Margaret E. Mitchell
605 Rome St.
Carrollton, Georgia 30117
mmitchel@westga.edu
_________________________________________________________________
Curriculum Vitae
October 2011
Education
PhD, English, University of Connecticut, 2004.
MA, English, University of Connecticut, 1995.
BA in English, Cornell University, 1992.
Publications
Scholarly articles
“Beautiful Creatures”: The Ethics of Female Beauty in Du Maurier’s Fiction. Special
Issue of Women: A Cultural Review, guest edited by Rebecca Munford and Helen Taylor. 2009.
“Reforming Beauty in Brontë’s Shirley.” Gender and Reform: A book collection of
selected essays from the 2006 Victorians Institute Conference, Cambridge
Scholars Press, ed. Anita Rose. 2009.
“‘Children of the Street’: Reconfiguring Gender in Gissing’s London.” Gissing and
the City: Cultural Crisis and the Making of Books in Late-Victorian
England. Palgrave Macmillan. John Spiers, ed. 2005.
“Gissing’s Moral Mischief: Prostitutes and Narrative Resolution.” Studies in the Novel
37.4 (Winter 2005).
Before West Georgia:
“Preface: ‘The Mirror is Doubtless Defective.’” Special Issue: Nineteenth-Century
British Literary Realism. Lit: Literature Interpretation Theory. Guest
Editor. 14.3 (2003): 179-84.
“‘Dreadful Necessities’: Nature and the Performance of Gender in Memoirs of a
Woman of Pleasure.” Women’s Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal.
32.3 (2003): 305-24.
Fiction
“It Would Be Different If.” New South, Summer 2011.
“July 4th, 1984.” New Ohio Review, 2011.
“Parties.” Southern Indiana Review, Winter, 2008.
“Closing the Barn Door.” Saranac Review, Summer 2007.
"The Widow Boddington." American Literary Review, Spring 2007.
"Shadows." Green Mountains Review. XIX.1, 2006.
“Ice Fishing.” Blueline. Spring 2004.
Creative Nonfiction
“Just a Splash.” Make Mine a Double: A Celebration of Women and Drink. Ed. Gina
Barreca. UP New England. Fall 2011.
“Afterword.” An American Tragedy, by Theodore Dreiser. New York: Signet Classics.
2010.
Encyclopedia Entries
“Jennifer Egan.” Encyclopedia of Contemporary Fiction. 2008-09.
“Fay Weldon.” British Writers: Supplement IV. New York: Scribners, 1997. 521-
40.
Conference Papers
(since appointment to UWG)
“The Economy of Dress in Gaskell’s Mary Barton.” Nineteenth Century Studies Association.
Albuquerque, NM. March 6, 2010.
“Transformative Bodies: Modeling Pain, Speaking Beauty in Egan and Gaitskill.”
Louisville Conference on Language and Literature Since 1900. Louisville,
KY. February 2009. (Also chair and organizer.)
“Representing Beauty: The Ethics of Opposition in Victorian Fashion Plates.
NAVSA/VSAWC. University of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. October,
2007.
“’Beautiful Creatures’: The Ethics of Female Beauty in du Maurier’s Fiction.”
Daphne du Maurier International Centenary Conference. Fowey, Cornwall,
UK. May 2007.
"Reforming Beauty in Brontë’s Shirley." Victorians Institute: Gender and Reform.
Converse College, Spartanburg, SC. October, 2006.
“'To defy her very self': Narrating Beauty in Dombey and Son." Narrative: An
International Conference. Ottawa, Canada. April, 2006.
“Policing The Whirlpool: Gissing, Gender, and Narrative.” Narrative: An
International Conference. Louisville, Kentucky. April, 2005.
Invited Reading
Savannah State. Presented a morning and an afternoon talk and reading for students. April 20,
2010.
Panel Chaired
"The Beautiful and the Good: Exploring the Beauty Controversy in Contemporary
Fiction." SAMLA. Atlanta, Georgia. November, 2009.
Editorship
Coeditor of LIT: Literature Interpretation Theory. A Routledge journal published by Taylor and Francis. With Regina Barreca of the University of Connecticut.
Work in Progress
Reforming Beauty, a book project examining representations of feminine beauty in the nineteenth- and twentieth-century novel, investigating the relationship between beauty, ethics, feminine subjectivity, and narrative. By working by ideas out in a series of articles and conference papers (see above), I am refining my approach to the book, assembling material, and devising an effective structure.
