The ARRUF Newsletter for November-December 2019
A Flourish, a Finale for 2019! Join us for discussions, a fascinating photo review of Paul Hester's exhibition, Doing Time in Houston, and the Holiday Reception and Luncheon. Check for other meetings and events below and on the ARRUF website: ARRUF.rice.edu
Stay tuned for 2020 as ARRUF's leadership launches the organization into an important role at Rice
IT'S A DATE
Nov. 12, Tues. Discussion of Future Trends (see more below) 10:30 a.m. Fondren 412
Nov. 12, Tues. Lunch at the Faculty Club 11:45 s.m.
Nov. 15, Fri. Discussion of Books We Loved in 2019 3 p.m. Fondren 412
Nov. 20, Wed. Paul Hester Photo Talk: Doing Time in Houston. 3 p.m. Glasscock School of Continuing Studies Room 110
Nov. 21, Thurs. Activities Committee meets Faculty Club 11 a.m.
Nov. 22, Fri. Memoir Writers MeetFondren 412 or ZOOM
Dec. 3, Tues. Executive Committee Meeting 10 a.m. Fondren 412
Dec. 5, Thurs. Holiday Reception and Luncheon 10:30 a.m. Faculty Club Lounge
Dec. 10, Tues. Discussion of Future Trends 10:30 a.m. Fondren 412
Dec. 13, Fri Reading Aloud of A Christmas Memory by Truman Capote (replaces this month only the Books We Love topic) 3 p.m. Fondren 412
See you in January 2020! Peace to All!
Paul Hester Phototalk: Doing Time in Houston, November 20, 3 p.m. Room 110 Glasscock School of Continuing Studies Building
Paul Hester is someone who notices what others miss, especially the distinctive things that make Houston a special visual and social environment. Paul recently retired after years in the Department of Visual and Dramatic Arts. He capped off the career with an exhibition, and on November 20 he will turn the highlights of the exhibition into a photo lecture. Be in the audience on Nov. 20th. You 'll find yourself saying, “Only in Houston!”
Paul Hester received an MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design, where he studied with Harry Callahan, Aaron Siskind, Lisette Model, Minor White, Charles Harbutt, Bert Beavers, Richard Lebowitz, and Sally Stein. He divides his time between Fayetteville, Texas and Houston, Texas; between looking , taking pictures, and thinking; between now and then; between here and there. His photographs reside in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris, Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, the Wooster Art Museum in Massachusetts, the National Museum of American Art in Washington DC, the Amon Carter Museum in Fort Worth, and in the homes of passionate collectors everywhere. He was on the faculty of the Department of Visual & Dramatic Arts, Rice University, Houston, for 15 years, where he taught courses in photography and writing-intensive classes about the language of photography. He traveled twice to Xi’an, China with groups of students studying ways in which China is represented in photographic histories.
The Genuine Benefits of Collaboration? MORE BENEFITS!
When Bob Curl responded to the first pleas of retired faculty who were unable to access Fondren Library’s on-line Resources, he didn’t anticipate the consequences: Now the University has revised its policies of access!
Bob Curl, Jim Young, and Mary Tobin expanded their efforts as the Committee on Benefits and Privileges and produced the Interim report in May 2018 that included how departments and schools across the University were involving retired faculty to achieve their goals, from hiring them to teaching courses, participating as research faculty, attending meetings and social events, and receiving departmental news. ARRUF shared this report with the Vice Provost's working group. Now we have received the wonderful news that the working group headed by the Associate Provost C. Fred Higgs, III has revised policies affecting retired faculty. While the complete policy revisions are not yet posted, we know this much, thanks to an email from Assistant Vice Provost for Academic iAffairs, Celeste Boudreaux on October 30th:
At long last, we are finally ready to launch a new process for giving non-emeritus faculty retirees off-campus access to a certain subset of Rice library resources through EZ Proxy. For more details about the resources available via EZ Proxy, see https://library.rice.edu/services/retired-faculty-services. In addition, we just today launched a new and improved VPAA website, which now includes a section for retired faculty: https://vpaa.rice.edu/retired-faculty. You will note that we have posted some information about library access on that page. Item #1 is specifically about the new EZ Proxy access that we are now testing.
. . .
As soon as I have received confirmation that [ARRUF members who asked for access] they are able to log in and access the resources, I will send emails to a list of other non-emeritus faculty retirees via their Rice email addresses, inviting them to request access if they are interested. As I receive requests, I will set them up with a special code in Banner, and the next day, they should be able to use the resources through EZ Proxy. This access will have to be renewed annually. Each summer, I will send those with access, plus any new retirees in this category (non-emeritus faculty retirees) emails inviting them to renew or be added. The first step for anyone wishing to set up such access is simply an email to vpaa@rice.edu asking for access to the Rice Retired Faculty Digital Library, or simply EZ Proxy.
This was a project that involved the cooperation of many individuals in the Fondren Library, the Office of Information Technology, and VPAA Office.
And we also know that last year members of the Associate Provost’s staff, especially Heather Holley, helped ensure that ARRUF’s needs were “top of mind” with the working group. Our most sincere thanks to Celeste Boudreaux, Heather Holley, and to Associate Provost Fred C. Higgs III! It is also worth noting with appreciation the efforts that ARRUF’s directors have made to keep the administration’s leaders aware of ARRUF’s activities and needs. Well done all around!
