Vita
Dr. Julie Phillips Brown
Department of English, Rhetoric, & Humanistic Studies
Virginia Military Institute, Lexington, Virginia 24450
tactualpoiesis.com
Appointments
Associate Professor of English, Department of English, Rhetoric, & Humanistic Studies, Virginia Military Institute (2019-present)
Society Fellow, Society for the Humanities, Cornell University (2020-21)
Assistant Professor of English, Department of English, Rhetoric, & Humanistic Studies, Virginia Military Institute (2013-19)
N.E.H. Post-Doctoral Fellow in Poetics, The Bill and Carol Fox Center for Humanistic Inquiry, Emory University (2012-13)
Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of English, Whitman College (2011-12)
Education
Ph.D., English Language and Literature, Cornell University (2011)
M.A., English Language and Literature, Cornell University (2009)
M.F.A., Creative Writing (Poetry), Cornell University (2008)
M.A., English Literature, University of Pennsylvania (2005)
B.A., English Literature, Fine Arts, and Visual Studies (summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa) University of Pennsylvania (2005)
Publications
book
The Adjacent Possible (poems). Winner of the 2019 Hopper Poetry Prize, Green Writers Press, 2021.
Signed copies available: https://www.tactualpoiesis.com/book
Textbook
Programming for Electrical Engineers: Matlab and Spice, with Dr. James C. Squire, P.E.. Elsevier, 2020.
Refereed Journal Articles
“Archival Theater: Susan Howe’s Tactile Elegies.” Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature 40.2 (2021), 307-332. [P]
“Otherbreath: Bare Life and the Limits of Self in Claudia Rankine’s Citizen.” “Extreme Texts” special issue, ed. Divya Victor, Jacket2 (2019). Online at: http://jacket2.org/article/otherbreath [P]
“Hinged-Pictures: the Material Poetics of Punctuation.” Talisman: A Journal of Contemporary Poetry and Poetics 46 (2018). Online at: https://www.talismanmag.net/brown.html [P]
“‘touch in transit’: manifestation / manifestación in Cecilia Vicuña’s cloud-net.” Contemporary Women’s Writing 5.3 (2011): 208-231. Abstract online at: https://doi.org/10.1093/cww/vpr012 [P]
Book Chapters
“Return of the Disappeared: Cecilia Vicuña’s Saboramis.” North American Women Poets in the 21st Century: Beyond Lyric and Language. Eds. Lisa Sewell and Kazim Ali. Middletown: Wesleyan University Press, 2020. [P]
“Testimony by Hand: Ann Hamilton’s myein.” Mixed Messages: American Correspondences in Visual and Verbal Practices. Eds. Catherine Gander and Sarah Garland. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 2016. [P]
“‘touch in transit’: manifestation / manifestación en cloud-net por Cecilia Vicuña.” Vicuñiana: El Arte y la Poesía de Cecilia Vicuña: un Diálogo Sur/Norte. Ed. Meredith Clark. Santiago, Chile: Cuarto Proprio, 2016. [P]
Critical Introductions & Reviews
“Review of Edward Allen, Modernist Invention: Media Technology and American Poetry.” The Robert Frost Review 31 (2022), 69-72.
“[beech, birch, ash]” in “What is a Book?: 101 Responses,” ed. Amaranth Borsuk, American Book Review 41.5 (2020), 6.
“alice by moonlight: Anastacia-Reneé’s s(heroism) & survivals.” The Fight & The Fiddle 2.1 (2018). Online at: https://fightandfiddle.com/2018/07/20/alice-by-moonlight-anastacia-renees-sheroism-and-survivals/ [P]
“To reconcile the people with the stones.” Review of Martha Collins’s Day Unto Day and Night Unto Night. Plume 82 (2018). Online at: http://plumepoetry.com/2018/04/book-review-martha-collins/
“Cecilia Vicuña.” Angels of the Americlypse: An Anthology of New Latin@ Writing. Eds. John Chavez and Carmen Giménez Smith. Denver: Counterpath Press, 2014.
