Curriculum Vitae — Alec Magnet
Education
The Graduate Center, CUNY
Ph.D. in English, expected September 2020
Dissertation Title: “Hungry Reading: Reparative Gothic in Tennyson and Melville”
Dissertation Director: Wayne Koestenbaum.
M.Phil. in English, February 2014.
M.A. in English, September 2012.
Thesis Title: “Morrissey Will Repair Me, and I Will Repair Morrissey: Feeling Queer Fandom with Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick.”
Thesis Advisor: Wayne Koestenbaum.
The University of Chicago
A.B. in English Language and Literature. General and Departmental Honors. June 2005.
Academic Employment
Positions Held
Adjunct Lecturer of English, City College of New York, CUNY. Fall 2011 – present.
Adjunct Professor of Academic Writing, Marymount Manhattan College. Fall 2017 – Spring 2019.
Adjunct Lecturer of English, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY. Fall 2012.
Fellow, Writing Across the Curriculum Program, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY. Fall 2011 – Summer 2012.
Graduate Teaching Fellow, City College of New York, CUNY. Fall 2008 – Spring 2011.
Academic Publications
Peer-Reviewed Journal Article
“Teaching/Feeling/Writing: A Theatrical Interlude on Affect, Pedagogy, and Performativity.” Co-written with T. Meyerhoff. Queer and Now. Spec. issue of The Writing Instructor (Mar. 2015).
Chapter in Scholarly Collection
“The Queer, Statistical Kinship of Tennyson and Melville.” Queer Victorian Families: Curious Relations in Literature. Ed. Duc Dau and Shale Preston. New York: Routledge, 2015. Click here for a PDF or see a preview on Google Books. Reviewers describe my chapter as “stunning,” “beautiful,” and “the most outstanding” essay in the collection, as well as one of the “strongest.”
Book Reviews and Encyclopedia Articles
“Shops.” All Things Dickinson: An Encyclopedia of Emily Dickinson’s World. Ed. Wendy Martin. Santa Barbara: ABC-CLIO/Greenwood, 2014. 2: 773-79. Click here for a PDF.
Review of Drinking History: Fifteen Turning Points in the Making of American Beverages, by Andrew F. Smith. Register of the Kentucky Historical Society 111.4 (2013): 640-642. Read it as a PDF or on Project MUSE (log-in required).
Teaching Experience
The City College of New York
Upper-Level English Courses Taught as Instructor of Record:
Captivity, Escape, and the Inescapable in American Literature (1 section)
The Pleasure and Horror of Performance in American Literature (1 section)
Fantastic Voyages in American Literature (1 section)
Gothic Literature (2 Sections)
Science Fiction and Fantasy (1 section)
Representative U.S. Writers of the Nineteenth Century (4 sections)
Representative U.S. Writers of the Twentieth Century (2 sections)
Representative British Writers of the Victorian Period (1 section)
Representative British Writers of the Romantic Period (1 section)
Mid-Level English Courses Taught as Instructor of Record:
Introduction to Literary Studies (6 sections)
Critical Reading and Writing: Poetry (3 sections)
The Great American Novel (1 section)
Independent Study: Islam and Literature (1 section)
Freshman Inquiry and Writing Seminars Developed and Taught as Instructor of Record:
Self and Other in Literature (2 sections)
U.S. Literature and Queer History (1 section)
Other General Education Courses Taught as Instructor of Record:
World Humanities II: 1750 to the Present (4 sections)
Freshman Writing Seminar (3 sections)
Freshman Composition (2 sections)
Marymount Manhattan College
Academic Writing Courses Taught as Instructor of Record:
Advanced Writing Seminar: Writing Fandoms (5 sections)
Writing Seminar II: What Does Fandom Do? (4 sections)
John Jay College of Criminal Justice
Composition Courses Taught as Instructor of Record:
Writing Across the Disciplines: Contemporary Gender and Sexuality (1 section)
High School Guest Lessons
Stuyvesant High School (New York, NY):
“The Whale and the Weaver: A College-Level Lesson on Chapter 102 of Moby-Dick.” American Literature, taught by Judd Staley, 23 March 2018
The Urban Assembly School for Wildlife Conservation (Bronx, NY):
“‘A Squeeze of the Hand’ and a Stroke of the Pen: A College-Level Lesson on Chapters 94–96 of Moby-Dick.” AP English Literature and Composition, taught by Judd Staley, 19 Oct 2015
“Reading, Writing, and Eating in Moby-Dick: A Taste of College English.” AP English Literature and Composition, taught by Judd Staley, 27 March 2015
Conferences and Presentations
Conference Presentations
“Queer/Geek, Camp/Fandom, Literature/Criticism: Convergences.” Modern Languages Association. Austin, TX. 10 Jan. 2016.
