https://www.uwlax.edu/news/posts/Campus ConnectionPosts tagged with 'Susan Crutchfield':2022-05-02T10:29:51.393Zhttps://www.uwlax.edu/news/posts/research-lasts/'Research lasts'2022-05-02T10:29:51.393Z2022-04-24T08:03:00ZNhouchee Yanghttps://uwlax.edu/profile/nyang2/nyang2@uwlax.edu
<div class="post-content lists">
<p class="date"><span class="label">Posted </span><span data-part="time">8:03 a.m.</span><span data-part="weekday"><span> </span>Sunday</span><span data-part="month"><span>, </span>April</span><span data-part="day"><span> </span>24</span><span data-part="year"><span>, </span>2022</span></p>
<div class="list-item-0">
<figure class="feature-photo">
<img loading="lazy" src="/contentassets/d2492d337f8a4841b98d59100cb0f8ab/2022-uwl-susan-crutchfield-helen-keller-research-0044.jpg/Large" alt="" />
<figcaption>In 2005, UWL Associate Professor of English Susan Crutchfield published an article about Helen Keller's short-lived career in vaudeville. Surprisingly, Crutchfield was contacted this spring by one of the most popular radio shows in America — Radiolab, which wanted to interview her for an upcoming episode.</figcaption>
</figure>
<h3 class="tagline">UWL’s Susan Crutchfield shares expertise on Helen Keller with popular radio show </h3>
<p>In 2005, Susan Crutchfield used a UW-La Crosse research grant to produce and publish an article about Helen Keller’s short-lived career in vaudeville.</p><p>The article generated some initial buzz, but in the 17 years since, Crutchfield assumed it had gone to rest in a quiet, mostly forgotten corner of the internet.</p><p>Then she received a call from one of the most popular radio shows in America.</p><p>“The call was totally out of the blue,” says <a href="https://www.uwlax.edu/profile/scrutchfield/" data-mce-href="/profile/scrutchfield/">Crutchfield, an associate professor of English at UWL</a>.&nbsp;</p><p>She was contacted by a writer from Radiolab, a show produced by WNYC and heard by hundreds of thousands of people each week. "I told them I would answer their questions, but since it was going back almost 20 years, I wasn’t sure how useful it would be.”</p><p>Crutchfield’s research and clips from her interview were featured in the show’s March 11, 2022, episode, <a href="https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/helen-keller-exorcism" data-mce-href="https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/radiolab/articles/helen-keller-exorcism">“The Helen Keller Exorcism.”</a> The show explores one deafblind woman’s complex relationship with the memory of Helen Keller.</p><p>Crutchfield’s expertise — which extends beyond Keller and into the broader portrayal of people with disabilities in literature, drama and film — was particularly useful during the portion of the show reflecting on Keller’s time as a performer.</p><p>Most people are familiar with the story of Keller’s childhood: a young girl, deaf and blind, learning to read and write with the assistance of her teacher and companion, Anne Sullivan.</p><p>Fewer know that, as older women in need of money, Keller and Sullivan performed their story in theaters across the United States and Canada — a topic examined in Crutchfield’s 2005 article, <a href="https://dsq-sds.org/article/view/577/754" data-mce-href="https://dsq-sds.org/article/view/577/754">“‘Play[ing] her part correctly’: Helen Keller as a Vaudevillian Freak.”</a></p>
</div><div class="list-item-1">
<figure class="image-style-e">
<img loading="lazy" src="/contentassets/d2492d337f8a4841b98d59100cb0f8ab/helen-keller.jpeg/Large" alt="" />
<figcaption>Helen Keller and her longtime caregiver, Anne Sullivan, developed a vaudeville routine in the 1920s to supplement their modest income.</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Crutchfield concludes that, because prevailing socioeconomic conditions limited career opportunities for women and people with disabilities, Keller had to abandon her political aspirations and embrace a theater circuit she may have otherwise avoided.