Liberal Arts in Action!
Brenda Roberts Ellington
Dean of the College of Liberal Arts, Associate Professor of English
Ellington has been an LSUA faculty member since 1987. Dr. Ellington was born in Lecompte, just a few miles south of LSUA. She earned a BA in Library Science at Louisiana Tech University; then as a University of Southwestern Louisiana / ULL Ragin’ Cajun, she earned teaching certifications in Library Science and English, an M.Ed. in Secondary Education, and a Ph.D. in English, majoring in Rhetoric and minoring in Linguistics, Early American Literature, and African American Literature. Dr. Ellington was a National Writing Project Teacher Consultant and has twice held the Mark Eugene Howard Endowed Professorship. Her teaching areas include Technical Writing, Professional Writing, Grammar, and Linguistics.
The LSUA College of Liberal Arts announces the winners of the LSUA Flash Fiction Contest for 2023. The contest garnered over 180 submissions from 14 different countries and from 20 different States of the US. Flash Fiction is a genre of creative writing that is short and generally has a surprise ending, although that is not necessary. The Flash Fiction stories that were submitted were impressive according to the panel of judges who blind reviewed the stories. The judges had a hard time picking out just three top stories, but they are confident that these stories were the best in this year’s contest.
First Place: David Holcombe (Louisiana, USA) - “Mary’s Tears”
Second Place: Gary Thomson (Ontario, Canada) – “The Steadfast Soldier”
Third Place: E J Delaney (Queensland, Australia) – “Poles Apart”
Dr. Holly Wilson, Professor of Philosophy and Religion, who organizes the annual contest remarked on the winners: “We are amazed that our little contest should reach other continents and countries and attract submissions from all over the world. But what is really remarkable is that all of the first-place winners in the past three years of the LSUA Flash Fiction contest have hailed from Central Louisiana. That tells you we have some very excellent creative writers in Central Louisiana.”
The LSUA Flash Fiction contest is an initiative of the LSUA College of Liberal Arts. It is an annual contest that awards $250 for first place, $150 for second place, and $100 for third place. Anyone may participate and submit their story. The call for submissions generally goes out in May or June and the entries are due by July 15. The announcement of the winners is made on August 15. Watch for the announcement of the next contest on Facebook: The LSUA College of Liberal Arts and the LSU Alexandria English, History, and Humanities. The winning stories are published in a beautiful booklet on the LSUA Website: https://www.lsua.edu/about-us/university-publications/lsua-flash-fiction-contest.
If you would like to know more about the College of Liberal Arts, please give us a call at 318-473-6581 or drop by and see us in Mulder 380.