Jessica Vestuto is a Stony Brook English BA alum and currently an editor for Mariner Books, a HarperCollins imprint. A former writer for the Stony Brook Press, Jessica has always believed in “the power of the pen.” 

What was your career journey like? How did you land on Stony Brook, decide to be an English major, and eventually go into publishing? 

Both my mom and my sister went there, and they were both English majors, so I knew for a fact that they had great professors and a really great program. It was like a financial thing too, [to] have such a high quality education and not go into so much debt was really important to me and I’m so grateful for [that] in the long run. I always loved writing in high school, I was very involved in the school paper. Sometime during my undergrad I discovered what an MFA in creative nonfiction was and it was one of those moments of, “that’s what I want to do.” That became my goal the whole time I was there. I was taking English courses, writing on the side, and working towards trying to get into those programs. I ended up going to Emerson, but the summer before that program started, […] I decided to do an internship at a publisher, at FSG, which is an imprint at Macmillan. When I was there, I [saw] what other editorial systems and editors were doing and I really fell in love with it. I still did my MFA, which was great, and at the same time I was working for a publisher in Boston.

What are your interests, what projects do you tend to be the most drawn to?

I do mostly literary fiction; as opposed to commercial fiction [which is] a little bit more story-driven, [literary fiction is] usually more of the voice and the characters than the plot. I do mostly debut authors which I really love. I’m interested in the intellectual breadth that a person can have and how long they can, hopefully for a very long time, be writing books. I’m always drawn to someone whose mind I really admire. It’s usually a little dark and a little weird, a little off-kilter. That’s the stuff that really excites me. One example is I’m working on a book [that] has vampires, but it’s playing with vampire tropes and subverts our expectation of what we think would happen to say something about culture, society, and politics.

How has your experience as an undergrad at Stony Brook benefitted you at HarperCollins? 

I learned how to speak and write about books, and that’s the foundation of everything I do now. So much of my job is hands-on, either through the jacket copy or in meetings with sales reps, I’m just trying to convince people to spend time and money on a book. I was really lucky to work with professors who encouraged me to read what I love, organize my thoughts, and express them effectively. That really shaped my editorial sensibilities. Also writing at the Stony Brook Press, I think that was the first time I really fell in love with the act of publishing something. Seeing my writing turn into a tangible object that other people could read — it’s the same thrilling feeling I get when a book I acquired comes from the printer, it just never gets old.

Lastly, what are you reading at the moment? 

I’m reading Human Acts by Han Kang. She wrote The Vegetarian and won the Booker [Prize for fiction in 2016], then the Nobel Prize [in literature] this year. She is brilliant in thinking about the world. I’m reading Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar too, that’s really good. One weird, fun book I’m reading is Jean Stein’s biography of Edie Sedgwick [Edie: An American Biography]. It’s a string of interviews edited together as one continuous conversation, it’s like a gossipy, illicit game of telephone that’s really fun to read.

David Heska Wanbli Weiden is an enrolled citizen of the Sicangu Lakota nation who strives to bring awareness about Native American literature, culture, history, and more into his classroom. His specialty in law and politics brings a new point of view within Indigenous studies, allowing us to understand the injustices Native Americans have faced by the U.S. Government. Currently working on a sequel to his bestselling book Winter Counts, Dr. Weiden continuously works on amplifying Indigenous voices both in mainstream media and in everyday life.

What made you pursue your current profession and what is the most fulfilling part of it?

Before I chose teaching 25 years ago, I was a licensed attorney in Colorado for a number of years. I did not find that to be the job I was best suited for, so I went back to school for teaching and earned my PhD at the University of Texas at Austin. I’ve never regretted that choice. The most fulfilling part about my job is certainly interacting with the students. When a class is going well and the students are really appreciating and understanding the material, it’s wonderful. I also enjoy helping students with their professional goals; I’ve helped students get into law school and graduate school and have been delighted to stay in touch with many of them. 

What inspired you to specialize in Native American Literature/Native American and Indigenous Studies? Why is it important to teach these topics to our students?

I’m an enrolled citizen of the Sicangu Lakota nation but grew up in Colorado. Our reservation is in South Dakota and my earliest memories involve visiting my family there. Naturally, I was drawn to issues involving Indigenous people, and especially fiction and nonfiction. For my M.F.A. degree in creative writing, I studied Native American fiction and literary theory at the Institute of American Indian Arts and I was able to focus on one particular area of Native literature for my thesis.

I believe it’s important to teach Native American studies, literature, culture, law, and politics, because Native Americans were the original people of this land, of course. But Indigenous people have a different way of thinking and looking at the world, which can provide a useful counterpoint to standard Western ideas and worldviews. I should also note that it’s important for Stony Brook students to know about the history of Indigenous people right here on Long Island, as well as learning about the current status of all of the Native people who are still here in New York. There’s a brand new program (and minor) in Native American and Indigenous Studies, and we have a community Steering Committee comprised of Native citizens from Long Island. In the new NAIS program, students can learn about Native history, art, culture, literature, and environmental justice. Students who’d like to learn more can check out the new website:  https://www.stonybrook.edu/nais/.

What is it like being a part of the Sicangu Lakota Nation? 