</p><p>“One of the more important things about her adulthood is her political activism. She was very much on the side of workers' rights, unionism and even socialism,” Crutchfield explains. “Vaudeville was this job that she and Anne Sullivan Macy took because they didn’t have another way to make a good living. They were both getting older. Anne’s health had never been great. And the lecture tours they had done in the past were too draining.”</p><p>Crutchfield says she was delighted to see that her article and insights proved useful to a show with so many listeners and so much name recognition. She was impressed, she says, by the way producers wove her contributions into the fabric of the larger, more complicated story.</p><p>The overall experience can offer lessons for researchers from other subject areas, Crutchfield says.</p><p>First, note-taking and documentation is vitally important. While the physical documents Crutchfield collected during her original research were long ago discarded, the notes she had saved on her computer allowed her to bridge gaps in her memory.&nbsp;</p><p>Second, good research is valuable, even if the payoff isn’t obvious or immediate.</p><p>“I’m thrilled that it got this kind of public audience — not just scholars, but other folks who listen to the show,” Crutchfield notes. “It’s gratifying to know that, when I published this, it didn’t just sit there with nobody reading it. The thing this really impressed upon me is that research lasts.”</p><p><br data-mce-bogus="1"></p>
</div></div>
<span class="section photo">
<span class="photo-ratio display-block">
<img loading="lazy" src="/contentassets/d2492d337f8a4841b98d59100cb0f8ab/2022-uwl-susan-crutchfield-helen-keller-research-0044.jpg/Medium" alt="In 2005, UWL Associate Professor of English Susan Crutchfield published an article about Helen Keller's short-lived career in vaudeville. Surprisingly, Crutchfield was contacted this spring by one of the most popular radio shows in America — Radiolab, which wanted to interview her for an upcoming episode." />
</span>
</span>
<span class="section details">
<span class="title">'Research lasts'</span>
<span class="date"><span class="label">Posted </span><span data-part="time">8:03 a.m.</span><span data-part="weekday"><span> </span>Sunday</span><span data-part="month"><span>, </span>April</span><span data-part="day"><span> </span>24</span><span data-part="year"><span>, </span>2022</span></span>
<span class="subhead">
<span>
UWL’s Susan Crutchfield shares expertise on Helen Keller with popular radio show
</span>
</span>
<span class="read">Read<span class="sr-only"> more about 'Research lasts'</span></span>
</span>https://www.uwlax.edu/news/posts/creative-citation/Creative citation2021-01-25T10:19:15.763Z2020-10-09T09:00:00ZBritney Heinemanhttps://uwlax.edu/profile/bheineman/bheineman@uwlax.edu
<div class="post-content">
<p class="date"><span class="label">Posted </span><span data-part="time">10:19 a.m.</span><span data-part="weekday"><span> </span>Monday</span><span data-part="month"><span>, </span>Jan.</span><span data-part="day"><span> </span>25</span><span data-part="year"><span>, </span>2021</span></p>
<figure class="feature-photo">
<img loading="lazy" src="/contentassets/d2492d337f8a4841b98d59100cb0f8ab/2020-uwl-jail-literacy-program-0019-1.jpg/Large" alt="" />
<figcaption>UW-La Crosse's Jail Literacy Program has received the State Public Defender Board's Eisenberg Award, given each year to a person or program that has had a substantial impact on criminal justice and the indigent defense community. </figcaption>
</figure>
<h3>UWL Jail Literacy Program wins state award</h3>
<p>UW-La Crosse’s Jail Literacy Program is being recognized for its transformative work with local jail inmates.</p><p>The State Public Defender Board is honoring the program with its 2020 Eisenberg Award, given each year to a person or program that has had a substantial impact on criminal justice and the indigent defense community.</p><p>Through the Jail Literacy Program, UWL English professors meet with La Crosse County Jail inmates to discuss literature, life and everything in between. Established in 2015, the program has offered sessions on poetry, fiction, nonfiction, memoir and more — and served dozens of current or former inmates.