Pretty Is, a novel. Under revision.
Winter People, a collection of linked short stories. Under consideration.
LRC Faculty Research Grant—funded research at the British Library for a project
entitled “Subversive Beauty and the Divided Self in Victorian Fashion Plates.” (Summer 2006)
Finalist, Ohio State University Short Fiction Award. 2004.
Finalist, Spokane Prize. Eastern Washington University's book-length short story competition. 2004.
University of West Georgia, 2004-
ENGL 1102 Composition (Spring 2007)
ENGL 2120H Honors British Literature Survey (Fall 2004, Spring 2006)
ENGL 2120 British Literature Survey (Fall 2005)
ENGL 2060 Intro to Creative Writing (Spring 2009)
ENGL 2190 Survey of Literature by Women (Fall 2004, Spring 2009)
ENGL 2300 Practical Criticism: Research and Methodology (Fall 2004, Fall 2006)
ENGL 3200 Introduction to Creative Writing (Fall 2006)
ENGL 3200 Intermediate Creative Writing, Fiction (Fall 2008)
ENGL 4106 Genre: Fiction (Spring 2005, Fall 2005)
ENGL 4109 Film as Literature: The 19th-Century Novel on Film (Summer 2005, Spring 2007)
ENGL 4130 Eighteenth-Century British Literature (Fall 2005)
ENGL 4145 Victorian Literature (Fall 2006, Spring 2005)
ENGL 4188 Major Author: Virginia Woolf (Summer 2007)
ENGL 4381: Victorian Literature on Film (2 separate independent studies, Spring 2006)
ENGL 4381: Creative Writing: Fiction and Creative Nonfiction (Fall 2006)
ENGL 6115 Repression and Reform in the Victorian Social-Problem Novel: Graduate Seminar (Spring 2006)
University of Connecticut, 1993-2002.
Nineteenth and Twentieth Century British Literature. Fall, 2002.
Literature and Composition. Fall, 2001.
Modern British Literature. Fall, 1998.
Literature and Composition. 8 sections, 1994-1998.
Composition. 6 sections, 1993-1997.
University
Search Committee for the Dean of Arts and Sciences, Fall2008-Spring 2009
University Senate, Spring 2006.
Graduate Research Award Committee, Spring 2006.
Department of English
Advisory Committee to the Chair, Spring 2009-present.
Co-Adviser, Sigma Tau Delta, Fall 2005-present.
Faculty Status Committee, Fall 2009-present.
Curriculum Committee, Fall 2008-present.
Chair, 18th Century Search Committee, Fall 2007-Spring 2008
Events Committee: Chair, Fall 2007-Spring 2008; member, Fall 2008-Spring 2009.
18th Century British Literature Search Committee, Fall 2006-Spring 2007.
Graduate Program Committee, Fall 2006-Spring 2007.
Chair, Graduate Program Committee, Fall 2005-Spring 2006.
Creative Nonfiction Search Committee, Fall 2004-Spring 2005.
Program Review Subcommittee, Fall 2004-Spring 2005.
Other Contributions to Academic Community
Faculty Works in Progress Talk: Presented and discussed with faculty colleagues an early
version of my Victorians Institute Conference presentation.
Sigma Tau Delta Benefit Reading for the Carroll County Soup Kitchen. Featured Reader,
2005 and 2008; Co-organizer, 2005-2009.
Graduate School Information Session. Participated in Panel sponsored by Sigma Tau
Delta, Fall 2006, Spring 2006.
Arms and Letters Conference sponsored by the Department of Foreign Languages.
Fiction Panel, Fall 2005.
Atlanta Gallery Project: Presenter and member of organizing committee for “An Evening
of Creative Writing,” sponsored by the Department of English, Fall 2005.
Invited Speaker: "Pushing Sisyphus's Boulder: Experiences of a First Year Assistant
Professor." University of Connecticut. English Graduate Student Alliance's
Professional Development Lecture Series, March 2005.
Shadow Day: A local middle school student attended my classes and solicited ideas and
advice about a career as a teacher and writer.
Served on committee formed by the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures to
evaluate the future of JAISA: Journal for the Interdisciplinary Study of the Arts, Spring 2005.
Spoke on guest panel In Dr. Rob Snyder’s publishing class, Nov. 2004.
Academic Affiliations
Modern Language Association
North American Victorian Studies Association
Victorians Institute
Associated Writing Programs
Society for the Study of Narrative Literature
Updated March 15, 2010.