Professor David Sumner explained the expanse of the American West to European and Asian students during his Fulbright Lectureship in Germany

Linfield Magazine Staff

Sumner, David

English

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Linfield Magazine Volume 4 Number 2 Fall 2007 Article 8 Fall 2007 Exploring Culture, Meaning of Space David Sumner Linfield College Linfield Magazine Staff Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.linfield.edu/linfield_magazine Recommended Citation Sumner, David and Linfield Magazine Staff (2007) "Exploring Culture, Meaning of Space," Linfield Magazine: Vol. 4 : No. 2 , Article 8. Available at: https://digitalcommons.linfield.edu/linfield_magazine/vol4/iss2/8 This article is brought to you for free via open access, courtesy of DigitalCommons@Linfield. For more information, please contact digitalcommons@linfield.edu. were not all German; there weresome Italians, Spaniards, a couple ofTurks and even a couple of Chinese.But without exception, all had livedonly in places that by western stan-dards had a high density population.If I were teaching Stegner inOregon, most of my Linfield stu-dents would know about space, notjust intellectually, but viscerally. Theywould know what it’s like to drivefrom La Grande to Ontario. Theywould have hiked in the easternCascades, Wallowas or Steens andlooked out across the empty sage andjuniper of eastern Oregon. Theywould know you grab a bite inJuntura because otherwise, it’s a longhungry ride to Burns. And it’s prob-ably easier to understand SusanBurling’s isolation if you grew up inDrewsey or Wagontire, if you havedriven on Highway 244 or wan-dered among the giant junipers inthe badlands east of Bend. The Germans taught me a lotabout careful land use and planning.I marveled at the efficient and con-venient rail service and ubiquitousbike paths. I was impressed with thewell-planned towns, that despite thedensity – or perhaps because of it –the Germans have carefully pre-served farm and forest. I would oftenrun in the woods and by the farmssurrounding Bayreuth and thinkabout both the beauty of the placeand the intense and careful land use.I would ride my bike to towndelighted as I counted the trout inthe creek the path followed. A 50-kilometer bike ride would take mefrom town to farm to forest to farmand back to town again several times.I was continually amazed at the liv-ability of a country with 83 millionpeople in a space the size ofMontana; it didn’t feel crowded.“Oregon is 70 percent the sizeof Germany,” I continued, “but hasonly 4 percent of the population –and that’s in 2007. In the 19th cen-tury, in Colorado, Idaho, California –the places Susan lived – the popula-tion was much smaller.”I learned about population fromthe Germans. I learned about carefulland use and planning, about livingwith others, about communitiesbuilt to human scale rather than carscale. What did my students learnfrom me? As a teacher you neverknow. I drew maps, quoted statistics,shared first-hand experience andmade them read, read, read. I hope Itaught them a little bit about the lit-erature and culture of the AmericanWest; I hope I taught them some-thing about space. – David Sumner(David Sumner, associate professor ofEnglish and director of the college writingprogram, is an outdoor enthusiast special-izing in American nature writing andWestern American literature. He taught atthe University of Bayreuth in Germanylast spring under the prestigious FulbrightJunior Faculty Lectureship Program. Thecourses he taught were: Western Dreams,Western Landscapes: Reading WesternAmerican Literature, and Literature andthe Object World: Empiricism, Ethics andAmerican Nature Writing. He has a bach-elor’s from the University of Utah, mas-ter’s from Brigham Young University andPh.D. from the University of Oregon.)“Space,” I heard myself saying.