News
Graduate Students Excel: Publishing in American Literature
During the past year, both a current graduate student and a recent graduate of Penn State’s Department of English published, or will soon publish, an article in the journal American Literature. Co-founded by Penn State’s Fred Lewis Pattee in 1929, American Literature has been known since its beginnings as the “preeminent periodical in its field.” American Literature is currently co-edited by the co-director of CALS’ First Book Institute, Priscilla Wald.
Penn State’s English graduate students have a variety of goals coming into the program, but all hope to publish their scholarly work in some capacity. The process of publishing is daunting and often looks different to every scholar, including Jessica Klimoff, a former Penn State graduate student and Postdoctoral Teaching Fellow who served on the inaugural CALS “Unprecedented” Webinar Series Organizing Committee in 2020-2021, and Thomas Bryant, a first-year PhD student who will serve as the 2026-2027 CALS Graduate Research Assistant.
Both scholars worked closely with professors to publish their respective work. Bryant’s forthcoming article, “Playing Chicken: Queer Ecology and Anti-Industrialism from Hawthorne to Wister,” emerged from an independent study on queer nineteenth-century American literature with CALS-affiliated Prof. Christopher Castiglia. Bryant adds that his work was also inspired by “a sequence of noticing chickens pop up at weird impasses in books that I love.” In both cases, their pieces changed significantly after their initial seminar papers. Klimoff’s article, “Because It Never Dies”: Archipelagic Time in from unincorporated territory [lukao]” came out of a course with former CALS Director Hester Blum called “Archipelagic American Studies.” Klimoff and Bryant say that their introductions and conclusions received the most feedback from their reviewers and from professors and peers who aided in their revision processes.
Beyond a general introduction, literature review, analysis, and conclusion structure, Klimoff explains that for her, “each argument seems to take shape on its own,” but that the most important practice in her writing is always centering “the exact intervention that the paper will make and how the paper's argument differentiates itself from other arguments.” When the structure is clear, Klimoff finds that she can more easily enjoy the writing process and that it feels “more grounded and meaningful.” Klimoff emphasizes that an early peer review workshop helped her begin the process of turning her piece into an article.
Bryant offers that he focuses on structuring his work around previously published articles, naming Sylvan Goldberg's “On Not Describing Death: Washington Irving, John Kirk Townsend, and Natural History’s Descriptive Agency,” published in the academic journal American Literary History in 2024. He explains that Goldberg “thinks similarly about animal description across texts” and balances theory and readings of his texts as Bryant sees his work accomplishing.
For Bryant and Klimoff, they both consistently returned to the central ideas they originally mapped out in the initial drafting stage, bringing different objects of analysis and their growing knowledge of the current scholarly landscape to the forefront. Expanding their knowledge base—as well as working closely with their advisors—helped both scholars to build the confidence to submit their essays for possible publication to the prestigious journal American Literature. Beyond prestige, they recognize that the scholarly work they engaged with and the interventions they made during revision are in line with the journal’s project and previous scholarship. Bryant specifically points to former CALS First Book Institute participant Sarah Ensor’s much-cited article “Spinster Ecology: Rachel Carson, Sarah Orne Jewett, and Nonreproductive Futurity,” which was published in the journal in 2012 and set a precedent for the work he was doing in queer ecology.
Support was vital for both scholars throughout the writing process. Beyond her initial work with Prof. Blum, Klimoff cites Professors Benjamin Schreier and Claire Colebrook and other graduate students including Justus Peña Berman, Kathleen Blackwood, and Eunice Toh—all past CALS Grad Award winners and/or Research Assistants—who each provided her with helpful feedback that allowed her to think through every element of the paper. She says that rounds of peer review helped her to “take a step back” and “practice being an ‘editor’ instead of a ‘writer.’” Along with providing structure and demystifying the process, peer review provides the necessary comfort of recognizing how your own process parallels others.
Bryant explains that Prof. Tina Chen, Director of Penn State’s Global Asias Initiative and Editor of the award-winning journal Verge: Studies in Global Asias, advised him on how to best navigate communication with the journal. He states, “If there is a lesson about graduate student resources here, it is that your professors are invaluable resources for the content and delivery of your work and that thinking with your peers is essential.” Both scholars also recommend attending academic conferences in one’s field as important places to think through your own work and listen to how other scholars think and talk through the kinds of questions you are grappling with.
The process of publishing an article is long and takes different paths for each scholar, especially for graduate students and early career scholars. In this process, as Bryant stresses, it is key to trust your own instincts: embrace what details stand out to you in any given text and journey down those paths of inquiry. Relying on your impulses and the community of scholars you find during your graduate studies will always be the foundation to academic success in its many forms.
You can read Jessica Klimoff’s article, “Because It Never Dies”: Archipelagic Time in from unincorporated territory [lukao]” in the September 2025 issue of American Literature, vol 97. Thomas Bryant’s article, “Playing Chicken: Queer Ecology and Anti-Industrialism from Hawthorne to Wister,” is forthcoming in the September 2026 issue.
Works Cited
Goldberg, Sylvan. “On Not Describing Death: Washington Irving, John Kirk Townsend, and Natural History's Descriptive Agency.” American Literary History, vol. 36 no. 4, 2024, pp. 969-994.
Ensor, Sarah. “Spinster Ecology: Rachel Carson, Sarah Orne Jewett, and Nonreproductive Futurity.” American Literature, vol. 84 no. 2, 2012, pp. 409–435.