Review of “The Small Space of a Pause”: Susan Howe’s Poetry and the Spaces Between. Reconfigurations: A Journal for Poetics & Poetry 4 (2010). Online at: http://reconfigurations.blogspot.com/2010/11/julie-brown-review-joyces-susan-howe.html
Selected Interviews
Book designer interview (radio). “Sarah Goodman Cuetara, Lisa Usani Phillips, and the Team Behind Wheeling Tern Books.” Weekend Breakfast, Peaks Island Radio (2022). Online at: https://peaksislandradio.com/sarah-goodman-cuetara-lisa-usani-phillips-and-the-team-behind-wheeling-tern-books/
Author interview (radio). “Writing Through: The Adjacent Possible.” With Good Reason (2020). Online at: https://www.withgoodreasonradio.org/episode/writing-through/
Author interview. Rappahannock Review 5.2. (2018). Online at: http://rappahannockreview.com/issue-5-2/interviews/interview-5-2-julie-phillips-brown/
“After Blue Front: A Conversation with Martha Collins.” Studies in American Culture 36.1 (2013).
Selected Poems
“Bedroom still in half-light, I look” & “General Theory.” Tinderbox Poetry Journal (2023). Online at: https://tinderboxpoetry.com/general-theory
“Wave Ode / 1,” “Wave Ode / 2,” “Moonrise,” & “Moth/er Or/chid.” Visual Art Special Issue, Ariadne (2022). Online at: https://ariadnemag.com/julie-phillips-brown/
“Homing,” “jewelbox,” “& “Two Stones.” The Rumpus (2021). Online at: https://therumpus.net/2021/08/rumpus-original-poetry-three-poems-by-julie-phillips-brown/
“For You, Unborn.” Vassar Review 6 (2021): 6-7.
“Remediation.” Tammy 11 (2021): 53-4.
“Gaillardia Aristata in the Age of Its Technological Reproducibility,” “An ossuary, dark,” & “Ritual for Summoning What You Cannot Remember—Your Mother in Your Infancy.” Revolute (2021). Online at: https://revolutelit.com/002-p-julie-philips-brown/
“Second Cut” & “Semblance.” Twyckenham Notes (2021). Online at: https://twyckenhamnotes.com/issue-thirteen/julie-phillips-brown/
“Tillfälle.” Poem-a-Day Series, Slover Library (2021). Online at: https://www.sloverlibrary.com/online-archive/2021/4/28/tillfalle
“Sonnet: Ovum.” Literary Mama (2021). Online at: https://literarymama.com/articles/departments/2021/03/sonnet-ovum
“The Snow-eater.” Literary Mama (2021). Online at: https://literarymama.com/articles/departments/2021/01/the-snow-eater
“Remember” (collaborative poem). Northern New England Review (2021). Online at: http://www.nnereview.com/of-note/2021/1/8/remember-collaborative-poetry-time-capsule
“Simpson Avenue” & “Her African Violets.” Empty House Press 5 (2020). Online at: https://www.emptyhousepress.com/issue-five/julie-phillips-brown
“Gift.” Apeiron Review (2020): 45. Online at: https://issuu.com/apeironreview/docs/issue_17_v1.3
“Asilos” & “Bop: Lunatia Heros.” Yemassee (2019): 7-8.
“Anniversary.” Nashville Review 29 (2019). Online at: https://as.vanderbilt.edu/nashvillereview/archives/15541
“When You Are Three.” Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review 50 (2019): 5.
“Underunder.” Harbor Review 3 (2019). Online at: https://www.harbor-review.com/issue-3-blue
“Lexington, Virginia.” Crab Orchard Review 24.1 (2019): 7-9. Online at: https://issuu.com/craborchardreview/docs/crab_orchard_review_vol_24__no_1_ge_a4630ae869f3a7
“When I Am Six [after Aimee Nezhukumatathil].” The Oakland Review 44 (2019): 110.
