NIU English Department

📚 Celebrating the Legacy of Dr. Mary Suzanne Schriber at NIU English 📚

The Department of English is thrilled to announce an exciting new chapter for the Schriber Scholars in Women’s Language and Literature Endowment in English with the launch of the Dr. Mary Suzanne Schriber Endowed Professorship of Literary Studies.

This fall, Dr. Melissa Adams-Campbell will serve as the inaugural Schriber Endowed Professor, supporting her scholarship on early American women authors and Native American women authors, among other research and teaching initiatives.

We are also proud to recognize doctoral student Karina Diaz, recipient of the newly revised Dr. Mary Suzanne Schriber Endowed Graduate Student Scholar Award. Diaz received the award in support of her dissertation project, Academic Grief: Culture, College, and the Open Wound in Latina Campus Novels.

NIU English is honored to celebrate Professor Emerita Mary Suzanne Schriber and her enduring legacy of advancing the study of women writers and gender-focused literary scholarship. Throughout her distinguished career, Dr. Schriber championed the recovery of overlooked American women writers and brought a feminist lens to literary studies. Since her retirement, she has continued to support NIU English and future generations of scholars through her generosity.

Join us in congratulating Dr. Adams-Campbell and Karina Diaz, and in celebrating Dr. Schriber’s remarkable impact. Also, stay tuned for information about related events this academic year.

Read more below about Professor Emerita Schriber’s career and the research of Dr. Adams-Campbell and Karina Diaz. 👇

NIU Today - Mary Suzanne Schriber supports student and faculty success through endowment Many faculty members leave a lasting legacy with the students they teach and mentor. However, after they retire, it takes an educator with a giving spirit and an eye for the future to be committed to the success of future students and faculty members. Schriber, with her National Defense Education Ac...

🌟 NIU-English PhD student Juliet Tawiah is having an amazing summer as a writing intern for the Smithsonian’s Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage.

📖 Read her latest piece on artists-in-residence Sierra and Hawk Henries, Nipmuc artists based on the coast of Maine, whose distinct artistic practices are rooted in a shared way of understanding materials and making in Native American tradition.

With Birchbark and Breath, Sierra and Hawk Henries Bring Intergenerational Artistry to the “Dawnland” |The connection between Sierra’s birchbark pyrography and Hawk’s flute is the result of a lifetime spent creating alongside one another.

👑🇬🇧 What an exciting day at Oriel College, home to NIU at Oxford!

As part of Oriel College’s 700th anniversary celebration, King Charles III visited the college.

In the photos below, English major Zachary Woodward shakes hands with King Charles. Also, students Kate Haupt, Casey Brucks, Taylor Harris, Zachary Woodward, Quratulain Imtiaz, Kaitlyn McLeland, Alex Acevedo, and Ava Mossop brave the London heat to enjoy a performance of 'Much Ado About Nothing' at the Globe Theatre.

A special thank you to Dr. E Mariah Spencer for capturing these memorable moments.

📚✈️ Go Huskie Study Abroad!

Congratulations to all our graduating Huskies! We're so proud of all of you!

🎉 Congratulations to Dr. Melissa Adams-Campbell for receiving a 2026 David W. Raymond Award for Use of Technology in Teaching!

Dr. Adams-Campbell was recognized for her work helping to develop NIU’s BookLab, an innovative, interactive learning space in Founders Library that she helped develop, as well as her forward-thinking approach to teaching—both inside and outside the BookLab—including 'Monsters and Makers: Frankenstein, Texts, and Technology,' where literature meets the technologies of textual creation.

Presented by the Provost’s Office Committee for the Improvement of the Undergraduate Academic Environment (CIUAE), the Raymond Award honors faculty who creatively and effectively integrate new technologies into their teaching. Awardees share their work with colleagues to advance teaching innovation across campus.

👏 Congratulations Dr. Adams-Campbell on this well-deserved recognition!

The Department of English congratulates major Stephanie Anne Alkonga, who is majoring in English with minors in the Sciences, for winning 1st place award in the Interdisciplinary category for the Office of Student Engagement and Experiential Learning’s 2026 CURE Awards.

Stephanie’s project “On Death and Disease: How Physicians' Perspectives Compare Across Specialties Through Written Work,” was mentored by Dr. Alexandra Bennett.

Congratulations!

https://www.niu.edu/engaged-learning/conferences/awards/index.shtml

This year, English’s Professor Adams-Campbell will be director for the NIU STEAM Summer Day Camp for middle and high schoolers, Monster Makers: Frankenstein, Texts, and Technology, July 6-10.

Enrollees will use a variety of creative technologies to design monstrous projects while reading the original Mary Shelley novel and watching early screen adaptations under the guidance of NIU. This camp is ideal for creative/humanities-focused high school students, especially those with an interest in writing, reading, art, science fiction and horror. See more information below.

Summer camps where art meets science! Art and science connect in printmaking and bookbinding, mixing creativity with experimentation and hands-on problem solving. In places like the NIU Book Lab, this blend comes to life as makers test inks, papers and techniques. We recently talked with Melissa Adams-Campbell, NIU Professor of English,...

Great afternoon at Crafting Knowledge: A Showcase of NIU BookLab Learning at Founders Memorial Library! 📚

The event featured an interactive BookLab demonstration led by Dr. Nicole Clifton, engaging guest talks on NIU’s dime novels by Matt Short and Sata Prescott, and a reception highlighting student work from English classes and BookLab activities. Visitors got to work with historic presses and create souvenirs.

Special thanks to Drs. Melissa Adams-Campbell and Beth McGowan for their continued leadership and dedication to promoting BookLab this year.

It was a wonderful afternoon at the reading of this year’s Arnold Fox Award winning papers! 📚✨

Special thanks to Dr. Reuven Pinnata for moderating, Neda Ghayour and Kay Gallo for organizing, and our faculty judges. We’re also grateful to our donors who continue to support this important award.

Congratulations to our graduate student winners—we’re so proud of you! 🎉👏

🌟 Fall 2025 Winners
1st Place : Kaitlyn Gibson
“This Defiant Edifice”: Q***r Ecology in Marianne Moore’s 'The Fish',” written for Dr. Timothy Ryan’s ENGL 601.

2nd Place: Mackenzi Jackson
"Walking with Mystery: Embodied Healing in Linda Hogan’s Affinity: Mustang," written for Dr. Melissa Adams-Campbell’s ENGL 693.

🌼 Spring & Summer 2025 Winners
1st Place: Juliet Tawaiah
"The Abyss of Justification: Slavery and Colonial Defenses in Poe’s “The Imp of the Perverse” and Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o’s A Grain of Wheat," written for Dr. Timothy Ryan’s ENGL 601.

2nd Place: Sean Brown
"She’s but the Sign and Semblance of Her Honor: Irony and the Humanistic Satire of Nobility in Much Ado About Nothing ," written for Dr. Timothy Crowley’s ENGL 641.

Congratulations to English’s Dr. Melissa Adams-Campbell as well as NIU-Library’s Dr. Beth McGowan on their successful Trek Talk "From Gutenberg to Generative AI: How Technology Shapes Us."

Their presentation highlighted the value of the BookLab to our students for hands-on learning and critical thinking skills in the age of AI as well as their vision for a Center for Text and Technology. Their presentation resulted in the award of a Graduate Assistant for FY27 and a substantial grant for the BookLab.

Congratulations!