During the past year, both a current graduate student and a recent graduate of Penn State’s Department of English published, or will soon publish, an article in the journal American Literature. Co-founded by Penn State’s Fred Lewis Pattee in 1929, American Literature has been known since its beginnings as the “preeminent periodical in its field.” American Literature is currently co-edited by the co-director of CALS’ First Book Institute, Priscilla Wald.
Penn State’s English graduate students have a variety of goals coming into the program, but all hope to publish their scholarly work in some capacity. The process of publishing is daunting and often looks different to every scholar, including Jessica Klimoff, a former Penn State graduate student and Postdoctoral Teaching Fellow who served on the inaugural CALS “Unprecedented” Webinar Series Organizing Committee in 2020-2021, and Thomas Bryant, a first-year PhD student who will serve as the 2026-2027 CALS Graduate Research Assistant.
Both scholars worked closely with professors to publish their respective work. Bryant’s forthcoming article, “Playing Chicken: Queer Ecology and Anti-Industrialism from Hawthorne to Wister,” emerged from an independent study on queer nineteenth-century American literature with CALS-affiliated Prof. Christopher Castiglia. Bryant adds that his work was also inspired by “a sequence of noticing chickens pop up at weird impasses in books that I love.” In both cases, their pieces changed significantly after their initial seminar papers. Klimoff’s article, “Because It Never Dies”: Archipelagic Time in from unincorporated territory [lukao]” came out of a course with former CALS Director Hester Blum called “Archipelagic American Studies.” Klimoff and Bryant say that their introductions and conclusions received the most feedback from their reviewers and from professors and peers who aided in their revision processes.
Beyond a general introduction, literature review, analysis, and conclusion structure, Klimoff explains that for her, “each argument seems to take shape on its own,” but that the most important practice in her writing is always centering “the exact intervention that the paper will make and how the paper's argument differentiates itself from other arguments.” When the structure is clear, Klimoff finds that she can more easily enjoy the writing process and that it feels “more grounded and meaningful.” Klimoff emphasizes that an early peer review workshop helped her begin the process of turning her piece into an article.
Bryant offers that he focuses on structuring his work around previously published articles, naming Sylvan Goldberg's “On Not Describing Death: Washington Irving, John Kirk Townsend, and Natural History’s Descriptive Agency,” published in the academic journal American Literary History in 2024. He explains that Goldberg “thinks similarly about animal description across texts” and balances theory and readings of his texts as Bryant sees his work accomplishing.
For Bryant and Klimoff, they both consistently returned to the central ideas they originally mapped out in the initial drafting stage, bringing different objects of analysis and their growing knowledge of the current scholarly landscape to the forefront. Expanding their knowledge base—as well as working closely with their advisors—helped both scholars to build the confidence to submit their essays for possible publication to the prestigious journal American Literature. Beyond prestige, they recognize that the scholarly work they engaged with and the interventions they made during revision are in line with the journal’s project and previous scholarship. Bryant specifically points to former CALS First Book Institute participant Sarah Ensor’s much-cited article “Spinster Ecology: Rachel Carson, Sarah Orne Jewett, and Nonreproductive Futurity,” which was published in the journal in 2012 and set a precedent for the work he was doing in queer ecology.
Support was vital for both scholars throughout the writing process. Beyond her initial work with Prof. Blum, Klimoff cites Professors Benjamin Schreier and Claire Colebrook and other graduate students including Justus Peña Berman, Kathleen Blackwood, and Eunice Toh—all past CALS Grad Award winners and/or Research Assistants—who each provided her with helpful feedback that allowed her to think through every element of the paper. She says that rounds of peer review helped her to “take a step back” and “practice being an ‘editor’ instead of a ‘writer.’” Along with providing structure and demystifying the process, peer review provides the necessary comfort of recognizing how your own process parallels others.
Bryant explains that Prof. Tina Chen, Director of Penn State’s Global Asias Initiative and Editor of the award-winning journal Verge: Studies in Global Asias, advised him on how to best navigate communication with the journal. He states, “If there is a lesson about graduate student resources here, it is that your professors are invaluable resources for the content and delivery of your work and that thinking with your peers is essential.” Both scholars also recommend attending academic conferences in one’s field as important places to think through your own work and listen to how other scholars think and talk through the kinds of questions you are grappling with.
The process of publishing an article is long and takes different paths for each scholar, especially for graduate students and early career scholars. In this process, as Bryant stresses, it is key to trust your own instincts: embrace what details stand out to you in any given text and journey down those paths of inquiry. Relying on your impulses and the community of scholars you find during your graduate studies will always be the foundation to academic success in its many forms.
You can read Jessica Klimoff’s article, “Because It Never Dies”: Archipelagic Time in from unincorporated territory [lukao]” in the September 2025 issue of American Literature, vol 97. Thomas Bryant’s article, “Playing Chicken: Queer Ecology and Anti-Industrialism from Hawthorne to Wister,” is forthcoming in the September 2026 issue.
Works Cited
Goldberg, Sylvan. “On Not Describing Death: Washington Irving, John Kirk Townsend, and Natural History's Descriptive Agency.” American Literary History, vol. 36 no. 4, 2024, pp. 969-994.
Ensor, Sarah. “Spinster Ecology: Rachel Carson, Sarah Orne Jewett, and Nonreproductive Futurity.” American Literature, vol. 84 no. 2, 2012, pp. 409–435.