Q & A with Professor Dave Sheridan

June 11, 2019

By RCAH Communications

We talked with Dave Sheridan, who teaches media and writing-related topics for RCAH and directs the RCAH Language and Media Center, fondly known as the LMC. Dave is pictured below at the drumset with RCAH students in the LMC.

 

What’s your favorite thing about teaching in RCAH?

The interdisciplinary approach that we take in RCAH provides opportunities to mix things in a wide variety of ways. When we read a story, for instance, we might analyze it in an essay. But we could just as easily decide to rewrite the story. Or write a parody of it. Or turn it into a short film. Or develop a comic book version of it.

What brought you to academia?

It’s probably more appropriate to ask why I haven’t left academia. Like most of my peers, I entered college when I completed high school. I’ve been attached to one campus or another ever since. Universities are extremely vibrant places, bringing together smart, creative people, and a wide range of resources. Our campus at MSU has incredible technologies, a library that contains nearly eight million titles, a beautifully strange-looking art museum, spaces for performing, making, eating, living. Why leave?

What’s your favorite pastime?

I don’t have a favorite. I play over-30 co-ed soccer on Friday nights. I’m in a “dad band” that gets together a few times a year to play rock and roll. I watch a lot of streaming TV and movies. I make all kinds of stuff— animations, books, short films. I write stories and poems. My youngest son is a nature-lover, so I’m always wandering through the woods with him.

What is something you’re working on right now that you’re really excited about?

I’m working on a series of pieces called “52 Missing Poems.” The poems are not written with ink. Instead, the words are cut out of black 3”X5” cards. The rule is that the condition of being cut out needs to somehow expand the meaning of the poem.

Anything special you want to say to alumni?

I have unlimited faith in the things that our alums will achieve. We’re a very new program, but our alums have already accomplished so much. I can’t even imagine the list of accomplishments RCAH alums will have amassed after ten, twenty, fifty years...