Resources

in the Aftermath of the Isla Visa Tragedy

Patrick Mooney, TA
Department of English, UC Santa Barbara
Eng 133SO, Prof. Waid

I do not even know how to begin to speak about the tragic events in Isla Visa on Friday evening. What I would like to say is that I care deeply about my students, and that I am horrified and deeply saddened by the events of this weekend. I know that many of you lost friends this weekend, and we are all shocked by this sudden irruption of violence in our community.

I am not a counselor, but will listen if you would like to talk. If you would like a referral to a campus counseling service, then I would be happy to point you in the right direction. If you are having difficulties with the course material, or with completing your assignments, then please come talk to me or to Professor Waid and we will do our best to be understanding and supportive.

Campus resources

Here is a short collection of campus services that may be helpful to students who are grieving.

• Counseling and Psychological Services at UCSB. 24-hour counseling is available by phone at (805) 893-4411. Student Resource Building. General information line is (805) 893-3091
• Student Health Social Work Services at UCSB. (805) 893-3087.
• CSO safety escort. Police Dispatch: (805) 893-2000.
• Academic advisers for students in the College of Letters and Science: (805) 893-2038; Cheadle Hall 1117.
• Academic advisers for students in the College of Engineering: (805) 893-2809; Harold Frank Hall 1006.
• Academic advisers for students in the College of Creative Studies: (805) 893-5319; Building 494, room 104.
• A Letter to Our Students, from the UCSB English Department.
• In Remembrance, from the UCSB English Department.
• My voicemail is 805.272.0069. Leaving me a voicemail is actually a quicker way of getting in touch with me than using my cell phone, which I tend to leave behind at inconvenient moments. However, leaving me a voicemail sends me an email, which I will almost certainly notice quickly, since I check my email all the time. I am not a professional counselor, but if you need someone to talk to, I will listen.

Selected theoretical approaches

Some of you may find (as I do) that taking a theoretical approach to the tragedy helps to resolve anxiety and is a way of beginning to understand the events themselves. Others may not be comforted by them.

None of this is required reading for English 133SO. None of these texts will be tested on the final exam. If they are not for you, then I will not think any less of you as scholars, human beings, students. Nor is this in any way a comprehensive bibliography on the relevant topics. These are simply texts that I myself find relevant. I am (of course!) happy to discuss any of these texts with you, or to provide alternate recommendations.

• This Is Water: Some Thoughts, Delivered on a Significant Occasion, About Living a Compassionate Life. This is a short commencement speech given by David Foster Wallace at the 2005 Kenyon College graduation.
• James, Aaron. Assholes: A Theory (ISBN 978-0-8041-7135-9). (2012.) (The whole book is quite good; I've excerpted the first and last chapters here. Last I checked, it is not available at UCSB campus libraries, but is available through interlibrary loan.)
• Nickel, Philip. Horror and the Idea of Everyday Life. From The Philosophy of Horror, ed. Thomas Fahy. Call no. PN 1995.9.H6 P45 2010 in Davidson Library. (2010.)
• Approaching Abjection, the first chapter of Julia Kristeva's Powers of Horror (ISBN 0231053460). (1980.)
• Preface and Precarious Life, from Judith Butler's Precarious Life: The Powers of Mourning and Violence. (ISBN 978-1844675449.)

Other resources

If you are looking for more information, you are welcome to browse through my browser bookmarks on various topics. Please note that some of these links contain disturbing material, and, of course, the fact that I bookmark something does not mean that I agree with any position that it expresses. Many categories will contain overlapping information. And I now wish I'd been tagging my bookmarks better and more consistently.

If anyone has any suggestions for additional resources, please let me know and I will post them.

• Christopher Michaels Martinez.
• Weihan Wang.
• Veronika Weiss.
• Katherine Cooper.
• The Isla Vista massacre.
• gender. (In my research library: gender identity; gender roles; genderless societies)
• misogyny. (In my research library: misogyny; misogyny in literature; misogynistic texts)
• feminism. (In my research library: feminism; feminism in literature; feminist criticism; feminist psychology; female experience.)
• terrorism. (In my research library: terrorism.)
• Information about the killer.