Criticism

Academic Freedom in the Post-9/11 Era (forthcoming, Palgrave 2010)

Edited by Edward J. Carvalho and David B. Downing

Appearing on Palgrave/MacMillan's Education, Politics, Public Life
Series Editors Henry A. Giroux and Susan Searls Giroux

Click on link to pre-order from Amazon.com.

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Academic Freedom and Intellectual Activism
in the Post-9/11 University (Spec. Issue of David B. Downing's Works and Days 51-54, 26-27.1/4 2008-09)

Edited by Edward J. Carvalho

As discussed in The New York Times

Stanley Fish "Think Again" blog posts:

8 Mar. 2009 "Neoliberalism and Higher Education" (references the work of contributors Henry A. Giroux, Susan Searls Giroux, and Sophia McClennen)
15 Mar. 2009 "To Boycott or Not to Boycott, That Is the Question" (references the work of contributor Grant Farred)
5 Apr. 2009 "Ward Churchill Redux" (references the Works and Days essay by Ward Churchill in relation to the Ward Churhcill v. Colorado University case)

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Recent Press for the Works and Days special double-issue Academic Freedom and Intellectual Activism in the Post-9/11 University

1. Works and Days articles discussed in Stanley Fish's New York Times blog
2. See Henry Giroux's response to Stanley Fish in CounterPunch (see also Giroux's note 13 where he says the latest Works and Days collection "may be the best collection yet published on intellectual activism and academic freedom.")
3. Works and Days cited by Marc Bousquet in The Chronicle of Higher Education (Bousquet proclaims that the volume is "the best value in academic freedom short of joining the AAUP."

Contributors:

Karren Baird-Olson, Robert Barsky, Derrick Bell, Joe Berry, Michael Bérubé,
Marc Bousquet, Eric Cheyfitz, Noam Chomsky, Ward Churchill, Martín Espada,
Grant Farred, Norman Finkelstein, Irene Gendzier, Henry Giroux, David Klein,
Sophia McClennen, Randy Martin, Ellen Messer-Davidow, Cary Nelson, Robert O’Neil,
R. Radhakrishnan, Bruce Robbins, Susan Searls Giroux, Cornel West, Steven Wexler,
Jeffrey Williams, John K. Wilson

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Press Release:

IUP and Works and Days Announce
Special Issue on Academic Freedom after 9/11

The literary journal Works and Days and Indiana University of Pennsylvania are proud to announce the February, 2009 publication of a special issue on Academic Freedom and Intellectual Activism in the Post-9/11 University.” Reporting on the state of academic freedom now, the more than 25 contributors include scholars, intellectuals, and activists from a range of fields, including literary studies, education, law, and history, among them luminaries like Noam Chomsky, Cornel West, Derrick Bell, Ellen Messer-Davidow, Bob O’Neil, Cary Nelson, Henry Giroux, Martín Espada, Randy Martin, Michael Bérubé, Sophia McClennen, Bruce Robbins, Irene Gendzier, Jeffrey J. Williams, Grant Farred, Eric Cheyfitz, R. Radhakrishnan, and Marc Bousquet.

Since 1915, academic freedom has been a principle that undergirds the university. It protects free inquiry essential to a democratic society. But in the twenty-first century, the basic principle has been deeply challenged. This timely issue therefore addresses some of the most urgent issues facing higher education in the United States. Global political and economic pressures have had dramatic effect on the conditions for teaching and research, and many of these changes have raised serious questions about the status of academic freedom. Indeed, some individual cases have circulated widely in the national media, such as the well-known battles over academic freedom by Ward Churchill and Norman Finkelstein, both of whom join the list of contributors to provide the Works and Days readership with unique, previously unpublished statements related to their respective cases.

The Works and Days volume is organized into five sections that examine such diverse topics as post-9/11 government policies that influence university space, the Ward Churchill case, the permissibility of researching the Israel-Palestine conflict in (and outside) the classroom, academic labor rights and contingent faculty concerns, and prognostications on the future of the university and democratic society. Academic Freedom and Intellectual Activism in the Post-9/11 University is guest edited by IUP doctoral candidate Edward J. Carvalho.

