The Maine Scholar, a publication that in the past has represented the entire University of Maine System, has recently become a department solely under the University of Southern Maine and is now called the Southern Maine Review. The Maine Scholar, created 13 years ago, featured work from graduate and undergraduate students, faculty and outside scholars in Maine through a submission process. Now known as the Southern Maine Review, the publication will still be open to the same people, but its focus will be on Southern Maine.
Wanda Whitten, the managing editor for the Southern Maine Review, is pleased with the new changes.
“Before we were everywhere and nowhere,” she said. “Now we’re very excited to be in one spot.”
The first publication of the Southern Maine Review will be released at the “Thinking Matters” writers conference next April. The deadline for submissions is August 1. Whitten and others from the Southern Maine Review will be hosting a roundtable discussion at this year’s “Thinking Matters” conference and using notes from that discussion in the next publication. The title of the roundtable will be “Characters of our Conversations.”
According to Whitten, the Southern Maine Review is a great asset to students at this University.
“We publish student work along with faculty work and outside scholars’,” she said. “It’s a huge benefit to students.”
If selected, students can use the publication to help them get into a graduate program or put it on a resume. All of the authors receive ten copies of the publication for those reasons.
The Southern Maine Review is also an opportunity for faculty to have interdisciplinary work published; the work that they submit is not required to be in their field and will also be peer reviewed, making their work credible for upper level and graduate classes.
In the past the Maine Scholar chose a different theme with each publication. Now as the Southern Maine Review, the selection committee will not impose a theme so that they pick the best work, regardless of the subject. The Southern Maine Review features all types of work including interdisciplinary articles, poetry and short stories. Whitten hopes to see artists submit visual work in the future as well.
The Maine Review was originally created in conjunction with the Honors program for the entire University of Maine System. Its purpose was to give students a new forum to write for. According to Whitten, who has worked for the review since its second publication, the directors of the program at the time felt that students should have the opportunity to have their work read by people other than their professors.
The Southern Maine Review is still housed in the Honors building on Bedford Street in Portland.
The publication also offers opportunities to work study students and volunteers who want to learn about editing and publishing.
“They’re thrown right into the process,” said Whitten. “It’s a great learning experience.”
Tyler Stanley can be contacted at [email protected]