UVA

Written by John Lyons, Commonwealth Professor of French, College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Each fall, thousands of excited, confused, worried, rushed first-year students arrive at the University, usually happy, but haunted by a distracting urgency.  It seems that everything has to be done at once and that a whole host of opportunities […]

  Written by William M. Ferraro, Research Associate Professor and Senior Associate Editor, The Washington Papers, College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences George Washington still attracts attention.  Some one million people visit his Mount Vernon home every year.  Both scholarly and popular investigations of his life and role in historical events pour forth […]

Written by Stephen Cushman, Robert C. Taylor Professor of English, College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences BESIDE THE POINT The sky has never won a prize. The clouds have no careers. The rainbow doesn’t say  my work, thank goodness. The rock in the creek’s not so productive. The mud on the bank’s not […]

Written by Debra Nystrom, Professor, Creative Writing Program, Department of English, College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences A little cool, you think, then the iron-scent takes you in, you leave your feet and let it—   early summer chill easing its ripple across your chest as if this water never held a body […]

Written by Gretchen Ki Steidle. Steidle, founder and President of Global Grassroots, teaches an experiential course each J-Term on “Conscious Social Change”. Students learn mindfulness-based leadership practices for self-awareness and design a conscious social enterprise as a team. Steidle is the author of the new book Leading from Within: Conscious Social Change & Mindfulness for Social […]

Happy Sunday Lifetime Learners! Today begins the most romantic week of the year – the week of Valentine’s Day. Traditionally, there is a lot of pressure placed on this one day; whether you’re taken or single, celebrating Valentine’s Day or Galentine’s Day, or just looking forward to discounted chocolate on February 15th, we all hold […]

Written by Jeb Livingood, Assistant Professor of English; Associate Director of the UVA Creative Writing Program, College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences   I served as a reservist in the Coast Guard for twenty-four years, and I’ve been teaching English at UVA for eighteen. Those are two different worlds—the military and academia—and I […]

Written by Deborah McDowell, Director of the Carter G. Woodson Institute for African-American and African Studies, and Alice Griffin Professor of English, College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences   Yesterday began the official celebration of Black History Month, founded by the Woodson Institute’s namesake, Carter Godwin Woodson.  To kick off the 28-day celebration, yesterday’s […]

Written by Lisa Russ Spaar, Horace W. Goldsmith Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Creative Writing Program, Dept. of English, College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences Epiphany Madrigal for Sydney Hall Blair   What’s a gift if not the heart’s envoi, a cut, a wrap, a species of we’re done here, it’s over, concluded, […]

Written by James S. Todd IV, Lecturer in the Department of Politics, College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences   The Founders, when they met in Philadelphia, created a system of shared powers and checks and balances in the hope that it would prevent abuse of power. The main fear in those days was […]

Written by Lisa Russ Spaar, Horace W. Goldsmith Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Creative Writing Program, Dept. of English, College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences   New Year’s Eve   I’m a sucker for a gothic ending: for example, this opal brooch of sky, like milk tinged with blood behind a leaden fret […]

Written by Lisa Russ Spaar, Horace W. Goldsmith Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Creative Writing Program, Dept. of English, College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences   Duet             New Year’s Eve   Two sisters side by side, benched at the gleaming fin of the living room’s out-of-tune baby grand, work out a mash-up, […]

Written by Lisa Russ Spaar, Horace W. Goldsmith Distinguished Teaching Professor in the Creative Writing Program, Dept. of English, College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences Advent Madrigal   Is waiting . . . a narrative? Can it be a way to live? This usher moon, globular flashlight, sketches the narrow aisle of night, […]

Written by Abby Palko, Director of the UVA Maxine Platzer Lynn Women’s Center. This has been reposted with permission from the Women’s Center blog. Originally posted December 6, 2017. In a world where Facebook has recorded so much of my family’s year, I treasure this time of year as an opportunity to really reflect on […]

Feeling stressed? Overwhelmed? UVA psychologist Peter Sheras offers some tips for beating the ‘holiday blues.’ Reposted with permission from UVA Today, December 4, 2017. Written by Jane Kelly, University News Associate, Office of University Communications. The words seem to contradict one another: holiday depression. Yet each year, people around the world suffer from the condition, […]

Written by Barbara A. Perry, White Burkett Miller Center Professor and Director of Presidential Studies, UVA’s Miller Center. Follow her on Twitter @BarbaraPerryUVA.   Recently Saturday Night Live opened its show with A Christmas Carol parody in which Alec Baldwin as Donald Trump is visited by three ghosts–Christmas Past, Present, and Future.  It struck me […]