Renee Emerson has joined the Shorter University faculty as Assistant Professor of English. She will teach Written Composition, American Literature and Poetry Writing.



Emerson earned her Bachelor of Arts in English from Union University in Jackson, Tenn. She graduated with a Master of Fine Arts in Poetry from Boston University. At Boston University, she worked as a writing tutor in the College of Arts and Sciences Writing Center and was a teaching fellow in creative writing. While there, she also served as an intern at Agni literary magazine and as a contributing editor for The Basilica Review literary magazine. She also has served as a literature and writing tutor through the Hundley Tutoring Center at Union University.



Emerson said, "My experience in my M.F.A. program at Boston University, studying under former U.S. Poet Laureates Robert Pinsky and Louise Gluck, has prepared me to teach Shorter students how to write poetry with skill and creativity; my experience writing as a Christian poet has prepared me to teach students not only how to write well but also what it means to write from a Christian perspective. I hope to teach students to pursue excellence while remaining true to their Christian worldview."



Emerson is especially looking forward to teaching poetry beginning in the fall semester. "I want to help students know how to write pieces that will do well in the world of poetry. My goal is to help them be able to write well and to get into the top M.F.A. programs."



Reading is crucial to the success of a poet or writer, she added. "I plan on making my students read a lot. It is important for students to read all the contemporary poets so that they produce works that are relevant for today. We want them to know what is being written now so when they send poems to literary magazines those pieces will be well received."



Emerson is the author of three poetry chapbooks: Something Like Flight (Sargent Press, 2010), The Whitest Sheets (Maverick Duck Press, 2010) and Where Nothing Can Grow (Batcat Press, 2011). She has numerous publications, including "Milkweed" and "Your Old Home" in Southern Humanities Review, 2011; "Easter Day Returning" in Christianity and Literature, 2011; "Witness" in Cider Press Review, 2011, and "Home on a Sunday" and "Inclement Weather" in MacGuffin, 2011.



In 2008, Emerson received the Helen C. Blythe Creative Writing Award from Union University. She claimed Boston University's Academy of American Poets Prize in 2009 and received a Pushcart Prize nomination for "The Wedding," a poem that appeared in the San Pedro River Review in 2011.



She and her husband, Bryan, have one daughter, Susan Olivia.



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