Skip to main content

Westminster English Professor Attends Literature Conference

Posted on Wednesday, July 13, 2005

Dr. Bethany Hicok, assistant professor of English at Westminster College, recently attended the American Literature Association conference in Boston.

 Hicok organized a panel, "Women Poets in Cultural Context: Dickinson, Moore, and Plath."

 "The panel featured three papers, all of which re-contextualized the work of three American poets , Emily Dickinson, Marianne Moore, and Sylvia Plath , by re-establishing the historical and cultural context of their poetic production," Hicok said.  "Drawing on new archival research, each paper discussed the poetic development of one of these three poets as an outgrowth of, and in dialogue with, the social and political forces that shaped their particular historical moment.

 Some of the work Hicok did was in collaboration with Lindsay Onufer, a 2004 Westminster graduate from Mars.

 "Lindsay accompanied me to the Lilly Library, so this particular paper and book chapter, represents significant ways the integration that I try to achieve between scholarship and teaching," Hicok said.  "When my students practice their profession , that is when they do literary criticism , I tell them that they are joining a conversation with other scholars.  My conference contributions and my ongoing conversation with a network of scholars in my field, are ways that I practice what I preach."

 At the conference, Hicok was asked by the Elizabeth Bishop Society to write about the panel, "Elizabeth Bishop: Correspondences," for the "Elizabeth Bishop Society Newsletter," which is published quarterly.

 Hicok, who has been with Westminster College since 2001, earned her undergraduate degree from Russell Sage College, and her masters' and Ph.D. from the University of Rochester.

 Contact Hicok at (724) 946-6349 or e-mail hicokbf@westminster.edu for more information.

Dr. Bethany Hicok