Works and Days provides a scholarly forum for the exploration of problems in cultural studies, pedagogy, and institutional critique. Founded by David B. Downing in 1984, each issue of the journal is organized around specific inquiries. Previous volumes include The Information University, Richard Ohmann: A Retrospective, and The Society for Critical Exchange: Phase 1.

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Poetry

"If the radiance of a thousand suns": Songs of the American Hiroshima (forthcoming, 2011)
Chants from the Seven Cities (Guerrilla Ignition, 2009)
solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short (Fine Tooth Press, 2007)

"If the radiance of a thousand suns":
Songs of the American Hiroshima, Books I - III (2011)
forthcoming manuscript in progress

SAMPLE POEMS:

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Author Note:

Inspired by both Oppenheimer's famous quote at Trinity (citing The Bhagavad-Gita) and the Bin Ladin term for a nuclear attack on American soil to mimic the 1945 bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, "If the radiance of a thousand suns": Songs of the American Hiroshima explores the harrowing realities (and concomitant dangers for global citizenry) of nuclear proliferation, the current political climate in and of the United States, as well as the post-9/11 modernity upon familial and cross-cultural relationships. The work will be presented in three parts and is scheduled for release in 2009. For more information on this work and clarifications on its research mission, please see the forthcoming interview with Mitch James to be published in the forthcoming edition of Quay.

Chants from the Seven Cities (Guerrilla Ignition, April 2009)

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Audiobook Track Listing: Sample audio: *Live Bonus Tracks* [6:37]

Sessions recorded in the Seven Cities (Norfolk, VA) on 30 July 2008.

*Live bonus tracks recorded 25 Sept. 2007 at the Commonplace Coffeehouse for the UnCommon Words reading series curated by Kenneth Sherwood. Background music “Lefty’s Alone” by Drop Trio from the album Big Dipper (courtesy Magnatune.com).

Cover artwork for “Chants from the Seven Cities” by Jason Beam.
Back Cover Photo Credit: Landon F. Garside

Overview: Recorded in a two-hour marathon session by producer, publisher, and poet Synnika Lofton in Norfolk, VA, Chants from the Seven Cities is Carvalho's first poetry audiobook release. Selections for this recording were culled from his full-length poetry collection solitary, poor, brutish and short and new, previously unpublished work. Highlights from the seventeen-track collection include "Jabberwocky 2004," "'The Day After' Canticles," and "Late night logic from a former postal worker," among others. Live bonus track montage included.

Chants from the Seven Cities (Guerrilla Ignition) will be available mid-April 2009 in downloadable format on iTunes and Amazon.com and distributed via CD format through CD Baby.com. Pricing set at $12.97 with introductory promotional rate to be announced on April 10..

 

solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short (Fine Tooth Press, March 2007)

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Sample Poems:

Advertising Blurb:

"Let us this once judge a book by the cover. What else can be done when we come upon the picture of a butterfly besmeared on a car bumper in its orange isolation? Here, the potential reader catches the first glimpse of Edward Carvalho’s collection of contemporary poetry—solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short —and is presented with an entirely new American landscape; an unrelenting portrayal of a modernity punctuated by 'No arts; no letters; no society…' But this book is no repetitive dirge, no mere grief-song for our civilization. Rather, Carvalho’s poems resonate with the potential for hope, welcoming all who are eager and brave enough to intercede upon the often illogical discourse of humanity. As such, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short, was born from the very earth it scorched. It emerges from a newly prepared soil, coated in the phosphates of the poet-author's many 'beautiful casualties.' Powerful, original, and certain to be for bookstores what Gideon was to the hotel drawer, Carvalho’s latest poetry, just like its front cover image, will most definitely not be ignored." —William Thompson

Reviews:

"Simply put, Carvalho’s book deals with the classic themes of sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll, but the author does not present anything trite or cliché. If his book were getting dressed, it wouldn’t be wearing a pair of leather chaps and hoist a guitar; it would choose to don some faded jeans and a big fat sneer at the system. This is not one of those books which could double as a door stop. If you expect to skimp on your Nyquil purchases, think again, as this text will most assuredly not induce drowsiness. Once you begin reading, you will devour its contents, in greedy little gulps. This is one of those books that you will recommend to everyone; but you won’t want to lend out your personal copy. Within one poem entitled 'Mondays,' Carvalho grapples with the frustrations of a typical cubicle-encrusted candy-bar napping incident, while in 'Américha' he rewrites the Star Spangled Banner to give voice to the sexual exploitation of immigrant workers. As these two brief examples illustrate, there is certainly something for everyone within this collection. Even though readers may be skeptical of a 'new' poet on the scene, this one has plenty to say, and he says it well. Carvalho comments upon (among other things) the frustrations presented by wireless communication, traditional creation stories, animal rights, prostitution, serial killings, and political happenings, all within the pages of solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short. Carvalho also presents countless clever references to canonical authors such as Shakespeare and [Beckett], proving that this doctoral student has read all of the pre-requisite masters, and is well on his way to becoming a master himself. If Henry Miller, Walt Whitman, and Edgar Allan Poe had an intellectual love child, this book may well have been the result. You don’t need to “get” every single allusion this author makes; but you do need to wrap your hands around a copy of this book. [. . .] His work challenges you to think about man’s struggle within a plethora of haunting, daunting, and complex social conditions." —Jennifer M. Woolston

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Author Note:

A manuscript created between 2004 - 2006, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short is the creative portion of my Master of Fine Arts thesis filed with Goddard College. Four months after graduation, Fine Tooth Press in Connecticut expressed interest in publishing the work in its entirety, tentatively slated for release later in the year.

The theme of the work is inspired by Thomas Hobbes's famous quote from Leviathan and examines modern man's relationship with himself, his fellow man and his society. Five distinct sections of the book chronicle familiar elements of modernity from discourse, the natural world, transportation, interaction within relationships and politics in order to help the reader make sense of the "mess of modern society."

Foreward by Dr. James R. Scrimgeour

Poetry (edited collections)

Pass-words (2008-09):
Poems from I speak the password primeval (PAresia Press, 2009)

Description: Pass-words is an annual publication for authors featured in the "I speak the Password Primeval" monthly reading series.

Series Editor: Edward J. Carvalho

Contributing Editors for the 2008-09 volume: Angel Anderson and Mitch James

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The 2008-09 list of contributors includes:

Abdullah M. Al-Dagamseh (translation of Mahmoud Darwish)
Mohammad I. Aljayyousi (translation of Mahmoud Darwish)
Majid Al-Khalaqi
Angel Anderson
Patrick Bizzaro
Edward J. Carvalho
Mahmoud Darwish (selections from "A Speech by the Red Indian")
Mitch James
Tony Lang
Laurie S. Miller
Mais Qutami
Jennifer M. Woolston

Interviews

Martín Espada: "A Branch on the Tree of Whitman: Martín Espada on the 150th Anniversary of Leaves of Grass." (Forthcoming in Espada's The Lover of a Subversive Is also a Subversive from the University of Michigan's Poets on Poetry series, 2010 [Available for pre-order on Amazon.com]).

Previously published in the Walt Whitman Quarterly Review 26.1 [Summer 2008], Quay 1.1 (print and online editions), and mirrored on martinespada.net.

Ron Slate: "Writing from the 'Heart of the Empire': Ron Slate on Incentive, History, and Politics in Poetry" (2006). Published on ronslate.com.

Gayatri Spivak (faculty profile here). "Changing Reflexes." Works and Days 55/56, 28.1/2 (2010): 325-45.


updated 19 May 2010

Criticism

Interviews

Poetry

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