“Morrissey’s Gladioli and Melville’s Sea-Moss: Fandom as Divinity and Vice-Versa.” Off the Books: Making, Breaking, Binding, Burning, Leaving, Gathering. BABEL Working Group. University of Toronto, Toronto, Ont., Can. 10 Oct. 2015.
“Sedgwick’s Unicycle: Thinking through the Convergence of Queer and Geek.” NeMLA 2015. Toronto, ON, Can. 30 Apr. – 3 May 2015.
“Melville, Tennyson, Animal Magnetism, Love.” Trance: The Conference. English Student Association. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 5–6 Mar. 2014.
“Gothic Things in Robert Browning and Nathaniel Hawthorne.” NAVSA 2014. London, ON, Can. 13–15 Nov. 2014.
“Melville, Hawthorne, and the Moss that Went to Sea in Its Youth.” Critical Visualities. The Ph.D. Program in English. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 31 Oct. 2014.
“I Have a Lot of Feelings about Morrissey’s Gladioli.” Critical Karaoke. The Ph.D. Program in English. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 5 Sept. 2014.
“Incorporation, Queer Exuberance, and Moral Containment: Undine in Moby-Dick and The Marble Faun.” The American Literature Association 25th Annual Conference. Washington, D.C. 22–25 May 2014.
“Fandom as Theory in Eve Sedgwick, Wayne Koestenbaum and D. A. Miller.” NeMLA 45th Annual Convention. Susquehanna University. Harrisburg, PA. 3–6 April 2014.
“The Ethics and Erotics of Collecting in Melville, Benjamin, and Barthes.” The American Comparative Literature Association’s Annual Meeting. New York University. New York, NY. 20–23 March 2014.
“Yojo, the Spine, and the Queer Little Gods.” Catharsis and Projection: A Roundtable on Non-Oedipal Psychologies and Doll-Making. Text Texture Textile Studio in association with the PhD Program in Psychology and the Feminist Studies Group. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 3 Dec. 2013.
“Tyranny, Nourishment, and Gothic Re-enchantment in Caleb Williams and Moby-Dick.” RMMLA 67th Annual Convention. Vancouver, WA. 10–12 Oct. 2013.
“The Neutral as Reparative Reading: Roland Barthes with Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick.” The Renaissance of Roland Barthes: The 2nd Annual Interdisciplinary Conference on Critical Theory. The PhD Program in Comparative Literature. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 25 April, 2013.
“Comic Strips as Pedagogy and Literary Criticism: Using Webcomics to Teach Long-Nineteenth-Century Literature.” The Midwestern Conference on Literature, Language, & Media 2013. Northern Illinois University. Dekalb, IL. 22 Mar. 2013.
“Shame, Identification, and Fandom in Morrissey’s ‘Disability-Chic Movement.’” Cripples, Idiots, Lepers, and Freaks: Extraordinary Bodies/Extraordinary Minds. English Student Association. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 23 Mar. 2012.
“Camp Encyclopedias and Reparative Imaginings in Moby-Dick.” Imagining A New Century. C19: The Society of 19th Century Americanists. Pennsylvania State University. University Park, PA. 22 May 2010. Read about it ESQ’s “The Year in Conferences” (Project MUSE log-in required).
“Joseph Cornell, Reparative Reading, and the Cinema of Attractions.” Cinematic Desire. Cinema Studies Group. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 4 Mar. 2010.
“Reparative Practices and the Exemption from Meaning in Sedgwick and Barthes.” Spanking and Poetry: A Conference on Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick. English Student Association. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 26 Feb. 2010.
“Persecution and Nourishment in William Godwin’s Caleb Williams.” The Poetics of Pain: Aesthetics, Ideology, and Representation. PhD Program in Comparative Literature. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 26 Feb. 2010.
