Gale Acuff has had poetry published in Ascent, Ohio Journal, Descant, Adirondack Review, Ottawa Arts Review, Worcester Review, Maryland Poetry Review, Florida Review, South Carolina Review, Arkansas Review, Carolina Quarterly, Poem, South Dakota Review, Santa Barbara Review, Sequential Art Narrative in Education, and many other journals. He has authored three books of poetry: Buffalo Nickel (BrickHouse Press, 2004), The Weight of the World (BrickHouse, 2006), and The Story of My Lives (BrickHouse, 2008). He has taught tertiary level English in the US, China, and the Palestinian West Bank.
Gaby Bedetti is the American translator of Henri Meschonnic’s work, a contributor to Lexington’s poetry blog, and a teacher at Eastern Kentucky University. Her publications include a photo essay in Italian Americana: Cultural and Historical Review, an article on rhythm as historicity in New Literary History, and a poem in The Voices Project.
Jennifer Bell is an Associate Professor of ESL at Delaware County Community College in Pennsylvania. With her M.A. in TESOL from West Virginia University and diverse teaching experience since 2002, she shows her students how to “Love Greater Philadelphia,” overcome cross-cultural challenges, and develop their linguistic skills.
Sarah A. Custen is a Utah-born, Brooklyn-based writer and educator. She received her MA in TESOL from The New School and a BA in English Literature from The University of Utah. Currently teaching academic ESL skills to adult immigrants and international college students, Sarah has previously lived and taught in Madrid and Tokyo, where she was also a regular contributor to Tokyo Weekender Magazine. In her free-time, Sarah loves to read, write, nap, stretch, snack, and go for long walks.
Kitty Dalton has been an English as a second language instructor and private tutor for 20 years, most recently at the Duke University Fuqua School of Business. She majored in Russian back in the Soviet era, recently reviving her skills to become a Russian > English volunteer translator for the microfinance lender, Kiva.org. She lives in the U.S. in the state of North Carolina.
Jacqueline Foster has taught EAP (English for Academic Purposes) classes both overseas and in Canada. She currently lives on the west coast of Canada and teaches at Vancouver Island University in Nanaimo, B.C. She has published practitioner-oriented pieces in teacher resource books and in various second language publications. Her professional areas of interest include learning disabilities in the adult ESL learner.
Anna Husson Isozaki has been teaching English in Japan and studying Japanese language and society since the 1990s, presently in Tokyo. Her fiction co-translations include Miyuki Miyabe’s Crossfire, a supernatural thriller and love story exploring vigilante justice, and Junichi Watanabe’s Beyond the Blossoming Fields, a novelized biography of Ginko Ogino, pioneer in women’s education and Japan’s first licensed female physician, published by Kodansha International and Alma Books, UK, respectively. She has edited several other published works in association with the Japanese Literature Publishing Project. She is also a member of SWET (the Society of Writers, Editors and Translators) and LiLT (Literature in Language Teaching). This is her second inclusion in The Font.
Edward Levinson is photographer, essayist and poet living in Japan since 1979. His book Whisper of the Land (Fine Line Press, 2014) is a collection of essays based on his life in Japan and includes many bilingual haiku. Timescapes Japan, (Nippon Camera, 2006) his award winning photo book takes one on a black and white pinhole photo journey through Japan. He resides in a countryside paradise on the Boso Peninsula in Chiba Prefecture where he attunes to nature and the world around him for creative inspiration. Please visit http://www.edophoto.com and http://www.whisperoftheland.com
Dianne Loyet is contributor of The Font’s regular column, In Love with Language. She was born and raised in Illinois, and became determined to study languages at the age of nine when her much older brother told her she was a ‘mala puella,’ and refused to explain what it meant. That determination carried her through bachelor’s and master’s degrees in Russian at the University of Illinois in Champaign. She briefly taught Russian but then switched to TESOL, earning an MA from UCLA and a PhD from New York University. She has been teaching composition to advanced non-native speakers of English since 1993. Currently she is an adjunct instructor at the University of Illinois at Springfield Intensive English Program.
Peter Mallett is a university professor and writer based in Kobe, Japan. Originally from the UK, he has an MA in Creative Writing from Bath Spa University. Former Arts editor of Kansai Time Out and publisher/editor of Artspace, he has written for The Asahi Evening News, Gramophone Japan, Opera News, The New Internationalist etc. His textbook From Word to Letter was published in 2007. He is seeking publication of his first novel Appassionata and is now working on a historical novel. He won the 1st Writers in Kyoto Writing Contest this year with his flash fiction piece Kimono Memories.
