A Note from the Editor

Abstract

A Note from the Editor John Fletcher As I write this (November 2021), I am wrapping up my first semester returning to in-person classes at Louisiana State University. This has been the toughest pandemic semester for me, perhaps the most wearying of my professional career. For a few months in summer 2021, I fooled myself into thinking that the worst of COVID-19 was behind us. We had the vaccines everyone had been hoping and praying for. I started going out to restaurants and movies. My masks stayed in my pocket. I traveled to see my family for the first time in over a year. Maybe, I thought, things will go back to some version of “OK.” By July’s end, hope had faded. Louisiana’s vaccination rates stalled below 50 percent, and the Delta variant spiked here early. Hospitals overflowed and infections soared, shattering 2020’s numbers, driven mostly by the unvaccinated. Beyond the now all-too-familiar health anxiety (Is it a sniffle or COVID?), I felt dismay. We—or at least a significant percentage of us—chose this. We had the opportunity to escape this pandemic and decided not to, like a horror movie character choosing to go back into the axe murderer’s lair. We had elected to step backward, as we also seem to in battles against white supremacy, climate change, and political corruption. The return to in-person learning thus proved more an ordeal than a relief. Upper administration forbade remote options, even as they urged us to livestream every session for quarantining students. Classes featured universal masking and HEPA-filtered air purifiers blasting constantly; discussions about plays and performances became wearying lessons in vocal projection and enunciation. (You’re lucky, I reminded myself. At least you have filters and masking mandates.) Adding catastrophe to injury, Hurricane Ida hit Louisiana in our second week, shutting us down just as we struggled to gain momentum. Baton Rouge was mostly spared; communities to our south and east endured horrendous damage and are still recovering. Students, faculty, and staff returned to classes tense and traumatized, distracted and disheartened. Even as COVID rates in my region decline and mask mandates lift, last summer’s false reprieve has left me pessimistic. Fool me once . . . Your mileage may vary, as they say. But in conversations with colleagues at other institutions as well as social media discourse among academics, I find echoes of my own fatigue. We may have gotten through the post-quarantine fall, but many of us are not thriving. The relative slenderness of this March issue indexes our collective exhaustion. We have plenty of essays and articles in our pipeline, but the flow has slowed considerably. People need more time. Finding reviewers for articles takes longer. The revise-and-resubmit process falters as local emergencies and narrower bandwidths steal our focus. Slowing down along with everyone else, I feel a combination of resentment and gratitude about the submissions-management system we use (ScholarOne), which keeps me on track with deadlines and reminders for editorial tasks. Nothing stings like the “You’re late” reprimand of a non-sentient auto-email. For what it is worth, then, allow me to offer a little grace. If you are someone who feels stuck in or intimidated by the publication pipeline, know that we editors want your work. I am never offended or angry when authors request more time, or when they take months rather than weeks to revise and resubmit. I have been there myself. Likewise, I understand when people decline invitations to review. Reading and responding to manuscripts is a labor of love, a gift of time and energy. It happens sometimes that we have no spare time or energy to give. Again, I have been there. I am grateful [End Page vii] when authors can make deadlines and when readers can accept invitations to review. But there is no contest, no scorekeeping for a “Most Dedicated to Scholarship” award (which would inevitably translate into a “Most Blessed with Time, Energy, and Focus” prize). We practice as life allows us. I am pleased, then, to showcase the work that this issue’s authors have contributed despite the Delta resurgence of...