“To understand western Americanliterature, you have to get yourbrain around space.” Teaching as a Fulbright fellowin Bayreuth, Germany, I was look-ing out at the 35 students who hadsigned up for Western Dreams,Western Landscapes. We were dis-cussing Wallace Stegner’s Angle ofRepose, a novel based on the papersof Mary Hallock Foote, and Iwasn’t sure my students under-stood how geographically isolatedthe protagonist was; I wasn’t surethey understood the expanse ofthe American West.Set in the late 19th century,Stegner’s novel traces the life of EastCoast artist and intellectual SusanBurling, a character who – like thehistorical Foote – corresponds withand publishes alongside some of thebrightest lights of her day: WilliamDean Howells, Samuel Clemens,Henry James. Married to a miningengineer, Susan finds herself not inthe Northeast – the center ofAmerican intellectual, artistic andpublishing life – but in the remoteWest. Her husband’s profession takesthem from lonesome western townto lonesome western town followingthe boom and bust reality of the19th century West.I wasn’t sure my students under-stood how isolated Susan felt – howremoved she was from her country’sartistic and intellectual center. TheyExploring culture,meaning of space1 6   -   L I N F I E L D  M A G A Z I N EDavid Sumner and his family, from left, Heidi, Silas, Camilla and Penn, spent six months in Bayreuth, Germany, while Sumner taughtas a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Bayreuth. Bicycling was their primary mode of transportation, along with trains and buses,and the experience was an educational opportunity for the entire family.Students, facultyearn FulbrightsLinfield College facultyand students alike have takenpart in international exchangessponsored by the FulbrightProgram.Since 1999, Linfield hashad three faculty, one adminis-trator and 15 student Fulbrightscholars. The college wasnamed a top producer ofFulbright awards for bachelor’sinstitutions in the Chronicle ofHigher Education last year. Several Linfield faculty andan administrator have earnedFulbright awards, includingmost recently, David Sumner,associate professor of English,who taught in Germany; EricSchuck, associate professor ofeconomics, who consulted inSouth Africa; and DawnNowacki, professor of politicalscience, whose research tookher to Russia. Sandy Soohoo-Refaei, associate director ofInternational Programs, earnedan administrative Fulbright tostudy in Japan.Student recipients includeAngie Jamison ’99, Nicaragua;Staci Bryson ’00, Germany;Seth Otto ’00, Bolivia; LynseyFarrell ’01, Kenya; MelissaKoosmann ’01, Austria; SarahMontfort ’02, Croatia; JenniferCregg ’02, Germany; PaulBeck ’03, Germany; AlexisLien ’05, Austria; Maria Davis’05, Iceland; Kari Blankenship’06, Tunisia; Holly Brause ’06,Uruguay; Rachyl Stupor ’06,Chile; Julia Back ’07, Australia;and Ryan Jones ’07, Austria.The grants are designed tofund study, research andteaching in other countriesto promote a greater globalunderstanding of differentcultures and nationalities.F A L L  2 0 0 7 -   1 7David Sumner with Penn, Camilla andSilas at the Richard Wagner Museum inGermany.were not all German; there weresome Italians, Spaniards, a couple ofTurks and even a couple of Chinese.But without exception, all had livedonly in places that by western stan-dards had a high density population.If I were teaching Stegner inOregon, most of my Linfield stu-dents would know about space, notjust intellectually, but viscerally. Theywould know what it’s like to drivefrom La Grande to Ontario. Theywould have hiked in the easternCascades, Wallowas or Steens andlooked out across the empty sage andjuniper of eastern Oregon. Theywould know you grab a bite inJuntura because otherwise, it’s a longhungry ride to Burns. And it’s prob-ably easier to understand SusanBurling’s isolation if you grew up inDrewsey or Wagontire, if you havedriven on Highway 244 or wan-dered among the giant junipers inthe badlands east of Bend. The Germans taught me a lotabout careful land use and planning.I marveled at the efficient and con-venient rail service and ubiquitousbike paths. I was impressed with thewell-planned towns, that despite thedensity – or perhaps because of it –the Germans have carefully pre-served farm and forest. I would oftenrun in the woods and by the farmssurrounding Bayreuth and thinkabout both the beauty of the placeand the intense and careful land use.I would ride my bike to towndelighted as I counted the trout inthe creek the path followed. A 50-kilometer bike ride would take mefrom town to farm to forest to farmand back to town again several times.I was continually amazed at the liv-ability of a country with 83 millionpeople in a space the size ofMontana; it didn’t feel crowded.