Texts, Technologies, and Literature

Beginning this fall, the English department will offer a new masters of arts in texts, technologies, and literature. The program is currently recruiting its first class of graduate students.

The M.A. in texts, technologies, and literature will give students the chance to further their understanding of literature and a broad array of other texts, including digital, academic and those that function in everyday use, in relation to both historical and contemporary culture.

When creating the new master�s, the English department decided that they wanted to develop a program that was different than anything else offered in the region. They also wanted to pull together the strengths in its two existing undergraduate tracks, literature and communications and technology. Finally, faculty wanted to look ahead to the future of the field and the future of the English department at UMBC.

�The discipline is changing, and it feels right in that way. We�re going with the way the discipline is moving,� said Orianne Smith, chair of English. She and Lucille McCarthy, the graduate program director, also feel that the balance between the two specialties of UMBC�s English department will make for a unique experience for students and faculty.

�It�s not just for literature folks, and it�s not just for technology folks. Everyone can get something out of it, and I�m really open to seeing how that evolves,� said Smith. She said that English faculty members are especially excited to teach master�s classes, since it will allow them to combine their teaching and research more deeply than they are able to do while teaching only undergraduate courses.

The department is currently recruiting students to begin graduate classes this fall. Smith and McCarthy expect that many members of this first class of students will be UMBC alumni. Smith said that in exit interviews with graduating students, the desire for a way to continue their studies at UMBC was often a topic of conversation. �There was pressure from below as well as endorsement from above,� she said.

She and McCarthy imagine students will come into the program with a variety of goals: some may be interested in pursuing a Ph.D. (students in this program can take classes in certain other UMBC departments, including the Language, Literacy, and Culture Ph.D. program); others might be teachers pursuing advanced training; and still more could be professionals entering or hoping to further their career in the communications, editorial, and digital media professions.

�We just don�t know what people will do with it. I think we�re going to learn together,� McCarthy said.

Another option for current students is the accelerated B.A./M.A., which allows undergraduates to take classes towards the master�s degree. MCCarthy said that she has a number of talented undergraduates in her classes pursuing projects that would be appropriate for graduate study.

Applications for the fall are due on May 1. Information, application requirements, a list of courses, and more can be found on the program�s website.

(4/1/13)

The Two Gentlemen of Verona

UMBC celebrates a milestone this month as the Department of Theatre stages its first production in the new Performing Arts and Humanities Building Proscenium Theatre. Opening on April 18 and continuing through April 27, William Shakespeare’s The Two Gentlemen of Verona will be directed by assistant professor Eve Muson.

“It was a purposeful choice for the Department of Theatre to inaugurate the new PAHB Proscenium Theatre with William Shakespeare’s joyful comedy Two Gentlemen of Verona�a play about growing into maturity and defining one’s potential,” said Nyalls Hartman, chair and associate professor in the Department of Theatre. “It mirrors the Department’s own journey�moving into a dynamic new home, carrying our rich history forward and defining the direction of our future.”

Cultural leaders in the Baltimore region have applauded the new space. Vincent Lancisi, the artistic director of Everyman Theatre, remarked that for UMBC students and faculty to have “a toolkit like this, a place to tell stories, to create and to think and to engage audiences is extraordinary.” Fred Lazarus IV, president of the Maryland Institute College of Art, stated, “We talk about space as the envelope which allows really exciting creativity to happen, and that’s really what [UMBC has] created here.” Their comments were given during the opening celebration of the Performing Arts and Humanities Building in fall 2012.

The Two Gentlemen of Verona is one of Shakespeare’s earliest works and a perennial favorite among theatre audiences. When the two gentlemen, Valentine and Proteus, leave Verona to seek their fortunes in Milan, their boyhood friendship turns to rivalry as they both fall in love with the Duke’s daughter, Sylvia�even though she is promised to a rich suitor and Proteus is already engaged to his hometown sweetheart, Julia. Proteus sets out to betray both friend and fiancée, only to find that Julia and Sylvia have a thing or two to teach him about loyalty and love. One quick-witted (and one not-so-quick-witted) servant, some bawdy outlaws, and a faithful canine companion make this one of Shakespeare’s most lighthearted romantic comedies.

The play addresses timeless questions in Shakespeare’s works centered around love, friendship, adolescence and identity. What does it mean to be in a long distance relationship? How does one manage to live on one’s own for the first time? Set in imagined Renaissance Italy, UMBC’s production melds past and present, transcends time and blends music and dance. A visual mash-up of time periods, the play explores what happens when the bonds of friendship and fidelity are put to the test.

The production features scenery and costume design by Elena Zlotescu (associate professor); lighting and video design by Adam Mendelson (lecturer); musical direction by Anderson Wells (class of ’13); vocal direction by Lynn Watson (associate professor); choreography by Renee Brozic Barger (Dance, ’99); sound design by Patrick Calhoun; fight choreography by Cristian Bell; and dramaturgical support by Michele Osherow (associate professor of English and affiliate professor of Judaic Studies).

More information about the production, including performances dates and ticket information, is available on UMBC’s Arts and Culture Calendar.

(4/16/13)

Collecting and analyzing information from simple cell phones can provide surprising insights into how people move about and behave—and even help us understand the spread of diseases.

At a computer in her office at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, epidemiologist Caroline Buckee points to a dot on a map of Kenya’s western highlands, representing one of the nation’s thousands of cell-phone towers. In the fight against malaria, Buckee explains, the data transmitted from this tower near the town of Kericho has been epidemiological gold.

Mobile phones are great sources of data—but we must be careful about privacy.

Anyone who has worked with mobile-phone data knows how incredibly useful such information can be, even when it’s anonymous. It is amazing—but at the same time frightening—what massive quantities of spatio-temporal data points from mobile phones can tell us about ourselves, our lives, and our society in general.

With massive amounts of computational power, machines can now recognize objects and translate speech in real time. Artificial intelligence is finally getting smart.

When Ray Kurzweil met with Google CEO Larry Page last July, he wasn’t looking for a job. A respected inventor who’s become a machine-intelligence futurist, Kurzweil wanted to discuss his upcoming book How to Create a Mind. He told Page, who had read an early draft, that he wanted to start a company to develop his ideas about how to build a truly intelligent computer: one that could understand language and then make inferences and decisions on its own.