Mark Canada

Language means everything.  Both our key to the world outside and the most human part of ourselves, language empowers and defines us.  Our parents remember our first words, and our children remember our last.  To know our world and ourselves, then, we must know our language.  As a professor of English at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke, I strive to give students the guidance, the tools, and, above all, the practice to become masters of their language.  By reading and writing regularly, engaging in discussions, and giving presentations, my students learn language by using it.  Along the way, they grow in other ways, as well, as they interpret facts and opinions, collaborate in groups, conduct research, and explore their rich literary heritage.  In short, my approach to teaching is to help students become their own teachers. An active reader and writer myself, I also regularly engage in scholarship in my area of specialization, American literature.  My current work centers on the relationship between American literature and American journalism in the nineteenth century.

Mark Canada, Ph.D. Professor of English UNC-Pembroke 910.521.6431 mailto:mark.canada@uncp.edu www.uncp.edu/home/canada

Background Years ago, as I watched my infant daughter trying to absorb the intricacies of the belt in her car seat, I understood a personality trait that perhaps led me to become a teacher: I like success. I don't favor any special kind, such as financial success—thank goodness—but rather the general fulfillment of potential, what the English poet Gerard Manley Hopkins called “the achieve of; the mastery of the thing.” Like Benjamin Franklin, another favorite of mine, I believe humans have tremendous potential, and I can think of no more appropriate or fulfilling job for me than helping them to realize that potential. Another guiding principle of my life and career has been a love for language. Growing up in Indianapolis, I wrote stories, worked for my high school newspaper, and headed off to Indiana University, where I majored in journalism and English. After my graduation in 1989, I went to work for the Johnson County Daily Journal, where I edited stories on deadline, wrote articles and headlines, laid out pages, and managed the weekly section on religion. After two years at the Daily Journal, I joined the staff of the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel, where I again edited stories on deadline and wrote headlines. My career took a turn in 1992, when I enrolled in the graduate program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. After earning my Ph.D. in English in 1997, I accepted a position at the University of North Carolina at Pembroke. There, working among a group of talented and dedicated colleagues, I have realized my calling. Drawing on my interests in both self-realization and language, I strive to help students achieve their potential as readers, writers, and thinkers.

Education Ph.D., English, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, May 1997, Major: American literature before 1900. Minor: English language. M.A., English, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, May 1994. B.A., English and journalism, Indiana University at Bloomington, May 1989, graduation with highest distinction. Selected Positions Assistant Chair, Department of English and Theatre, UNC-Pembroke, 2008-present English Professor, UNC-Pembroke, 1997-present Adjunct Instructor, UNC-Chapel Hill, 2001-present Copy editor, The News-Sentinel, Fort Wayne, Indiana, 1991-1992. Copy editor, Daily Journal, Franklin, Indiana, 1989-1991. Selected Honors Board of Governors’ Award, UNC-Pembroke, 2008. Outstanding Teacher Award, UNC-Pembroke, 2000. C. Carroll Hollis Prize for Outstanding Master's Thesis, Department of English, UNC-Chapel Hill, 1994. Phi Beta Kappa, Indiana University, 1989. Vice-President's Scholar, Indiana University, Bloomington, 1988.