Native Americans have an important role in the U.S. because of our unique status as political entities as well as ethnic minorities. Many people don’t know that there are just under 600 sovereign Native nations within the boundaries of the United States. Because of this status, enrolled Natives are dual citizens:  citizens of their Native nation and of the United States. So, I’m a citizen of the Sicangu Lakota Nation as well as an American citizen; this creates a sense of duality, not only in regards to citizenship but culturally as well. 

Are you currently working on any publications/research that you’d like to talk about?

Yes, I’m working on the sequel to my novel, Winter Counts. That novel was marketed as crime fiction, but was really a meditation on Native identity and an examination of the broken criminal justice system on reservations. I was fortunate in that the book received a fair amount of attention, both from readers and policymakers. I explore other issues in Wisdom Corner, the next book in the series. On the scholarly side, I have just written “Leonard Peltier’s Sun Dance,” an essay that will appear in The Cambridge Companion to American Prison Literature. It’s an examination of the Peltier case and a literary analysis of his memoir. Many believe that Leonard Peltier was a political prisoner and wrongly convicted for aiding and abetting murder on the Pine Ridge reservation in the 1970’s. He was just released from prison; President Biden commuted his sentence in the very last hour of his presidency. 

What has been the most impactful thing you’ve ever learned during your research?

The most impactful thing I’ve learned is there is a huge gap in knowledge among high school and college students when it comes to the status of Native Americans and how they’ve been treated by the U.S. government. When I started teaching Native American history and culture twenty years ago, I learned that many people do not understand that our religion and spirituality was made a federal crime until 1978. Until 1978, there could be a criminal conviction and prison sentence for any Native American who practiced our unique spiritual ceremonies. Students are always stunned to learn this. There are many other laws and policies regarding Native citizens that students are surprised to learn. My hope is that my teaching and writing can help to educate people as to the history and culture of Native peoples and hopefully bring about changes in law and policy.

Felicia is currently a Teaching Assistant at Stony Brook working on her dissertation for the English PhD program. With a focus on ecofeminism, imperialism and Women’s Gender and Sexuality Studies, Felicia writes with purpose. 

What are your specializations and topics of interest as well as what you’re currently working on? 

I’m in my second year of the English PhD, so I’m ending the coursework period this semester and starting to gather people I’ll be working with on my dissertation committee. I’m really interested in a lot of queer spaces and queer world building theory that came out of the community grappling with AIDS in the 80s and 90s. I’m interested in using it to think about psychologically processing the climate crisis that we’re in. I recently wrote the “Thread Moving Through the Hole” essay, [it’s about] me processing loss of snow, processes of immigration, and how we contextualize what’s happening around us. It’s definitely in its very early stages — over the summer is where I’m reading and researching and in a focused way. A lot of ecofeminist theories that are rooted in race relations and imperialism — you can’t disconnect them.

What led you to go for doctoral studies?

Going back to [the question of] how can you be effective, what kind of person are you? I’m almost 30, so I have done different things since college. I was mostly working at queer bars or on women or indigenous-led farms and switching between those two roles after college, but always working on writing. I still think those forms of work aren’t things that I’m leaving behind. I definitely see a future still working on farms in the summer. Now I work at a literary café […] very engaged in New York queer scenes and activist scenes. Reading, writing, and teaching about the issues that matter to me has always been something that I know I am nourished by. I also really like being with students and forming relationships that will help them […] move in the world in a way that is kinder to it.

Speaking of students, versus your time as a student and now being a Teaching Assistant interacting with humanities students, what have you noticed students today facing? Are there any notable differences, or do you kind of feel like it’s more or less the same experience? 

It’s definitely not the same experience, which is crazy because I’m only 10 years older than everyone in college. Students appear to be more anxious and feel very scared about messing up, [they] don’t seem to have a lot of confidence or training in their ability to write. They’re fully capable of it, […] I do think that it is a newer trend of a heightened sense of perfectionism. I’m friends with teachers who have been teaching for 30 years who do effort-based grading, and I think that would produce a different type of student in a good way.

What drew you to Stony Brook? I know you’ve been in a lot of different locations, is there anything about this school that stood out to you in terms of PhD programs?

There are things about this program that are really great. The English and the Gender Studies programs are really interconnected here. Also, when I was applying to PhD programs, it was important for me to write in ways that are academic, but are not really what the academy wants you to do. I really love theory or academic writing that is narrative [like] poetry or theory work that’s image-based. I specifically wanted to keep going through [the PhD program] one, because I want to teach at universities, but two, I want to learn to write that way and that writing training. So far I’ve been able to already start working on that writing, and for all of my coursework, instead of a classic final, I’ve gotten to experiment with different types of that kind of writing [surrounding] my dissertation project. I do already feel like I’ve been getting training in trying to write that way, so that’s been cool.

Lastly, what are you reading at the moment? 

Right now I am reading a transnational feminism of the Americas book. One of my favorite theory books is No Archive Will Restore You by Julietta Singh. Getting to return to Toni Morrison in our class [Single Author] is really nice. One of my classes is a teaching practicum figuring out how to teach with feminist pedagogy, so lots of different things.