“Love in the Time of Intelligence Augmentation.” The Speakeasy Project Anthology (2019). Online at: https://www.thespeakeasyproject.net/group-7-chen-chen-summer-2018
“Thesis.” Vinyl (2019). https://vinylpoetryandprose.com/2019/02/julie-phillips-brown/
Excerpt from The Adjacent Possible. Posit 20 (2019). Online at: https://positjournal.com/2019/01/28/julie-phillips-brown
Excerpt from Immemorial. Interim 35.3 (2018). Online at: https://www.interimpoetics.org/35-3/julie-phillips-brown
“Lee-Jackson Day, after Charlottesville.” Tahoma Literary Review 12 (2018): 148.
“Goshen.” Rappahannock Review 5.2 (2018). Online at: http://rappahannockreview.com/issue-5-2/contents/poetry/julie-phillips-brown/
Excerpt from The Adjacent Possible. Peregrine (2015).
“If something should happen.” delirious hem (2010). Online at: http://delirioushem.blogspot.com/2010/03/for-mama-lucille-julie-phillips-brown.html
Excerpt from The Adjacent Possible. Denver Quarterly 42.4 (2008): 8-12.
Excerpt from Rhetorical Theater. Columbia Poetry Review 21 (2008): 114.
Excerpt from Fantomina. Conjunctions (2008). Online at: http://www.conjunctions.com/online/article/julie-phillips-brown-03-07-2008
Artist’s Books
Immemorial. Hand-bound edition of 20, 6.5 x 11 inches, 12pp. Atlanta, GA & Lexington, VA, 2013-16.
w/rest. Hand-bound edition of 6, 4 x 5.5 inches, 57pp. Ithaca, NY, 2008.
Nine Tankas. Hand-bound edition of 80, 2.3 x 2.3 inches, 11pp. Ithaca, NY, 2006.
Rhetorical Theater. Hand-bound edition of 12, 4 x 5 inches, 38pp. Ithaca, NY, 2006.
Pedagogy
“Poem for Calling Ghosts.” National Poetry Month , Virginia Poets Database: A Literary and Educational Resource, 2022. Online at: https://digitalcommons.odu.edu/poetryspotlight-apr2022/29
“A Quantitative Study on the Effects of Studio Art Training on Proficiency in Statics,” with Dr. Gerald Sullivan and Dr. Jon-Michael-Hardin. IDETC2018 Official Proceedings, ASME International Design Engineering Technical Conferences & Computers and Information in Engineering Science, 2018.
“Pedagogy and ‘Technologies of Poetic Imagination.’” Kblog. Kelsey St. Press, 2009. Online at: http://www.kelseyst.com/news/2009/03/08/pedagogy-and-technologies-of-poetic-imagination-guest-blogger-julie-phillips-brown/
Popular Press
“Pronto, Let’s Go.” Shen Valley Magazine 3 (2019): 16-17.
“Generosities of Hand: Crafting Community at Make Waynesboro Clay Studio.” Shen Valley Magazine 2 (2019): 44-49.
Publications in Progress
Tactual Poïesis: Material Translation in Contemporary Women’s Poetry (scholarly monograph)
The New Sister Arts: Women and the Poet-Artist’s Book (scholarly monograph)
Chimera (hand-bound artist’s book, edition of 14, 6 x 10 inches, 24pp. Lexington, VA)
Grace (non-fiction manuscript)
“‘Dark blue feeling’: Time and the Erotics of Black Elegy” (essay)
Honors, Grants, & Fellowships
2021, Philip Freund Prize in Creative Writing, Cornell University.
2021, Directors’ Scholarship, Rare Book School, University of Virginia.
2020, Society Fellowship, Society for the Humanities, Cornell University.
2020, Ayres Faculty Development Leave, Virginia Military Institute.
2020, Mary Jean Irion Prize, Friends of Chautauqua Writers' Center (first place).
2019, The Hopper Prize for Poetry (winner, selected by Kathleen Hellen).
2019, The Berkshire Prize, Tupelo Press (runner-up, judged by Oliver de la Paz).
2019, May Sarton New Hampshire Poetry Prize (finalist, judged by Deb Gorlin)
2019, The Washington Prize, The Word Works (semi-finalist).