Teaching Since joining the faculty at UNCP, I have taught more than a dozen undergraduate and graduate courses, including an online course in grammar for UNC-Chapel Hill. My efforts have been recognized with two teaching awards, including the University of North Carolina’s Board of Governors’ Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2008. The cornerstone of my teaching philosophy is personal engagement. In short, I seek to know my students as individual human beings—each with his or her own set of values, strengths, and aspirations—and to provide them with personalized learning experiences that inspire and engage them. For starters, I make a point of learning every one of my students’ names on the first day of class. I joke with them that now I can call on them—and I do. As they soon learn, my approach is always positive; I seek not to embarrass them, but to engage them. Indeed, conversation is one hallmark of my teaching. Whether they are critiquing a classmate’s argument during peer review, analyzing naturalism in a group discussion, or studying symbolism in an online discussion, my students grow accustomed to my questions: “Why do you think that?” “What evidence suggests that reading to you?” “That’s a great observation. What do you make of that?” These conversations, which begin on the first day of class, continue throughout the semester. In a typical week, my students might read an argument or a novel, respond to it in a “Think Fast” quiz, discuss it in groups, and reflect on their new knowledge in a “Think Again” post on Blackboard, where all of us can learn from them. I also meet with students in conferences, where our focus is always on their work, their skills, their questions. Finally, I respond to their work in progress reports, where I provide guidance tailored to their own abilities and performance. Over my years of interacting with thousands of students, I have come to realize the value of motivation. If we can help students to become invested in their own learning—to see it as important, even inspiring—they will do the bulk of the work. Outside the classroom, I provide students with online lessons featuring objectives, assignments, links to relevant resources, and other material. In class, I supplement my comments with photographs, paintings, maps, and other things to see and do. On several occasions, I have taken education beyond the campus, leading educational trips to Philadelphia, Boston, and other locations. Above all, I seize opportunities to help students see the relevance of language and literature in their lives. I wish I could say that every student who has come into contact with this approach of personal engagement has gone away a changed person. I can’t. Like all teachers, I have had my moments—many of them, in fact—of frustration. “We’ve covered this material for the past three weeks,” we often say to ourselves or to one another, “and they still don’t get it.” These memories, however, don’t stack up next to the ones of another cast. In a senior seminar not long ago, I asked a question about research, and a student came up with the perfect answer; he was the same student I had taught in composition years ago. He got it. In a previous semester, I saw a student who did not pass composition with me one semester return and, through hard work and determination, pass the class. She got it. Each is a little closer to his or her potential. I hope they found some satisfaction in those accomplishments. I know I have.

Selected Courses ENG 1060: Composition 2 ENG 201: Southern Literature ENG 203: Introduction to Literature ENG 2230: American Literature Before 1865 ENGL 313: Grammar of Current English ENG 3430: The American Novel ENG 3460: Aspects of the English Language ENGS 4290: Literature and Journalism ENGS 5060: Literature and Journalism ENG 507: Biblical Literature FRS 1000: Freshman Seminar Teaching Strategies and Assignments “Think Fast” exercises “Think Again” reflections Live and online discussions Group activities Peer review Student-authored Internet resources Portfolios Student presentations Multimedia lectures Online lessons and podcasts Field trips Personalized progress reports Selected Educational Travel “Lewis, Clark, and You!” Junior Enrichment Experience for North Carolina Teaching Fellows, May 2004. “A New Orleans Feast,” Junior Enrichment Experience for North Carolina Teaching Fellows, May 2003. “Colonial Williamsburg,” Junior Enrichment Experience for North Carolina Teaching Fellows, June 2002. “Beginning in Boston,” Junior Enrichment Experience for North Carolina Teaching Fellows, June 2001. “Philadelphia in the Life of America,” Junior Enrichment Experience for North Carolina Teaching Fellows, 2000. Internet Resources All American, literary and historical guide featuring student work Be Your Best, guide to study strategies Corps of Discovery, Diplomacy, Science, and Survival, slide show on Lewis and Clark expedition The Grammar Hardware Store, resource on English grammar Guide to Library Research, tutorial created with librarian Michael Alewine

Scholarship My research interests center on American literature, particularly the work of Edgar Allan Poe and other writers of the nineteenth century. I also have published articles on distance education, co-edited a Jossey-Bass volume on service-learning, and given presentations on composition pedagogy and the Lewis and Clark expedition. My current project is a book on the intersections of literature and journalism in the nineteenth century. The Story and the Truth: American Journalism and Literature in the Nineteenth Century, which is under review at a university press, examines commonalities in the two disciplines, literary critiques of journalism, and efforts by authors to create a kind of “news of their own.” Ultimately, it provides a framework for understanding these various intersections, showing the process by which journalism and literature diverged in the nineteenth century, leaving two distinct disciplines, each with its own set of aims, conventions, and practices, as well as, most significantly, its own sense of truth. Although it draws on numerous useful studies by other scholars, such as Shelley Fisher Fishkin and David Reynolds, The Story and the Truth provides a fresh perspective on the powerful and fascinating influence that the phenomenon of journalism exerted on American literature in what was a formative period for both disciplines. Because of the nature and scope of this project, my scholarship has ranged over a large number of authors, since nearly every major writer of the nineteenth century either worked as a journalist, as Poe, Walt Whitman, Frederick Douglass, Mark Twain, William Dean Howells, Theodore Dreiser, and Stephen Crane did, or responded to the phenomenon of journalism, as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Herman Melville, Rebecca Harding Davis, Emily Dickinson, and other writers did. Thanks in part to an award of Directed Academic Leave from my university in spring 2007, I conducted research for this book at the Huntington Library in San Marino, the Mark Twain Papers & Project in Berkeley, the Library of Congress, the University of Virginia Library, and other libraries around the country. As I have been working on this book, I also have written essays and given presentations on Harriet Beecher Stowe, Mark Twain, and Henry James. I recently began drafting an essay on Dreiser’s critique of journalism in Sister Carrie. Outside this project, I have published essays and given presentations on Edgar Allan Poe, Thomas Wolfe, the Western writers Vardis Fisher and Frederick Manfred, and pedagogical subjects such as e-folios and service learning. “The Right Brain in Poe’s Creative Process” and “Flight into Fancy: Poe’s Discovery of the Right Brain” both emerged from my dissertation, Poe in His Right Mind, a study of the role of the right brain in Poe’s artistic method. Details of Poe's life and work—including his fascination with music, dreams, and the “Imp of the Perverse”—suggest that he possessed an extraordinary right cerebral hemisphere. By exploring these details in light of both current and nineteenth-century models of the divided brain, I have tried to expose the process by which Poe used his unusual brain and his knowledge of phrenology to produce works unique in their visual imagery, musicality, surreal details, emotional appeals, and potent effect on readers. Although I generally write and speak for academic audiences, I also have addressed lay audiences on a number of occasions. In addition to giving the winter commencement address at UNCP in 2008, I have given presentations on the Lewis and Clark expedition and the political humor of H.L. Mencken for UNC-Chapel Hill’s Adventures in Ideas series. In spring 2009, I will give a presentation on Mencken and the Scopes Trial for “Darwin and the South,” a seminar sponsored by the Center for the Study of the American South in Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

