tribute to denise sweet Festschrift: a volume of articles, essays, etc., contributed by many authors in honor of a colleague, usually published on the occasion of retirement, an important anniversary, or the like (dictionary.reference.com). Retirement is something that most everyone works toward. It brings people together through group investments, pension plans, even a national organization—AARP. But on an individual level, retirement is less easily defined. And when your life’s work is poetry, working—and being creative—doesn’t simply end. For many artists, retirement offers new wellsprings of inspiration. In the pages that follow, the recent retirement of UW-Green Bay professor Denise Sweet (Dee) has inspired former students, fellow writers, and colleagues around the world to pay her tribute. As a poet, Dee’s work is deeply reflective of her pride in her Native American heritage. Much of her writing celebrates her heritage as a member of the Bear clan of the Anishinaabe (White Earth). Throughout her career, she has used her poetry as a vehicle to make both political and social statements. Her work has been widely published in anthologies, national journals, chapbooks, and collections, and has been featured in museums and art exhibits. Her poetry can even be found on buildings: her poem, “Constellations,” is etched into the granite wall on Milwaukee’s Midwest Airlines Center. In recognition of her talents, Dee was named Wisconsin’s second Poet Laureate, serving from 2004 to 2008. Dee’s dedication to her art has transformed students and friends alike. At UW-Green Bay, she was an Associate Professor of Humanistic Studies and First Nations Studies, teaching creative writing, mythology, and literature to hundreds of students for twenty years. Her poetry workshops were simultaneously close-knit and expansive, venturing off campus for raucous readings at coffeeshops and “slam” poetry contests in Chicago. Today, in classrooms, on stages, and in various walks of life, “Dee’s Minions” continue to give voice to the lessons she instilled and do so proudly.
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UW-Green Bay’s credo asks us to “connect learning to life,” and in her teaching, Dee traveled borderlands far beyond the classroom. To increase UW-Green Bay’s outreach to Latino and Asian American communities in the 1990s, she brought first graders to campus for the Young Writers’ Workshop. She conducted a travel seminar for UW-Green Bay students to study among the Mayan peoples of the Yucatan Peninsula and Guatemala. In addition to serving as the chair of the American Indian Studies program, she was a director of UW-Green Bay’s first self-sponsored, precollege program for students of color. Her commitment to integrating oral histories into Wisconsin classrooms resulted in several awards, most notably a $10,000 grant from the Institute for Learning Partnership. For these efforts and countless others, she was twice honored at the UW-System’s Women of Color annual ceremony.