Graduate students are encouraged to participate in professional and community service opportunities during their time in the program. Professional service is an important part of the academic C.V. and can take many forms. Graduate students can participate in departmental service through GSEA, institution-wide service through GSA and other student organizations, and field-level service by participating in organizations relevant to their fields of interest, such as organizing panels for conferences. Graduate students can also organize speaker events, reading groups, or other avenues to pursue and develop their own scholarly interests.

GRADUATE STUDENTS IN ENGLISH ASSOCIATION (GSEA)

The Graduate Students in English Association (GSEA) is a part of the Graduate Students Association (GSA), and provides a structure by which graduate students in the English department can foster support for one other, organize social events, and provide intellectual programming. Some of the social events and support systems that GSEA has organized in past years include a mentorship program for new graduate students, a quarterly writing retreat, and a welcome event. Intellectual programming that GSEA has sponsored or supported include inviting speakers, the (Dis)junctions conference, student-led initiatives like RAPP and percolate, and a faculty Brown Bag series. GSEA also holds quarterly fundraisers and provides graduate students with mini-grants for travel and conferences.

GSEA also acts as a liaison between faculty and graduate students and provides graduate students with several opportunities to serve the department alongside faculty members. GSEA holds quarterly town hall meetings for graduate students to discuss any questions or concerns with the Department Chair and Director of Graduate Studies (DGS). GSEA is the primary means through which English graduate students can gain professionalization experience through serving on various departmental committees:

Graduate Committee: Five graduate student representatives serve on the Graduate Committee, which discusses concerns from graduate students and the graduate program processes, give feedback on Areas Petitions but do not vote on them, and modifies program requirements as needed. This committee always consists of GSEA officers.

Admissions Committee: Two graduate student representatives serve on the Admissions Committee. They read and vote on prospective applicant materials with faculty and organize Open House activities. GSEA nominates representatives based on interest and fit. Those interested should express their interest directly to GSEA officers.

Website / Newsletter Committee: Two graduate student representatives serve on the Website/Newsletter Committee. They work with the faculty committee leader to update the department website and newsletter. GSEA nominates representatives based on interest and fit. Those interested should express their interest directly to GSEA officers.

Alumni Relations Committee: One graduate student representative serves on the Alumni Relations Committee. GSEA nominates the representative based on interest and fit. Those interested should express their interest directly to GSEA officers.

All English department graduate students are encouraged to be involved in GSEA. The officer positions are President, Vice President, Treasurer, Communications Officer, and two Representatives. Elections are held every year in Fall Quarter.

STUDENT-RUN SCHOLARLY ORGANIZATIONS

Student run scholarly organizations can change on a year-by-year basis, depending on the time, interest, and availability of current graduate students. In the past few years, students have organized reading groups in Queer Theory, Global 19th Century, and Asian American studies. Students who are part of the Speculative Fiction and Cultures of Science (SFCS) and Southeast Asian Studies (SEAS) designated emphases have also collaborated with faculty members to hold speaker series and conferences (ex. SEASGRAD conference). Students that need to reserve a CHASS Facilities space for an official department sponsored event, should complete a Host Information Form with all the event details. Use this link to reserve a department space.

Here are a couple of student-run scholarly groups that are currently active:

Race and the Premodern Period (RAPP), a speaker series housed in the English department at UCR, was founded in 2019 by Dr. Mariam Galarrita. She started RAPP to bring a much-needed conversation about premodern critical race studies (PCRS) to our department and campus at large. RAPP provides a safe learning community committed to anti-racism and to combating antiBlackness. This community aimed to provide appropriate scholarly engagement and proper mentorship for those attending to premodern critical race scholarship. The series has run for three consecutive years and has featured discussions with various scholars, activists, performers, and artists. In its current iteration, RAPP strives to uphold the goal initially put forth for the inaugural 2019 series: to give a platform to the work of BIPOC individuals and to show that their work is valued, important, and critical. If you'd like to learn more about RAPP or are interested in getting involved/supporting the series, please reach out to Alejandra Marquez, the RAPP Coordinator, Adrita Mukherjee, or Amanda Mocsi, Co-Organizers.

The Garden: A Salon for Black Cultural Exploration is a recurring explorative scholarly space that centers the ever-present marginal experiences of Black life and prioritizes the politics of play, joy, dreaming, rest, and care in Black life amid white-supremacist sanctioned violence. Inspired by the contemplative collection of prose, essays, and poems in Alice Walker’s In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens and the eco-guided radical contemplations of change intimated in Adrienne Maree Brown’s Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds, The Garden invites thoughts on hope, healing, and wholeness through creative expression while focusing life through the Black Womanist lens. The Garden gestures toward growth, lushness, vitality, and endless evolution through being and becoming that characterizes worlds of Black thought, practice, and relation. Through open dialogue, The Garden gives feminist, queer, spiritual, and speculative practices a dynamic platform to collaborate and experiment in Black thought. Through the offerings of various scholars, both artistic and academic, this scholarly space compellingly engages in the emerging contours, depths, textures, and future(s)of Black studies. Contact Liza Wemakor 2024-25 Coordinator, to learn more about The Garden, or if interested in getting involved/supporting the series.

Latinx Organization (official title TBD), is under the supervision of Dr. Richard Rodriguez and Dr. Magda Garcia, that will center around the study of Latinx literatures. Contact student organizers, Carolina Hernandez-Bachman, Alejandra Marquez, and Abigail Uribe for more information.