“Oregon is 70 percent the sizeof Germany,” I continued, “but hasonly 4 percent of the population –and that’s in 2007. In the 19th cen-tury, in Colorado, Idaho, California –the places Susan lived – the popula-tion was much smaller.”I learned about population fromthe Germans. I learned about carefulland use and planning, about livingwith others, about communitiesbuilt to human scale rather than carscale. What did my students learnfrom me? As a teacher you neverknow. I drew maps, quoted statistics,shared first-hand experience andmade them read, read, read. I hope Itaught them a little bit about the lit-erature and culture of the AmericanWest; I hope I taught them some-thing about space. – David Sumner(David Sumner, associate professor ofEnglish and director of the college writingprogram, is an outdoor enthusiast special-izing in American nature writing andWestern American literature. He taught atthe University of Bayreuth in Germanylast spring under the prestigious FulbrightJunior Faculty Lectureship Program. Thecourses he taught were: Western Dreams,Western Landscapes: Reading WesternAmerican Literature, and Literature andthe Object World: Empiricism, Ethics andAmerican Nature Writing. He has a bach-elor’s from the University of Utah, mas-ter’s from Brigham Young University andPh.D. from the University of Oregon.)“Space,” I heard myself saying.“To understand western Americanliterature, you have to get yourbrain around space.” Teaching as a Fulbright fellowin Bayreuth, Germany, I was look-ing out at the 35 students who hadsigned up for Western Dreams,Western Landscapes. We were dis-cussing Wallace Stegner’s Angle ofRepose, a novel based on the papersof Mary Hallock Foote, and Iwasn’t sure my students under-stood how geographically isolatedthe protagonist was; I wasn’t surethey understood the expanse ofthe American West.Set in the late 19th century,Stegner’s novel traces the life of EastCoast artist and intellectual SusanBurling, a character who – like thehistorical Foote – corresponds withand publishes alongside some of thebrightest lights of her day: WilliamDean Howells, Samuel Clemens,Henry James. Married to a miningengineer, Susan finds herself not inthe Northeast – the center ofAmerican intellectual, artistic andpublishing life – but in the remoteWest. Her husband’s profession takesthem from lonesome western townto lonesome western town followingthe boom and bust reality of the19th century West.I wasn’t sure my students under-stood how isolated Susan felt – howremoved she was from her country’sartistic and intellectual center. TheyExploring culture,meaning of space1 6   -   L I N F I E L D  M A G A Z I N EDavid Sumner and his family, from left, Heidi, Silas, Camilla and Penn, spent six months in Bayreuth, Germany, while Sumner taughtas a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Bayreuth. Bicycling was their primary mode of transportation, along with trains and buses,and the experience was an educational opportunity for the entire family.Students, facultyearn FulbrightsLinfield College facultyand students alike have takenpart in international exchangessponsored by the FulbrightProgram.Since 1999, Linfield hashad three faculty, one adminis-trator and 15 student Fulbrightscholars. The college wasnamed a top producer ofFulbright awards for bachelor’sinstitutions in the Chronicle ofHigher Education last year. Several Linfield faculty andan administrator have earnedFulbright awards, includingmost recently, David Sumner,associate professor of English,who taught in Germany; EricSchuck, associate professor ofeconomics, who consulted inSouth Africa; and DawnNowacki, professor of politicalscience, whose research tookher to Russia. Sandy Soohoo-Refaei, associate director ofInternational Programs, earnedan administrative Fulbright tostudy in Japan.Student recipients includeAngie Jamison ’99, Nicaragua;Staci Bryson ’00, Germany;Seth Otto ’00, Bolivia; LynseyFarrell ’01, Kenya; MelissaKoosmann ’01, Austria; SarahMontfort ’02, Croatia; JenniferCregg ’02, Germany; PaulBeck ’03, Germany; AlexisLien ’05, Austria; Maria Davis’05, Iceland; Kari Blankenship’06, Tunisia; Holly Brause ’06,Uruguay; Rachyl Stupor ’06,Chile; Julia Back ’07, Australia;and Ryan Jones ’07, Austria.The grants are designed tofund study, research andteaching in other countriesto promote a greater globalunderstanding of differentcultures and nationalities.F A L L  2 0 0 7 -   1 7David Sumner with Penn, Camilla andSilas at the Richard Wagner Museum inGermany.

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