inheritance, role-model, heritage, and identity. Challenging these representations of textual dominance shows that minority texts are not frozen into a position of un-canon, but have multiple points of identification, some of which belong to the canon, the dominant: ancestors that reside outside their local setting of textual production. This shows that identity is always plural, fragmented; foreign and familiar.
The dissertation maintains a formally and linguistically innovative mode throughout, composed ambitiously in the form of critical-creative writing that I call "critical-lyric". This blended voice stylistically and metaphorically complements the multiple points of identification that form an interrogation of oral and sonic traditions in minority Anglophone literatures, to show identity's flexibility, fallacy, fix, and fortitude.
I am an
Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Staffordshire.
Jasper Cross, Ph.D. in Creative and Critical Writing, Cardiff University
(2006). Dissertation: The Man of Instructions, accompanied by a
critical commentary, is a coming-of-age novel that shifts back and forth through
time as the narrator seeks his identity in the potential selves that are the
characters who populate his writing, his dream life and his everyday life.
Vanessa Richards, M.Phil in Creative Writing, Cardiff University (2005).
Dissertation: "Hom(e)age," a collection of poetry, prose, photographic images and
videos, accompanied by a critical commentary. Two themes are explored. One is
the notion of home and being at home in one's life. Two is coming of age, as in
moving into and out of the feminine phase of fertility. Richards is currently
an Associate in the Study and Practice of Dialogue at Simon Fraser University.
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FELLOWSHIPS, HONORS AND AWARDS
Visiting Fellowship, Drama Department, Goldsmiths College, University of London (2009)
Nomination for The Lincoln Prize, Slave Songs and the Birth of African American Poetry,
Gettysburg College (2008)
Nomination for the Christian Gauss Award, Slave Songs and the Birth of African American Poetry,
Phi Beta Kappa Society (2008)
Nomination for NAACP Image Award, Slave Songs and the Birth of African American Poetry
(2008)
CHOICE Recommended Book, Slave Songs and the Birth of African American Poetry,American
Library Association (2008)
CHOICE Editors’ Pick and Highly Recommended Book, The Heritage Series of Black Poetry,
American Library Association (2008)
Nomination for PEN-Oakland Josephine Miles Award, The Heritage Series of Black Poetry
(2008)
Nomination for William Sanders Scarborough Prize, The Heritage Series of Black Poetry,Modern Language Association (2008)
National Program Directors’ Prize in Content, Association of Writers and Writing
Programs, Faculty Adviser to Statement Magazine (2008)
National Endowment for the Arts Access to Artistic Excellence Grant, in partnership with The
Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens, and The British Council, PI (2008-09)
British Council Writer-in-Residence Program Grants, PI (2008-09, 2007-08, 2006-07, 2005-06, 2004-05)
Katherine Carter Fund Research Grants, California State University at Los Angeles English Department (2008, 2007, 2006)
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Huntington Library Research Fellowship (2006-07)
Journal of Scholarly Publishing Significant University Press Title
for Undergraduates, Every Goodbye Ain’t Gone with Aldon Lynn Nielsen,
University of Toronto Press (2007)
Book for Understanding Race Relations, Every Goodbye Ain't Gone with
Aldon Lynn Nielsen, American Association of University Presses (2007)
Nomination for PEN-Oakland Josephine Miles Award, Every Goodbye Ain’t Gone with Aldon
Lynn Nielsen (2006)
Poets & Writers Visiting Writer Grant, PI (2006)
British Council Fellowships (2005, 2004)
National Endowment for the Humanities/American Communities Program Fellowship (2004-05)
Cambridge Seminar in Contemporary Literature Fellowship, Downing College (2005)
Joseph A. Bailey II, M.D. Fellowship in the African American Experience (2004-05)
American Delegate, British Council Bookcase, Edinburgh Festival (2004)
Cardiff University Research Grant (2004)
Lannan Foundation Grant, African American Poets-in-Residence Series, PI (1998-99)
Virginia Commission for the Arts Project Grant, PI (1998-99)
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PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES
Lauri Ramey was founding Curator of the African American Poetry Archive at Hampton University, and founding Director of the UK's first BA Creative Writing program at the University of Bedfordshire. At California State University at Los Angeles, she directs the
British Council's Writer in Residence Program, served as Founding Director of the
Center for Contemporary Poetry
and Poetics, and was faculty adviser to the issue of Statement Magazine which won the 2008 Association of Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) National Program Directors' Prize in Content. |