2019, Cleveland State University Poetry Center First Book Competition (semi-finalist, judged by Brenda Hillman).
2019, Sewanee Writers’ Conference Participant, The University of the South.
2017, Jackson-Hope Grant for New Directions in Teaching and Research: “Fine Arts Collaborations with Engineering: 3D Scanning & Modeling for Artists & Engineers.” Co-PI with Dr. Gerald Sullivan, Virginia Military Institute ($42,000).
2016, Grant-in-Aid of Research: “Artists’ Books in Theory and Practice.” Virginia Military Institute.
2015, Jesse Ball duPont Summer Seminar, National Humanities Center.
2014, Institute Grant for Teaching and Research: “CyberPost: VMI Cyber Center, Integrating Informatics and Humanities for Enhanced Cyber Value, Intelligence, and Productivity.” Co-PI with Dr. Mohamed Eltoweissy, Virginia Military Institute, 2014 ($100,000).
2013, Jackson-Hope Grant for Faculty Development, Virginia Military Institute.
2013, Dean’s Academic Speakers Program Award, Virginia Military Institute.
2010, Ruth Lilly Poetry Fellowship (finalist).
2010, Colorado Prize for Poetry (finalist).
2010, Cleveland State University First Book Competition (semi-finalist).
2009, Travel Research Grant, Society for the Humanities, Cornell University.
2007, Robert Chasen Memorial Poetry Prize, Cornell University.
2004, William Carlos Williams Graduate Poetry Prize, University of Pennsylvania.
Invited Talks
“Poetry in the Expanded Field.” Society for the Humanities, Cornell University, December 2020.
“CLSC Book Discussion: The Displaced: Refugee Writers on Refugee Lives.” Chautauqua Literary & Scientific Circle, Chautauqua Institution, August 2020.
“Toward a Tactile Poetics.” The Bill and Carol Fox Center for Humanistic Inquiry, Emory University, January 2013.
“Reading Between Page and Screen.” Invited Speaker Series, School of Literature, Media, & Communication, Georgia Institute of Technology, November 2012.
Conference Presentations
“Expanded Elegy in Victoria Chang’s Obit.” Expanded Poetry: The Poetics and Politics of Repetition, Institute for Comparative Literature, Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Porto, Portugal, November 2022.
“‘Dark blue feeling’: The Temporal Erotics of Black Elegy.” American Literature Association Symposium on American Poetry, Washington, DC, February 2020.
“Reading as Ritual Response: The Artist’s Books of Cecilia Vicuña.” Modern Language Association, Seattle, WA, January 2020 (delivered in absentia by Dr. Lisa Sewell due to illness).
“Our Sharp, White American Background: Hypervisibility and Malédiction Corporelle in Citizen.” Northeast Modern Language Association, Washington, DC, March 2019.
“Tactual Poïesis: The Sensorium in Cecilia Vicuña’s Poetry.” Northeast Modern Language Association, Washington, DC, March 2019.
“Otherbreath: Claudia Rankine & Poetic Citizenry in the 21st Century.” Louisville Conference on Literature and Culture since 1900, Louisville, KY, February 2018.
“Beautiful Meteors: Ways of Knowing in Susan Howe’s My Emily Dickinson and That This.” Northeast Modern Language Association, Baltimore, MD, March 2017.
“Hinged Pictures: Emily Dickinson, Susan Howe, Jen Bervin, and the Material Poetics of Punctuation.” Society for the Study of American Women Writers, Philadelphia, PA, November 2015.
“Hinge-Picture: the Material Poetics of Punctuation.” American Literature Association, Boston, MA, May 2015.
“Extremely Close and Incredibly Slow: Integrated Approaches to (Digital) Literacy.” Virginia Humanities Conference, Washington, DC, April 2015.
“Our Bodies, Our Screens.” South Atlantic Modern Language Association, Atlanta, GA, November 2013.
“That Was Now, This Is Then.” South Atlantic Modern Language Association, Atlanta, GA, November 2013.
