University News

Literary Magazine for Veterans Continues in its Second Year

February 15, 2017

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MACOMB, IL – "SITREP: Veteran Perspectives on Combat and Peace," a literary magazine for WIU students, alumni, faculty and staff veterans and service members, will continue in its third year.

The project's advisors, Barbara Harroun and Jacque Wilson-Jordan, both assistant professors in the WIU Department of English, were inspired to create the magazine after years of working with student veterans in their composition and creative writing classes. Moved by the power of their students' stories, and receiving early support from Kathy Meyers, assistant director of the Veterans Resource Center, Harroun and Wilson-Jordan believed such work should be celebrated and shared beyond the classroom to provide a forum for veterans and service members, as well as foster a greater cultural awareness of their experience.

Submissions for this year's magazine are due Saturday, March 25 and can be sent to SITREPWIU@gmail.com.

Last year's magazine, now available at bit.ly/2li3kco, features fiction, non-fiction, poetry and photography by 16 contributors who represent all major service branches and served in Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan and many other locations stateside and overseas. Contributors have worked in a number of capacities, among them, machine gunner, corpsman, infantry officer, medic, automated logistical specialist, human resources officer, radio operator and pilot.

This year, student and alumni editors, Ryan Bronaugh (fiction), Jared Worley (poetry), Dan Holst (poetry) and Luke Cummings (non-fiction), will continue their work with the magazine. In the past two years, small groups of advisors, editors and contributors have presented at a variety of venues, including the local Rotary Club, the Dealing With Differences Institute conference at WIU, the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Macomb, the Macomb Women's Club and The Conference on Community Writing in Boulder, CO. Last year, Richard Chamberlain and Brice Shake, of CAIT (Center for the Application of Information Technologies), designed a website, which can be found at sitrep-vv.org

In the past year, the magazine has formed valuable community liaisons with The Buchanan Center for the Arts, directed by Kristyne Gilbert, and the Western Illinois Museum, directed by Sue Scott. Grant funds, provided by the Buchanan Center for the Arts, will help fund this year's magazine.

In November, the Western Illinois Museum sponsored an event on Veterans Day to showcase its collection of veteran oral histories of McDonough County. Two SITREP contributors from 2016, Chris Bell and Jared Worley, added their oral histories to the collection.

The magazine continues to receive valuable support from the WIU Veterans Resource Center; the WIU Department of English and the Council on Student Activities Fund.

For more information, visit sitrep-vv.org







Posted By: University Communications (U-Communications@wiu.edu)
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