Book Matters, an event series highlighting faculty authors, will return with two new events for spring semester 2024.
“The Office of the Vice President for Research created this series to elevate and celebrate faculty members who have published books,” said Kristy Nabhan-Warren, associate vice president for research. “We are excited to continue supporting their efforts to bring their works to public audiences.”
The series, which launched in fall 2022, is part of a broader effort spearheaded by the OVPR to support and celebrate writing across the disciplines and help position the institution as the university where faculty write for a broader audience and think deeply about scholarship for the public good.
If you are a faculty member with a recently published or forthcoming book and wish to be added to our faculty book listing, please complete this form.
Detailed information is available online at https://research.uiowa.edu/book-matters. All events are free and open to the public, but RSVPs are encouraged.
Margot Livesey in conversation with Lan Samantha Chang at Prairie Lights
Join us for a reading and discussion, co-sponsored by Prairie Lights, to celebrate Margot Livesey’s new novel, The Road from Belhaven. Livesey is professor of fiction in the Iowa Writers’ Workshop and the author of 10 other books. After the reading, Lan Samantha Chang, Writers’ Workshop program director and Elizabeth M. Stanley Professor in the Arts, will join Livesey for a conversation and Q&A with the audience. Appetizers and wine will be available.
Monday, Feb. 19, 2024
7 – 8:30 p.m.
Prairie Lights, 15 S. Dubuque St., Iowa City
RSVP
Growing up in the care of her grandparents on Belhaven Farm, Lizzie Craig discovers as a small child that she can see into the future. But her gift is selective—she doesn’t, for instance, see that she has an older sister who will come to join the family. As her “pictures” foretell various incidents and accidents, she begins to realize a painful truth: she may glimpse the future, but she can seldom change it.
Nor can Lizzie change the feelings that come when a young man named Louis, visiting Belhaven for the harvest, begins to court her. Why have the adults around her not revealed that the touch of a hand can change everything? After following Louis to Glasgow, though, she learns the limits of his devotion. Faced with a seemingly impossible choice, she makes a terrible mistake. But her second sight may allow her a second chance.
Christopher Goetz in conversation with Corey Creekmur at Prairie Lights
Join us for a reading and discussion, co-hosted by Prairie Lights, to celebrate Christopher Goetz’s recent book, The Counterfeit Coin: Videogames and Fantasies of Empowerment. Goetz is an associate professor and head of film studies in the Department of Cinematic Arts. After the reading, Corey Creekmur, associate professor of cinematic arts, will join Goetz for a conversation and Q&A with the audience.
Thursday, March 21, 2024
7 – 8:30 p.m.
Prairie Lights, 15 S. Dubuque St., Iowa City
RSVP
The Counterfeit Coin argues that games and related entertainment media have become almost inseparable from fantasy. In turn, these media are making fantasy itself visible in new ways. Though apparently asocial and egocentric—an internal mental image expressing the fulfillment of some wish—fantasy has become a key term in social contestations of the emerging medium. At issue is whose fantasies are catered to, who feels powerful and gets their way, and who is left out. This book seeks to undo the monolith of commercial gaming by locating multiplicity and difference within fantasy itself. It introduces and tracks three broad fantasy traditions that dynamically connect apparently distinct strata of a game (story and play), that join games to other media, and that encircle players in pleasurable loops as they follow these connections.
Individuals with disabilities are encouraged to attend all University of Iowa-sponsored events. If you are a person with a disability who requires a reasonable accommodation to participate in this program, please contact Casey Westlake in advance at 319-467-0039.