Our department has a strong tradition of democratic inclusion and sense of community. Faculty and graduate students participate as equals in various reading groups, community organizations, events involving visiting speakers, and our theater group, English Alternative Theatre (EAT). Perhaps more importantly, graduate students have a strong voice in the administration of the department; for example, they are on almost all departmental committees, including hiring committees.
Our focus on inclusion and community also manifests itself in our attention to diversity. The department has been recognized by the university's Black Faculty and Staff Council for its "outstanding leadership in creating a multicultural academic environment," and 10% of our students come from traditionally underrepresented groups or are international. Not only are we interested in promoting diversity in faculty and student population, but we are also committed to promoting diversity and multiculturalism as important objects of intellectual inquiry both in our own classrooms and across the university and larger communities. The Ad-Hoc African/Americanist (AHAA) faculty group, for instance, fosters vigorous conversations about African, African-American, and African diaspora literatures among faculty and students, promotes diversity, and makes connections between the English Department and other units within the University of Kansas and the larger community for the sponsoring of multicultural events. Faculty and graduate students in our department have served as leaders and participants in the Hall Center's ongoing Gender Seminar. Faculty regularly crosslist courses with Women's Studies, African Studies, and the Center for Indigenous Nations. Both faculty and graduate students have spearheaded significant service-learning programs with the local community, including the Douglas County Jail.
Finally, our student organization, SAGE, fosters a sense of community among graduate students. SAGE stimulates and coordinates student activity in such areas as curriculum, academic standards and ethics, graduate teaching assistantships, professionalization, and orientation of new graduate students. SAGE also sponsors a colloquium and readings each semester, and publishes a graduate student newsletter.
The English Department hosts two intensive summer institutes which bring in nationally-known scholars for a two-week graduate seminar in a topic of interest in current scholarship: the Holmes Institute sponsors a visiting scholar in either American or British literature and the Multicultural Literature Institute sponsors a scholar in the literature of a particular ethnic or minority group. The Science Fiction Institute held on campus each summer is nationally recognized and offers graduate students opportunities to help in the programming process.
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