Book Manuscript The Story and the Truth: American Journalism and Literature in the Nineteenth Century. Under review. Series Volume Developing and Implementing Service-Learning Programs. New Directions for Higher Education 114 (Summer 2001).  Co-editor with Bruce W. Speck. Articles in Periodicals “The Paperboy Turned Novelist: Thomas Wolfe and Journalism.” The Thomas Wolfe Review 27: 1-2 (Winter-Spring 2003): 70-78. “Assessing E-folios in the Online Class.” New Directions for Teaching and Learning 91 (September 2002). “Flight into Fancy: Poe's Discovery of the Right Brain.” The Southern Literary Journal 33:2 (Spring 2001): 62-79. “How the Mind Turns Language into Meaning.” Review of The Ascent of Babel. American Speech 76:2 (Summer 2001): 213-215. “The Internet in Service-Learning.” New Directions for Higher Education 114 (Summer 2001): 45-50. “Students As Seekers in On-line Courses.” New Directions for Teaching and Learning 84 (Winter 2000): 35-40. “The Right Brain in Poe's Creative Process.” The Southern Quarterly 36:4 (Summer 1998): 96-105. Book Chapter “Vardis Fisher: An Essay in Bibliography.” Rediscovering Vardis Fisher: Centennial Essays. Moscow: University of Idaho Press, 2000. Articles in Reference Volumes “Benjamin Franklin.” Encyclopedia of American Literature. New York: Facts on File, forthcoming. “Edgar Allan Poe.” Southern Writers: A New Biographical Dictionary. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2006. “Hodding Carter.” Southern Writers: A New Biographical Dictionary. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2006. “Thomas Holley Chivers.” Southern Writers: A New Biographical Dictionary. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2006. “Anne Moody.” Southern Writers: A New Biographical Dictionary. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2006. “The Short Story, Beginnings to 1900.” The Companion to Southern Literature. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2001. “Sheriff.” The Companion to Southern Literature. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2001. “Thomas Dunn English.” American National Biography. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999. “Frederick Kemper Freeman.” American National Biography. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999. Presentations “This Is Our Story.” Winter Commencement Address. UNCP. December 2008. “Turn East, Turn Complacent: Mark Twain’s Journalistic Decline.” Western Literature Association Conference. Boulder, Colorado. October 3, 2008. “H.L. Mencken: The Great Iconoclast.” “Political Satire from Mark Twain to The Daily Show.” Adventures in Ideas series. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Chapel Hill, North Carolina. June 21, 2008. “The Story and the Truth.” ETL Forum. UNCP. September 2007. “The Portrait of a Journalist: Henrietta Stackpole and the Failings of the Press.” Reading Henry James Colloquium. Salem, Massachusetts. May 29-31, 2007. “The Story and the Truth.” Joint Journalism Historians Conference. New York, New York. March 24, 2007. “Using Blackboard to Teach Freshman Composition Students the Research Process.” With Michael Alewine. UNC Teaching and Learning with Technology Conference. March 17, 2006. “Helping Students Understand the Academic Research Process.” With Michael Alewine. UNCP. January 2006. “’Dear Fred’ . . . ‘Dear Vardis’: A Friendship in Letters.” With Joseph Flora. Western Literature Association Conference. Los Angeles, California. October 20, 2005. “Corps of Discovery, Diplomacy, Science, and Survival.” Adventures in Ideas series. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Chapel Hill, North Carolina. September 24, 2004. “The Paperboy Turned Novelist: Thomas Wolfe and Journalism.” Annual meeting of Thomas Wolfe Society. Burlington, Vermont.  June 6, 2003. “Teaching Literature Online: A New Twist on Student-centered Learning.” The Teaching Literature Conference.  Rutgers University. New Brunswick, New Jersey.  March 24, 2001. “The Horror!  The Horror!” UNCP. October 2001. “Real Work, or How Students and I Learned to Like Composition.” South Atlantic Modern Language Association Conference. Birmingham, Alabama. November 11, 2000. “Literature of the Macabre.” UNCP. October 1999 and October 2000. “Puzzling Poe.” Faculty Forum. UNCP. February 1999. “The Life of Poe's Mind.” Life of the Mind series. UNCP. October 1998.

