The Michigan College English Association

Tag: College English Association

  • Report on the College English Association Conference 2025 by Cheryl Caesar and Ed Demerly

    This year’s conference in Philadelphia on March 27-29, 2025, was widely attended by 265 presenters organized into 73 sessions. Schools from every part of the United States and nine foreign countries were represented, including universities in Nepal, Canada, Lebanon, China, Saudi Arabia, and Italy.

    Featured Speakers

    The plenary speaker, Dr Daniel Ernst of Texas Women’s University, spoke about the impact of artificial intelligence on higher education and assessment.

    Ahmed Badr, an Iraqi-American author, poet, and social engineer, was the featured speaker at the Diversity Luncheon.

    Poet, essayist, and literary critic Artress Bethany White of East Stroudsburg University spoke at the Women’s Connection Reception.

    Playwright and poet Lorene Cary of the University of Pennsylvania spoke at the All-Conference Luncheon.

    Michigan Presenters 

    Cheryl Caesar, Michigan State University

    Aaron Bush, University of Michigan

    Lynne Johnson, Northern Michigan University

    Susanna Engbers, Ferris State University

    John Staunton, Eastern Michigan University

    Roundtable Topics

    This CEA innovation included three sessions. Roundtable discussions are less formal than panels. Presenters offer “flash essays” of about 500 to 700 words, and the audience is invited to engage in open discussion. Three sessions were offered this year:

    English Education Programmatic Assessment: Navigating the Accreditation Process

    Freedom to Get Fat: A Discussion about Fatness and Fatphobia in Fiction

    Bringing Arts, the Outside, Rituals to the Classroom

    Emphasis at this Conference

    Over the years as trends change, we have seen an emphasis on new topics. Once women in literature headlined the conference, then use of the internet, indigenous work, comic novels, LGBTQ, etc. This year, AI seemed to dominate with sessions such as

    • AI in the Writing Classroom: Friend, Foe, or Facilitator
    • Reimagining Writing Pedagogy: Harnessing AI for Educational Success
    • Freeing the Writer Within: Empowering Student Writers through Effective and Ethical Use of AI
    • Surveying the Landscape: Student and Faculty Experiences with Generative AI

    Affiliates’ Breakfast

    At the breakfast, there was some discussion of conference modalities post-COVID: in-person, Zoom, or hybrid.

    Peter Elliott of Anderson University in Indiana would be interested in talking with MCEA about how we manage a Zoom conference. He has also launched a new journal, Indiana English, which is accepting submissions. 

    The Florida CEA is “reaching out for partners,” and our MCEA’s Board member RaSheeda Brown has reached out to this group by email. The Florida CEA also has a journal, the Florida Scholarly Review.

    Gloria Lessman and Heather Ann Johnson from the University of Nebraska attended the breakfast. They are not yet Affiliates, but Jeri Kraver has reached out to them from the Rocky Mountain group.

    Conference Proceedings

    The CEA Critic will publish its usual conference proceedings issue in the fall that will feature a selection of representative essays from those chosen “Best of Section,” award-winning essays, and more news from the conference.

    Save the Date

    At the conference President’s Reception, we announced that the 55th conference will take place March 26-28, 2026, in Charlotte, North Carolina. Our theme will be “Declarations,” fitting for the first state to declare independence from Great Britain. The submission site will open August 15, 2025.

  • Summary of the College English Association’s 51st Annual Conference

    This conference was held in Birmingham, Alabama, from March 31 to April 2, 2022.

    There were 73 breakout sessions on topics including peace studies, Native American literature, composition and rhetoric, American and British literature, LGPTQ studies, film studies, popular culture, war and trauma literature, religion and literature, and creative writing.

    Denise Miller from Western Michigan University and Ed Demerly (retired) from Henry Ford College and the MCEA Board represented Michigan.

    The 52nd annual conference will be held in San Antonio, Texas, from March 30 to April 1, 2023. The theme for that conference is Confluence. For further information, see the CEA website at www.conftool.pro/cea2023 . Submission of paper proposals (one per person) may be made between August 15th and November 1st, 2022. Papers presented at Michigan CEA’s conference will automatically be accepted if the submission makes clear that the paper was previously presented at the Michigan CEA conference.

    Notes from the Affiliates’ meeting at the CEA Conference in 2022

    Members present were Stacy Bailey (Rocky Mountain CEA), Ed Demerly (Michigan CEA), Valerie Kasper (Florida CEA), Gerald Siegal (Pennsylvania CEA)—via ZOOM, and Moumin Quazi (Texas CEA).

    Guests were Scott Borders (CEA Executive Director), Jeraldine Kraver (Editor, CEA Critic), and Emily Pucker (Board Member).

    Jeraldine Kraver introduced us to what the Rocky Mountain CEA has offered now for four years—pop-up conferences with papers limited to 500 words (about five minutes) presented on a Zoom format. This allows presenters to offer the essence of their idea or argument in a simple and streamlined manner and allows for more presenters and more discussion. The pop up format also gives those who have never presented at conferences an opportunity to “get their feet wet” in an unthreatening way. Furthermore, it introduces all participants to new, still undeveloped concepts which might be explored further. This year’s conference theme is focused on “What is Right with English Studies?” A previous conference asked, “What are some Impediments to Student Success?” For further information on the Rocky Mountain CEA’s June 11, 2022 Pop-Up Conference, contact James Meredith at James.Meredith@csuglobal.edu . Jeraldine urged the affiliates to try this format within their own organizations.

    The CEA Critic is published three times a year. The editor welcomes longer submissions from the affiliates describing any news we may have to offer. She also encourages affiliate members to submit papers to The CEA Critic even if they may feel the work is not quite ready for publication. The editorial staff will work with the writer to get the material ready for publication.

    Emily Pucker (University of Alabama) is considering starting a new affiliate for the southeastern United States.

    Moumin Quazi inquired why the South Asian Literary Association had not yet been accepted as an allied organization of CEA. There was no specific response yet.

    The majority of affiliates held Zoom conferences or no conferences in 2020 and 2021, but most are planning in-person with Zoom access conferences for 2022.

    The conference offered a table display of calls for papers and prominent recognition of those affiliates, including Michigan, which sponsored beverage breaks.

    Submitted by Ed Demerly, MCEA’s CEA representative and Board Member