Summer daze
I've been busy writing, celebrating my new book, and exploring exciting mentorship opportunities!
Dear friends,
It's been a season of focus, and family, and travel—and now somehow I blinked, and September is here. The kids are finally back in school, the days are getting just a smidge shorter, and I find have missed writing in this space.
Writing, Writing, Writing
While I haven't written much here lately, I have been writing in lots of other places. My second book came out, for one thing! (More on that below.) And it felt like all my pandemic writing projects were emerging at the same time:
“COVID, Care, and Community.” Digital Futures of Graduate Study in the Humanities. Eds. Simon Appleford, Gabriel Hankins, and Anouk Lang. Debates in Digital Humanities series, Minnesota University Press, 2024.
“Public Works: Ecological Inspiration for Equitable Knowledge Production.” Co-authored with Alyssa Arbuckle. Digital Humanities in Practice. Eds. Constance Crompton, Laura Estill, Richard Lane, and Ray Siemens. Routledge, 2025.
“Everything is Different but Nothing is New: The Missed Opportunity of Reform in the Wake of COVID-19.” Co-authored with Kashema Hutchinson, Sujung Kim, and Adashima Oyo. Recentering Learning: Creating the Post-Pandemic University. Eds. Maggie Debelius, Josh Kim, and Edward Maloney. Johns Hopkins University Press, 2024.
“Socially Engaged Administration and the Potential for Graduate Education.” Humanizing Collectivist Critical Pedagogy: Teaching the Humanities in Community College and Beyond. Eds. Sujung Kim, Leigh Garrison-Fletcher, and Kaysi Holman. Peter Lang, 2024.
“Cultivating a Joyful Workplace through Trust, Support, and a Shared Mission.” Joyful, Engaged, Sustainable: Graduate Education for a Thriving Humanities Ecosystem. Eds. Stacy Hartman and Yevgenya Strakovsky. The Modern Language Association, 2023.
It's kind of a lot, and really underscores to me how many irons I've had in the fire over the past few years, and how many fruitful collaborations.
Among all these projects, the thing I'm most proud of right now is Presence of Absence: Meditations on the Unsayable in Writing.
I love that this book is published by punctum, and that the digital version is free to anyone who wants to read it. I love that I have been able to reclaim writing that I did so many years ago, and make it my own again. I love that doing so has reminded me that I don't have to get anyone's permission to write about this topic or that one; that I still have the right and the skills to write about literature if I want to, even though I've taken a totally different career path.
When I showed my kids the proofs and told them more about the book, my seven-year-old said, “I didn't know that you write books about books!” And that brought me a ton of joy, too.
Work in Progress
In addition to these finished works, I've got something very special forthcoming: “On Gathering,” the issue of Journal of Electronic Publishing that I'm editing, slated for publication this fall/winter. I'm so excited about it: the pieces are so varied and creative, picking up many of the threads of conversation that started within the Inkcap Collective and spinning them into scholarly discourse that pushes boundaries and imagines new possibilities. I will be so excited to share it here when it comes out.
My work has been pushing me in new directions with clients lately, too. For instance, I'm proud to have helped Full Spectrum Education secure funding from the Wallace Foundation for a partnership with education nonprofit JusticexDesign. Together, FSF, JxD, and I will undertake research that asks how organizations can navigate the double-bind present in storytelling—its potential for transformative justice, but also for harm. I am so honored to be part of this collaboration.
New Offerings
Finally, over the past few months I've also dipped my toe into 1:1 mentorship/coaching work—and my first client got hired for their top-choice job in a new field! 🎉 I was reluctant to add mentorship/coaching to the services I offer because that space can sometimes feel a teeny bit predatory to me. This client actually had to talk me into working together! But I'm so glad they did, because I really do love helping people find their footing as they pursue new professional directions. I've decided I'm open to working with more folks in this way, so if you're interested (or know someone who might be), please reach out.
I'm grateful, as always, for this space; if you've made it this far, know that I don't take your readership for granted. As the year gets underway, I'll be thinking about new ways to connect so that the Inkcap Collective can continue to be a vibrant space of hope and possibility.
Warmest,
Katina