Peter’s story in this issue of The Font was awarded joint second place by Alexander McCall Smith in the 2017 Scottish Arts Club Short Story Contest and will be published in a print anthology of winning stories later this year.
Peter Marsh was born in the UK and has lived in Grenada, Tanzania, Germany and currently, Japan. He has made a living by teaching Mathematics, Chemistry, Physics or Theory of Knowledge as the occasion demanded. His writings include an anthology of tales about a fictional Caribbean island, numerous independent short stories and memoirs and, most recently, a full-length musical for which he has written book, lyrics and music. A long-time member of the Tokyo Writers’ Workshop, Peter has given presentations at the Japan Writers’ Conference on dialogue, humour and plotting. His work has been published in The Caribbean Writer, Dark Fire, The Lowestoft Chronicle and Fabula Argentea.
Karen McGee lives in Tokyo, where she serves as co-organizer of the Tokyo Writers Workshop and the Japan Writers Conference. Her story “Dot Rat” appeared in Otto Penzler’s “The Best American Mystery Stories 2017.” This is her second piece in “The Font.”
Pete Mullineaux lives in Galway, Ireland. He has published four poetry collections, most recently How to Bake a Planet (Salmon Poetry, 2016).
Eak Prasad Duwadi is an Assistant Professor who teaches English Language and Literature in Kathmandu University, Nepal. Eak has worked as a creative writer, teacher trainer and editor of some esteemed journals and magazines. Author of three books, contributor of book chapters, writer of hundreds of mind-blowing articles in English and Nepali published in the esteemed dailies, has also published about twenty research papers in peer-reviewed journals from USA, Australia, UK, and India. When not in Kathmandu, Eak visits different countries to speak in international conferences as a keynote or resource person. He can be found at eak@ku.edu.np
Michael Pronko became a professor of American Literature and Culture at Meiji Gakuin University in Tokyo after years of traveling, an M.A. in ESL, another in Comp Lit and a PhD in English and film from the University of Kent. His seminars focus on contemporary novels and film adaptations and he teaches classes in American film, music and art.
Michael has published three award-winning collections about Tokyo life: Motions and Moments (2015), Tokyo’s Mystery Deepens (2014), and Beauty and Chaos (2014). He published his first novel, The Last Train, in 2017. The follow-up novel, The Moving Blade, will be published in 2018. Michael has written regular columns for many publications: The Japan Times, Newsweek Japan, Jazznin, ST Shukan, and Artscape Japan. He also runs his own website, Jazz in Japan (www.jazzinjapan.com). More at: www.michaelpronko.com www.facebook.com/pronkoauthor @pronkomichael
Mary Roberson Wiygul has taught English in the United States’ public-school system for over twenty years. Her work has been featured in Huffington Post, Hippocampus Magazine, WOW! Women On Writing, the Erma Bombeck Writers’ Workshop, Southern Roots Magazine, Dead Mule School of Southern Literature, Magnolia Quarterly, Southern Sass Magazine, Screamin’ Mamas Magazine, Mamalode, You & Me Magazine, and The Voices Project. She recently presented her work at the Mississippi Philological Association yearly conference in Jackson, MS (US).
Brenda Romero is a professor of Spanish at College of Saint Mary in Omaha, Nebraska. She began her academic career in her native Mexico, and later graduated with a Ph.D. in Latin American Literature from the University of Utah. Dr. Romero was the Editor in Chief of the Utah Foreign Language Review, and her work has been published in various journals including La Tolteca ‘Zine, Tinta, and Pegaso. In addition to her teaching and scholarship, she regularly leads Study Abroad trips so her students can experience first-hand the rich culture and history of Spain and Latin America.
Eric Paul Shaffer is author of seven poetry books, including Even Further West; A Million-Dollar Bill; Lāhaina Noon; Portable Planet; and Living at the Monastery, Working in the Kitchen. More than 450 of his poems appear in reviews in Australia, Canada, England, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Wales, and the USA. In 1998, Shaffer moved to the Hawaiian islands and now lives on O’ahu, teaching composition, literature, and creative writing at Honolulu Community College.
Elizabeth Wagenheim teaches ESL to future artists and designers at Maryland Institute College of Art, where she is inspired by their creativity. When not in the classroom, Elizabeth enjoys thrift stores, parenting her teens, and dreaming of Mexico. Her educational background includes an MA TESOL, an MFA Creative Writing, and graduate coursework in intercultural communications.