Want to work on the Benefits and Privileges Report update? Send an email to Coreen Kovacs at ARRUF.invites@rice.edu to explore your options as a volunteer on the committee.
Memoir Writers Meet Nov. 22. What do YOU remember?
A classic TV program claimed there were “a million stories in the Naked City,” and there are nearly as many in our own past. Remember when Willy was turned around above his tomb to face Fondren? When classrooms were NOT air conditioned? The streaker at the football stadium? Come join in a session of the memoir writers' monthly Friday gatherings to listen to tales from our past. Eventually you will want to draft one of your own. Or not. You will be welcome if you simply listen and give feedback—the positive kind—what you liked best, what you wished there were more of. In December the group will not meet. However, November 22, January 10, and February 14 are on the schedule. 10 a.m. in Fondren 412 or participate via ZOOM.
Another Year of Recognition for Jane Chance and Her Scholarship and Poetry
2019 has been a year of acknowledgement and success for Jane Chance, whose Chaucer scholarship continues to be celebrated, given awards, and reprinted in new editions. Her reputation as a poet has also grown.
BOOKS
Her book, "Tolkien, Self and Other, "This Queer Creature," was reprinted in paperback by Palgrave-Macmillan in 2019.
Her second book, "The Middle Ages," (Finishing Line Press, 2018), was awarded a finalist in the Eric Hoffer Book Award Competition.
Other books out of print have been accepted for reprint by Wipf Stock:
"Gender and Text in the Middle Ages" (formerly University Press of Florida),
"Medieval Mythography," 3 vols., formerly published by UPF.
UPF has also reprinted: "Woman as Hero in Old English Literature," Syracuse University, and "Women Medievalists and the Academy," 2018, University of Wisconsin Press, now in 2 vols.
LECTURES
Professor Chance delivered a plenary lecture, "Grendel's Mother and Tolkien's Women," at Tolkien 2019, in Birmingham, UKY, Aug. 9, 2019. She has been invited to do another version of this as a plenary at the Tolkien and Lewis Conference at Taylor University, in Indiana, next June, 2020.
POETRY Publications and Awards
"Spit," reprt. "Feminine Rising," ed. Andrea Fekete and Lara Lillibridge (Malvern Hills: Cynren Press, 2019), 91.
"Torre di Cetara," reprt. in The Enchantment of the Ordinary, Anthology, ed. John Gorman (Houston: Mutabilis Press, 2019), 35.
"Unicorn," rpt. in "Do You See the Way the Light: A Poetry Anthology from Friendswood Library's 2017-18 Ecphrastic Poetry Contests," ed. Matthew Riley (Friendwood: Friendswood Library, 2019), 14-17.
OTHER COMPETITIONS
"My Mother's Brocade Purse," was selected to be read in the 2019 Ekphrastic Poetry Contest at Friendswood Library.
"Unfrozen" was selected to be read and published in "The Book of Water," the 2019 Waco-Wordfest Anthology (Waco, TX, 2019), Oct. 4-6, 2019.
Featured Poet with Randall Barnes, at Poetry Fix, at the Fix Cafe, Houston, TX June 25, 2019.
Gulf Coast Poets Featured Poet, Barnes and Noble Book Store, Webster, TX, June 3, 2019.
Poet and Organizer, Medievalist Poetry: Introduction and Reading,49th Annual Medieval Studies Congress, Western MIchigan University, Kalamazoo, MI: May 9, 2019.
Featured Poet, Inprint First Friday Reading, Houston, TXZ, May 3, 2019.
WIVLA Poetry Reading at Heights Community Library, Heights, TX, April 13, 2019.
WIVLA Poetry Reading, Community Library, La Porte, TX, April 6, 2019.
CONGRATULATIONS TO JANE!
Building an Arts Legacy
Emeritus faculty continue to strengthen the international legacy in the arts through creation of resources for future scholars.
ARRUF member Professor Emerita Anne Schnoebelen reports the following entry has been added:
Alessandro Grandi: Opera Omnia, “Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae,” 112-2, Il secondo libro de motetti a due, tre, e quattro voci con il basso continuo per sonar nell’organo (1613), ed. Steven Saunders and Anne Schnoebelen (American Institute of Musicology, 2019).
Professor Emeritus William Camfield and independent scholar Candace Clements, who are members of a team of four scholars who meet in Paris twice annually each year, announced that the group has published the final volume of the Francis Picabia catalog raisonné. The study of over 7000 items will be a key reference for future scholars. Camfield and Clements presented an overview to ARRUF members this spring.
WANT TO ZOOM? Here’s how:
If you can’t come to a meeting that is scheduled for Fondren 412, you can join most meetings held in Fondren 412 on your tablet or computer with ZOOM.
- Set up your FREE ZOOM account first by going to ZOOM.US on your browser.
- At the appointed day and time, go to the ZOOM site and find the JOIN MEETING tab on the menu.
- Put in the ARRUF meeting ID 271-570-0281 to join the session.
Many apologies for the many delays in issuing this newsletter. The first resolution will be to deliver the January issue in the first week of the month. There have been software problems that resisted, over and over, all attempts to solve them. Thank you for your patience. Happy Holidays.
Copyright © 2019, Rice University, All rights reserved.
Our mailing address is:
The Association of Retired Rice University Faculty
Office of the Provost MS-2
Rice University
P. O. Box 1892
Houston, TX 77251-1892
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ARRUF.invites@rice.edu