“Retorno de los Desaparecidos / Return of the Disappeared.” Society for Comparative Literature and the Arts, Gilford, NC, October 2013.
“The Politics of Cross-Genre Writing in Susan Howe’s The Midnight.” Lifting Belly High: A Conference on Women’s Poetry Since 1900, Pittsburgh, PA, April 2008.
Poetry Readings
“The Adjacent Possible: Poems of Emergence and Relation,” Friends of the Lehigh Libraries, Lehigh University, Bethlehem, PA, 2022. Online at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0cuXv9NRSQ
Reading with Brenna Womer, Washington and Lee University, Lexington, VA, 2022.
Philip Freund Prize Reading, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, 2021
Authors’ House Reading, Friends of the Chautauqua Writers’ Center, Chautauqua, NY, 2021
Spotlight Reading for Danielle Legros Georges, Chautauqua Institution, Chautauqua, NY, 2021.
Friends of the Chautauqua Writers’ Center Literary Arts Contest Reading, Chautauqua, NY, 2020.
Spotlight Reading for Gabrielle Calvocoressi, Chautauqua Institution, Chautauqua, NY, 2020.
Sewanee Open Mic, Sewanee Writers’ Conference, Sewanee, TN, 2019.
Opening for Luisa Igloria, Washington and Lee University. Lexington, VA, 2018.
World Language Poetry Night. Lexington, VA, 2018.
RARA Benefit Reading. Lexington, VA 2016.
World Language Poetry Night. Lexington, VA, 2016.
Writers at Studio 11. Lexington, VA, 2014.
World Language Poetry Night. Lexington, VA, 2014.
Writers at Studio 11. Lexington, VA, 2013.
MLA Off-Site Reading. Seattle, WA, 2012.
MLA Off-Site Reading. Philadelphia, PA, 2009.
Poem in Your Pocket Day. New York, NY, 2007.
MFA-MFA Exhibition and Reading. Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, 2007.
SOON Productions Reading Series. Ithaca, NY, 2006.
MFA-MFA Exhibition and Reading. Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, 2006.
Teaching Experience
Virginia Military Institute
Genre Studies: Poetry (8 sections)
Visual Arts Studio: Painting (7 sections)
Digital Rhetorics (6 sections)
Senior Capstone (6 sections)
Ways of Reading (4 sections)
Writing and Rhetoric II (5 sections)
Fieldwork (2 independent studies)
Summer Independent Research (SURI) (2 sections)
American Literary Traditions (2 sections)
American Literature in Cultural Context: Race in the American South (1 section)
Writing and Rhetoric I (1 section)
Genre Studies: Fiction (1 section)
Language of Art (1 section)
Emory University
Poetry in the Expanded Field (1 section)
Whitman College
Language & Writing (2 sections)
Introduction to Poetry (1 section)
Cornell University
Poetry in the Expanded Field (1 section)
Creative Writing (4 sections)
Technologies of Poetic Imagination (2 sections)
Cultural Studies (2 sections)
Student Mentorship
2022, Faculty Co-Mentor, Giovanna Donatelli, Senior Capstone Project, Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies, Virginia Military Institute.
2020, Faculty Mentor, Tyren Cloyd, “An Ecopoetic Response to Environmental Injustice: Realities of Ecosystemic Violence in America.” Senior Capstone Project, Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies, Virginia Military Institute.
2019, Faculty Mentor, Aubrey Butto, “Arroser la Vie”: Bearing Witness to the Joint Androgyny of Marcel Duchamp and the Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven.” English Honors Thesis, Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies, Virginia Military Institute.
2018, Faculty Mentor, Aubrey Butto, “‘Between this Lovembrace’: The Ancestral Erotics of the Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven’s Poetry.” Summer Undergraduate Research Institute, Virginia Military Institute.
2017, Faculty Mentor, Chealsea Sias, “Martha Collins’s Blue Front and Art.” Senior Capstone Project, Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies, Virginia Military Institute.
2016, Faculty Mentor, Sarah Lemon, “Approaching Spoken Word Through an Intersectional Lens.” Senior Capstone Project, Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies, Virginia Military Institute.