Service Like my scholarship, my service ranges over a variety of areas, but focuses on a few. I have been particularly active in the areas of administration, assessment and planning, faculty evaluation and hiring, professional development, and recruitment. As assistant chair of the Department of English and Theatre, I conduct degree audits for students, review faculty syllabi, coordinate the observations of part-time instructors, and advise the chair on departmental matters related to staffing, funding, and space. Since assuming this role in January 2008, I have met with some of my colleagues and established an optional template that instructors may adapt when drafting their syllabi. I also manage the department’s Blackboard site, where, among other things, I maintain a bibliography of relevant articles from The Chronicle of Higher Education, helping my colleagues keep up with developments in pedagogy, technology, and other areas. I have served on a number of committees charged with tasks related to assessment and planning. My most recent work in this area involves the development of UNCP’s Quality Enhancement Plan, a requirement for SACS accreditation. After serving on the committee that solicited input on the topic of the QEP, I have played an active role on the QEP Steering Committee. In addition to contributing to the ongoing conversations about the details of this plan, which will focus on the improvement of student writing at UNCP, I have drafted a description of the selection process for the final report and am serving on a subcommittee charged with writing the literature review for the report. In my roles serving on various other committees, I also have had a hand in the development of assessment plans for individual departments, the establishment of learning communities, and the development of the university’s honors college. As a member of my department's Graduate Committee on English Education, I helped to revise our graduate program to make it even more rewarding and rigorous. In particular, I took a leading role in the development of a new capstone experience, which involves both a portfolio and a presentation.  Over the years, I also have been active in the evaluation and selection of faculty, including both English instructors and librarians. As a member of dozens of review and search committees, I have evaluated portfolios and applications, scheduled campus visits, conducted interviews, and observed numerous instructors in the classroom. My service in the area of professional development has taken a variety of forms. As a longtime member of UNCP’s Task Force for Teaching Excellence, I have helped to select recipients of faculty grants and to plan the university’s annual Faculty Development Day. I also have planned or given a number of presentations on pedagogy for my colleagues, served as a faculty mentor, and chaired the committee charged with establishing UNCP’s Administrative Fellows Program. Finally, as chair of the Program Committee for the South Atlantic Modern Language Association, I helped shape the program of the 2007 conference, which introduced a poster session. When I am sold on something, I enjoy sharing my enthusiasm for it with others. For this reason, recruitment comes naturally to me. As a member of my department’s recruitment committee, I wrote the copy for our brochure on the English major, and I regularly represent my department at the university’s admission open houses. I also manage the department’s Web site and contribute material to it. On the university level, I have accepted several invitations to appear in recruitment collateral materials, including television advertisements and a video created for the Internet site UniversityTV.com, and have represented UNCP in Italy, speaking to a group of students from a Department of Defense school in Vicenza. Outside of these five areas, I have served my department, my university, and the larger community in a number of ways. As chair of my department’s Instructional Resources Committee, I coordinate my colleagues’ requests for books and other media and help develop policy for the use of computer labs and other resources. Within my department, I also have advised majors and played active roles in several departmental initiatives, including a revision of our English major. On the campus level, I have served as a mentor to Teaching Fellows and helped select the recipients of faculty awards. In the local community, I have addressed both adult and juvenile book clubs and have served as the president of the Central Carolinas Phi Beta Kappa Association, which sponsors cultural programs and awards scholarships to high school students.