“Morrissey Will Repair Me, and I Will Repair Morrissey.” The Society for Utopian Studies 34th Annual Meeting. Wrightsville Beach, NC. 31 Oct. 2009.
“What’s Underwater in Moby-Dick? (Actually, This Paper Is Mostly about Masturbation.)” Underground. PhD Program in Comparative Literature. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 7 Nov. 2008.
Invited lecture
“Letters, Bodies, and the Evasion of Gender in Herman Melville and Margaret J. M. Sweat.” Fe/mail: Women, Letters and Postal Art. The Feminist Studies Group and Text Texture Textile Studio. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 16 May 2013.
Conference Organized
Food! The Conference! An Interdisciplinary Graduate Conference in the Humanities. Co-chaired with Jennifer Little. English Student Association. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 18 May 2011.
Panels Organized
“Queer/Geek: Theorizing the Convergence of Camp, Fandom, and Other Deviances.” Co-chaired with Balaka Basu. NeMLA 46th Annual Convention. Toronto, ON, Can. 30 Apr. – 3 May 2015.
“Wet Theory: Creative Writing as Affective Lever in Feminist and Queer Theory.” Co-chaired with Meridith Kruse. NeMLA 45th Annual Convention. Susquehanna University. Harrisburg, PA. 3–6 April 2014.
“Catharsis and Projection: A Roundtable on Non-Oedipal Psychologies and Doll Making.” Co-chaired with T Meyerhoff. Text Texture Textile Studio in association with the PhD Program in Psychology and the Feminist Studies Group. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 3 Dec. 2014.
Panels Moderated
“Organizing Objects.” Victorian Classes and Classifications. North American Victorian Studies Association. London, ON, Can. 14 Nov. 2014.
“Reading, Rhetoric, and the Body.” Minding the Body: Dualism and Its Discontents. English Student Association. The Graduate Center, CUNY. New York, NY. 28 Feb. 2013.
Awards and Fellowships
Pedagogical Enrichment Grant, The City College of New York, CUNY, 2020
Faculty Development Grant, The Professional Staff Congress, 2019
Nominee, Provost’s Outstanding Teaching Award, The City College of New York, CUNY, 2019
Writing across the Curriculum Fellowship, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY, 2011–2012
Enhanced Chancellor’s Fellowship, The Graduate Center, CUNY, 2007–2012
Nicholson Center Award for Best Undergraduate Essay in the Field of British Studies, University of Chicago, 2005
National Merit Scholarship, University of Chicago, 2001–2005
Teaching Certifications
Certificate of Effective Teaching Practices, Association of College and University Educators, 2015.
Certification to Teach Writing-Intensive Courses across the Curriculum, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY, 2012.
LGBT Safe Zone Training, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY, 2012.
Academic Service
The City College of New York
Faculty Advisor, Student Mental Health Initiative, Fall 2014 – Spring 2017
Judge and Presenter, The Allan Danzig Memorial Award in Victorian
and Romantic Literature, 2017
and Romantic Literature, 2017
Placement Committee Member, Ph.D. Program in English, The Graduate Center, CUNY, 2015–present.
The Graduate Center, CUNY
Co-Chair, Association for Critical Theory, Fall 2016 – present
New Teaching Fellow Mentor, Fall 2017 – Spring 2018
New Student Mentor, Fall 2011 – Spring 2017
Panelist, Conference Organizing: A Roundtable Discussion, 15 April 2016
Librarian, English Student Association, The Graduate Center, CUNY, Fall 2015 – Spring 2016
Elections Committee Member, Ph.D. Program in English, The Graduate Center, CUNY, 2014–2015
Co-Organizer and Web Curator, Text Textile Texture Studio, The Graduate Center, CUNY, September 2013–present
Recruitment Committee Member, Ph.D. Program in English, The Graduate Center, CUNY, 2011–2012
Founder and Chair, Feelings: The Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick Memorial Reading Group, The Graduate Center, CUNY, 2009–2011
Fundraising Committee Member, Ph.D. Program in English, The Graduate Center, CUNY, 2009–2010
Alumni Committee Member, Ph.D. Program in English, The Graduate Center, CUNY, 2008–2009
Alec Magnet 