Merry Gangemi is a writer, activist, editor, and the producer and host of Woman-Stirred Radio. She earned her BA from New York University, and an MA in comparative Literature from San Francisco State University. She is currently working towards her MFA at Vermont College of Fine Arts, in both poetry and fiction.

Her short fiction and poetry can be found in Chroma, MatriFocus, Wisconsin Review, River Oak Review, Paterson Literary Review, Journal of New Jersey Poets, Sinister Wisdom, Harrington Lesbian Fiction Quarterly, Harrington Lesbian Literary Quarterly, Off Our Backs, and Street Spirit.

December 21, 2009

Redirect to...

As of January 1st, Quiddities will be put to rest.

Please go to: Woman-Stirred or Merry Gangemi

To listen to Woman-Stirred Radio, go to WGDR

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December 07, 2009

Happy Birthday Emily Dickinson!!

This Thursday, Woman-Stirred Radio presents a special two-hour program to celebrate the birthday of one of the most imagined, and distinctly American poets of all time: Emily Elizabeth Dickinson, born December 10, 1830. In the first hour Julie R. Enszer and Merry Gangemi will read the original work of poets from around the country, and welcome poets who will read their original poems about or inspired by Emily Dickinson, including: Barbara Crooker, Carol Dorf, Charlotte Mandel, Claire Keyes, Elizabeth Oakes, Jane Satterfield, Janet McCann, Julie Moore, Lesley Wheeler, Rachel Dacus, Susan Rich, and Tamiko Beyer.

In the second hour, Martha Nell Smith visits Woman-Stirred Radio to talk about the possibilities of Emily Dickinson, and unpack some of the myriad ways in which Dickinson's legacy has enriched and sustained the creativity and scholarship of millions of women, redefining and re-imagining the ferocious brilliance of the Belle of Amherst (how I dislike that moniker!!). Martha Nell and Merry will also talk about the intensely passionate and intellectual relationship between Emily and her beloved sister-in-law, Susan Gilbert Dickinson.

So please join Merry Gangemi and her guests on Thursday, December 10th from 4 to 6 pm (eastern) for a delightful celebration of Emily Dickinson's 107th birthday.

Tune in at 91.1 fm (in Central Vermont) or stream the show live at WGDR Community Radio. Want to join the conversation? Call 802.454.7762 or send an email with your questions and comments to mgangemi@vtlink.net or julierenszer@gmail.com.

December 02, 2009

Martin Duberman: Waiting to Land

This Thursday, at 5:00 p.m., Woman-Stirred Radio and Merry Gangemi welcome Martin Duberman, Distinguished Professor of History Emeritus at Lehman College and the Graduate School of the City University of New York.

They will discuss Duberman's latest (and third) memoir: Waiting to Land: A (Mostly) Political Memoir 1985-2008. (The New Press, 2009).

Duberman is prolific writer, with more than twenty books to his name, including: James Russell Lowell (a National Book Award finalist), Paul Robeson, Stonewall, Cures: A Gay Man's Odyssey, and his edited collection of essays, The Antislavery Vanguard. His play In White America won the Vernon Rice/Drama Desk Award for Best Off-Broadway Production in 1963. In 2007 he published The Worlds of Lincoln Kirstein, abiography of the man who was the force behind George Balanchine's New York City Ballet

Waiting to Land: A (Mostly) Political Memoir 1985-2008, interweaves diary entries with letters and reflections written in 2008. It is an important document in its reflections and analysis of the more recent years of the gay Rights movement in America. Howard Zinn notes that Duberman "is known for his unique combination of talents... a distinguished historian, a talented writer, and an impassioned advocate of gays and other beleaguered members of the human community."

So please tune in or stream it live, tomorrow, Thursday, December 3rd at 5 p.m. to Woman-Stirred Radio on WGDR, Central Vermont's community radio station.

Want to join the discussion? Call 802.454.7762.

November 10, 2009

James Schwartz: In Pursuit of the Gene

This week, Merry Gangemi welcomes James Schwartz, to Woman-Stirred Radio, Thursday, November 12th, at 5:00 pm (eastern), to talk about his new book, In Pursuit of the Gene: from Darwin to DNA.

"... Schwartz presents the history of genetics through the eyes of a dozen or so central players, beginning with Charles Darwin and ending with Nobel laureate Hermann J. Muller. In tracing the emerging idea of the gene, Schwartz deconstructs many often-told stories that were meant to reflect glory on the participants and finds that the “official” version of discovery often hides a far more complex and illuminating narrative. The discovery of the structure of DNA and the more recent advances in genome science represent the culmination of one hundred years of concentrated inquiry into the nature of the gene. Schwartz’s multifaceted training as a mathematician, geneticist, and writer enables him to provide a remarkably lucid account of the development of the central ideas about heredity, and at the same time bring to life the brilliant and often eccentric individuals who shaped these ideas.

In the spirit of the late Stephen Jay Gould, this book offers a thoroughly engaging story about one of the oldest and most controversial fields of scientific inquiry. It offers readers the background they need to understand the latest findings in genetics and those still to come in the search for the genetic basis of complex diseases and traits" (Harvard UP).