The Graduate Student Assembly (GSA) recently elected new officers for the coming year. The GSA is the official means of communication between graduate students and the administration of the university. Brian Gatten, a fourth-year grad student in the English PhD program, has been elected President of the GSA for 2007-2008.
What is the focus of your Ph.D.?
I am focusing on historical trends in drama, so I do a lot with the Theater
Department and with Comp Lit since I focus on drama from all different periods
and even countries, as it all influences everything else. I try to keep
my theoretical perspective focused enough that my dissertation will still be
coherent even with such a wide range of texts.
What did you do before UT?
I did my undergrad work at Harvard in comparative literature (although they don't call it that there, for reasons unknown), studying mostly classical Latin poetry and Shakespeare. And Jesus. I had a real fixation on pop culture representations of the Jesus / Judas story. I started out really fascinated by Jesus as a cultural icon, and I ended up absolutely in love with characterizations of Judas.
Why did you decide to attend UT?
Well, besides the fact that it's a great program and there are people here like my advisor, James Loehlin, who do amazing things that you really can't find anywhere else, I'm originally from near Dallas and my family is scattered around Texas. I figured if I was going to be somewhere for as long as it takes to get a PhD in English, I'd probably want the chance to see my various relations more than once a year.
What are your goals for GSA in the next year?
My primary goal is to make GSA more truly representative of graduate and professional
students' interests. A major part of that is just getting delegates
from all the many departments on campus that historically have not been represented. The
GSA does a lot of important things that most students either don't know
about or assume must be taken care of exclusively by administrators or maybe
by SG. I want to make sure that before too long, every graduate and professional
student on campus knows that we are here, and that we're here to serve
their needs, from representing their academic and financial interests to the
administration and to the state legislature to handing out free barbecue and
coffee mugs.
Between being a student leader and pursuing your academic goals, you must be pretty busy. How do you relax and find balance in your life?
Well, partly I do that by getting even busier. I haven't given up on the writing or the acting, and I'm still actively working on some projects in that vein. I'm taking a class with Lynn Miller in the Theater Department on writing for solo performance this semester, and that's been fantastic; there are some really talented people in there. I probably won't have time to act in a full play production again anytime soon, but I have been involved with some short films done by students over in the RTF department lately. I've also taken some martial arts classes, which is handy for keeping in shape and also useful because I don't get any secret service in this job. Strangely enough.
Q & A by Elisabeth McKetta, April, 2007