</p><p>“Discussing literature and talking about these philosophical questions can show us that we’re not alone, and that can be really powerful,” explains <a data-mce-href="/profile/ksultzbach/" href="/profile/ksultzbach/">Kelly Sultzbach, an associate professor of English who coordinates the program</a>. “People in jail are still members of our society, and it’s important for them to feel that way and be treated that way.”</p><p>Literature, Sultzbach says, can provide inmates a window into their own lives and decisions, and can help them manage their emotions more effectively.</p><p>It also sharpens their understanding and use of language, which can help them navigate the legal system or unravel complicated court documents, she says.</p><p>But it’s hardly a one-way transaction. Working with inmates, UWL faculty gain a richer and more nuanced perspective toward life, cultivating skills they can use in the classroom.</p><p>“Every time I am in the jail, I learn something new,” notes <a data-mce-href="/profile/kparker/" href="/profile/kparker/">Kate Parker, chair of the English Department and one of the program’s founding members</a> (with Sultzbach and <a data-mce-href="/profile/bkopp/" href="/profile/bkopp/" data-mce-selected="inline-boundary">Bryan Kopp</a>).</p><p>“It doesn’t matter if I’m sharing a poem that I’ve taught in a college class a hundred times — I always, always see it with fresh eyes after a conversation with our JLP readers,” Parker says. “They bring so many insights, so many life experiences, so much raw emotion to every conversation — it inspires me every single time.”</p><p>For some faculty, the motivation to work with inmates is both personal and professional.</p><p><a data-mce-href="/profile/kerrthum/" href="/profile/kerrthum/">Kate Errthum, an associate lecturer of English</a>, says her brother spent 10 years bouncing in and out of jail — a period that, for her, crystallized the struggle of many inmates and their families.</p><p>“Here I was going to college, and my brother couldn’t stay out of jail,” Errthum says. “(Inmates) feel like second-class citizens, and I know how isolating it is and how hard it can be. This is work I believe in on a very personal level.”</p><p>The program is currently paused due to COVID-19, but Sultzbach and others are considering ways to continue reaching inmates from afar. Virtual sessions aren’t possible, but the group has discussed writing book reviews for the jail library, in hopes of attracting inmates to titles they might normally overlook.</p><p>The pandemic has also preempted the State Public Defender Board’s annual conference in Milwaukee, where UWL faculty could have accepted the award in person. A virtual conference is scheduled for November — although that hardly dulls the gratification among faculty.</p><p>“One of the things that makes this award special is it’s not the kind of award you might expect an English Department to receive,” explains <a data-mce-href="/profile/scrutchfield/" href="/profile/scrutchfield/">Susan Crutchfield, a professor of English</a> who has taught in the program the past two years. “There’s this idea that literature is an esoteric area of study that doesn’t have an impact on the real world. I think this demonstrates the social power literature can have on a community, and that’s a really powerful statement.”</p>
</div>
<span class="section photo">
<span class="photo-ratio display-block">
<img loading="lazy" src="/contentassets/d2492d337f8a4841b98d59100cb0f8ab/2020-uwl-jail-literacy-program-0019-1.jpg/Medium" alt="UW-La Crosse's Jail Literacy Program has received the State Public Defender Board's Eisenberg Award, given each year to a person or program that has had a substantial impact on criminal justice and the indigent defense community. " />
</span>
</span>
<span class="section details">
<span class="title">Creative citation</span>
<span class="date"><span class="label">Posted </span><span data-part="time">10:19 a.m.</span><span data-part="weekday"><span> </span>Monday</span><span data-part="month"><span>, </span>Jan.</span><span data-part="day"><span> </span>25</span><span data-part="year"><span>, </span>2021</span></span>
<span class="subhead">
<span>
UWL Jail Literacy Program wins state award
</span>
</span>
<span class="read">Read<span class="sr-only"> more about Creative citation</span></span>
</span>