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Dr. Gina Briefs-Elgin
Associate Professor of English
New Mexico Highlands University
I received my B.A. from Georgetown University where I majored first in languages, with a year in Provence at the University of Aix-Marseille, and later in English literature. My doctorate, with a concentration in poetry, is from the University of Virginia. I came west in 1979, working first as an assistant cabinetmaker in Santa Fe and Denver woodshops and then as a writer/manager for a contemporary art gallery in Santa Fe. In 1984 I joined the Western States Arts Federation as Special projects coordinator and writer. I coordinated the Western States Book Awards, working with western authors, small press publishers, corporate sponsors, and awards jurors like Denise Levertov, Elizabeth Hardwick, N. Scott Momaday, Sandra Cisneros, and Tito Rios. I attended the Small Press and Journal Publishing Expo, represented WESTAF at the annual American Booksellers and American Library association conventions, and served on a National Endowment for the Arts panel on literary awards. I was also managing editor for two WESTAF books, Building for the Arts and Cultural Tourism. During this time, I completed my dissertation, "To Keep It Forever: Deanimating Metaphor in the Poetry of Elizabeth Bishop," although I was not seeking a career teaching literature.
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By 1988, my goals were clarifying: I wanted to work with words, to teach the craft of writing. And I wanted to help people develop and explore their life dreams. I found a home in the field of composition. In 1990, after a semester teaching writing at a youth shelter and at Santa Fe Community College, I began my career at Highlands University.
Teaching: Courses taught: English 100, Freshman Composition 1 and 2; Intro
to Poetry; Creative Writing-Poetry; Intro to Drama; Methods of Teaching
Writing; Theories of Writing; Nonfiction Prose; Creative Nonfiction.
As a writing teacher specializing in basic writing and creative nonfiction,
my ambitions for my students are these: that they learn to use writing and
reading to explore what matters most to them and to reach their full
potential; that they learn the power of writing and reading as resources in
the quest for a more just and greener world; that their engagement with
language make them more alive to the world's wonders, dark or bright,
bizarre and beautiful.
Research: I have presented in the areas of motivation, memory, self-actualization, flow, and writing in non-traditional settings. I am interested in humanistic psychology and in issues of economic justice and right livelihood. My research and publication interests emerge from one question: how can we, as composition teachers, help our students use writing to discover and explore what matters most to them and to reach their full potential?
Resumé - Updated 5/12/05
Selected Publications, Presentations, and Grants - Under Revision
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Send e-mail to Dr. Gina Briefs-Elgin
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