2016, Faculty Mentor, Iyan Roseborough, “Spike Lee’s Do The Right Thing: A Film Analysis on Speaking Out and Speaking Up the Right Way.” Senior Capstone Project, Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies, Virginia Military Institute.
2016, Faculty Mentor, Sarah Lemon, “‘Unediting’ and Contextualizing Emily Dickinson’s ‘Truth is as Old as God.’” Summer Undergraduate Research Institute, Virginia Military Institute.
2016, Faculty Mentor, Caitlyn Jackson, “The Role of Queer Women Poets in the Gay Rights Movement.” Senior Capstone Project, Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies, Virginia Military Institute.
2013-16, Coordinator, Annual Creative Arts Contest, Virginia Military Institute.
2013, Tutor, Writing Center, Institute Writing Program, Virginia Military Institute.
Professional Service
Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA)
2019, Job Clinic Mentor
2019, Chair, “Navigating Trauma: Pasts, Presents, and Futures in African American Literature” (roundtable). Northeast Modern Language Association, Washington, DC, March 2019.
The Robert Frost Review
2021-present, Reviewer
Virginia Military Institute
2017-present, Digital Humanities Coordinator, Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies.
2017-present, Scott Shipp Hall Renovation Committee.
2017-present, Committee for Academic Technologies.
2015-present, Committee for Enhanced Learning Environments.
2015-18, Extracurricular Events & Sigma Tau Delta Committee, Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies.
2013-17, Institute Scholars Program Selection Committee.
2016, Summer Undergraduate Research Institute Proposal Judge.
2014-15, Art History Search Committee, Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies,.
2013-15, Institute Writing Publications Board.
2013-15, Communications & Marketing Committee. Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies.
2013-14, Rhetoric & Composition Search Committee. Department of English, Rhetoric, and Humanistic Studies.
Washington and Lee University
2020, Judge, The Mahan Award for Poetry & The Academy of American Poets Prize, Department of English.
Whitman College
2012, Jackson Award (Reader), Department of English, Whitman College.
2011-12, Board of Advisors, The Pioneer, Whitman College.
Other Professional Experience
2009, Lecturer, International Teaching Assistant Program, Center for Teaching Excellence, Cornell University.
2008, Teaching Assistant, “Desire,” lead by Professor Ellis Hanson, Cornell University.
2007, Lecturer, International Teaching Assistant Program, Center for Teaching Excellence, Cornell University.
2004-05, Teaching Assistant, “Graphic Design,” University of Pennsylvania.
2000-02, Teaching Assistant, Mellon Writing Program, University of Pennsylvania.
Related Professional Skills
Adobe Creative Suite: Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Dreamweaver (advanced)
QuarkXPress (advanced)
HTML, Squarespace, Wordpress (advanced); Wax, Jekyll (novice)
Design & Editorial Experience
Editorial Experience
2019-present, Founding Editor, House Mountain Review & House Mountain Press, Lexington, VA.
2013-17, Executive Editor, Cadence: A Journal for Literature and the Arts , Virginia Military Institute.
2005-07, Associate Editor, Epoch, Department of English, Cornell University.
Design Experience
2022, Book Designer, Guest People (by Lisa Usani Phillips), for Wheeling Tern Books, Newton, MA and Peaks Island, ME.
2009-2021, Web Developer, ceciliavicuna.com & konkon.cl, for Cecilia Vicuña, New York, NY.
2008-09, Design Consultant, Pale Fire Lounge Project, Department of English, Cornell University.
2008-11, Publicity Coordinator, English Department Roundtable, Department of English, Cornell University.
2004, Graphic Designer, Village of Arts and Humanities, Philadelphia, PA.
Languages
English (native)
French (advanced)
Swedish (advanced)
Spanish (reading)
Professional Affiliations
Member, Association of Writers & Writing Programs
Member, Modern Language Association
Member, Northeast Modern Language Association
Member, The Society for the History of Authorship, Reading and Publishing
Member, Society for the Study of American Women Writers