Assessment and Planning Quality Enhancement Plan Steering Committee. University of North Carolina at Pembroke. 2007-present. Quality Enhancement Plan Selection Committee. UNCP. 2007-2008. Assessment Committee. UNCP. 2004-2005. Learning Communities Committee. UNCP. 2004-2005. Honors Committee. UNCP. Fall 1999. Strategic Planning Task Force. UNCP. November 1998-April 1999. SACS Technology Committee. UNCP. April 1998-1999. Graduate Committee on English Education. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. October 1997-December 2000. Faculty Evaluation Tenure Review Committee for Dr. Karen Helgeson. Chair. English and Theatre. UNCP. Fall 2008. Post-tenure Review Committee for Dr. Nancy Barrineau. English and Theatre. UNCP. Fall 2008. First-Year Review Committee for Dr. Youngsuk Chae. UNCP. English, Theatre, and Languages. Spring 2008. First-Year Review Committee for Librarian Robert Wolf. UNCP. Fall 2006. Tenure Review Committee for Librarian Carl Danis. UNCP. Fall 2006. Post-tenure Review Committee for Dr. Patricia Valenti. Chair. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Fall 2005. Review Committee for Librarian Robert Arndt. UNCP. 2004-2005. Review Committee for Instructor Frank Myers. UNCP. Fall 2004. First-year Review Committee for Librarian Carl Danis. UNCP. 2003-2004. First-year Review Committee for Librarian Robert Arndt. UNCP. 2003-2004. Post-tenure Review Committee for Dr. Monika Brown. Chair. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Fall 2003. Tenure Review Committee for Dr. Kay McClanahan. Chair. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Fall 2003. First-year Review Committee for Dr. Roger Ladd. Chair. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Fall 2003. First-year Review Committee for Dr. Jon Lewis. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Fall 2003. First-year Review Committee for Dr. Melissa Schaub. Chair. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Fall 2003. Hiring Search Committee for Composition Instructors. English and Theatre. UNCP. Fall 2008. Search Committee for Linguistics Professor. English and Theatre. UNCP. Fall 2007-present. Search Committee for Composition Professor. Chair. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. 2005-2006. Search Committee for Instructional Designer. UNCP. 2004- 2005. Search Committee for Literature Professors. Chair. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Spring 2003. Search Committee for ETL Librarian. UNCP. Spring 2001. Search Committee for Associate Provost for Outreach. Chair. UNCP. Fall 2000. Search Committee for Writing Center Director. UNCP. Summer 1999. Search Committee for Reference Librarian. UNCP. Fall 2000. Search Committee for Journalism Professor. UNCP. Spring 1999. Professional Development Faculty Mentor. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. 2007-2008. Program Committee. South Atlantic Modern Language Association. Spring 2003-Fall 2007. (Chair: Fall 2006-Fall 2007.) Awards Committee. UNCP. Fall 2001-Spring 2003. Executive Steering Committee. Southern American Studies Association. 2000-2002. Administrative Fellows Committee. Chair. UNCP. Fall 1999-present. Task Force for Teaching Excellence. UNCP. Fall 1999-present. “Pedagogical Possibilities of the Internet.” Presenter. Faculty development workshop. UNCP. April and August 1997. “The World Wide Classroom.” Presenter. Faculty development workshop. UNCP. Fall 1997. Recruitment and Outreach Recording of UNCP advertisement for Sky Radio. October 2008. Interview of Scott Turow. WNCP-TV. May 2008. Appearance in recruitment video for UniversityTV.com. April 2008. Appearance on Academe Today. WNCP. September 2004. Recruitment Committee. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Fall 2003-present. Other Syllabus template. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Spring 2008. President. Central Carolinas Phi Beta Kappa Association. January 2007-present. UNC in Washington Committee. UNCP. Fall 2005-present. Appeals Committee. Chair. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Spring 2005-present. Ad Hoc Committee on Continuing Education Units. UNCP. Fall 2003. Mentor.  North Carolina Teaching Fellows. UNCP. 2000-present. Faculty Conciliator. UNCP.  2000-2002.  Instructional Resources Committee. Chair. English, Theatre, and Languages. UNCP. Fall 1999-present. Web Site Administrator. English and Theatre. UNCP. 1998-present. Food Services Committee. UNCP. 1997-1998.