Excerpt from "Presstime"
The Newsletter of the University of Illinois Press
No. 5, September 1998
Elizabeth Dulany, Associate Director of the Press, is retiring after a long and multifaceted career. As an acquisitions editor she's made her mark in western history, anthropology, and religion, especially Mormon studies. Indeed, her career has been marked by a perennial concern for publishing books that express the experiences, world view, and contributions of groups separated from the mainstream by culture, belief, or orientation: Native Americans, Mormons, Seventh-day Adventists, Hari Krishnas, Christian Scientists, gays and lesbians. A striking recent example is Two-Spirit People: Native American Gender Identity, Sexuality, and Spirituality, edited by Sue-Ellen Jacobs, Wesley Thomas, and Sabine Lang, which won the 1997 Ruth Benedict Prize for an edited book given by the Society of Lesbian and Gay Anthropologists.
This year Liz received the highest honor given by the Mormon History Association: the Grace Fort Arrington Award for Historical Excellence. This award, which recognizes "a person who has contributed heavily over his or her lifetime to the cause of Mormon history and culture," has been won only once before in the past fifteen years by a non-Mormon. In his presentation speech, Leonard Arrington expressed appreciation for Liz's longtime advocacy of Mormon history, saying, "It is a special privilege to present the award to one who has spent much of her professional life helping to incorporate Mormon history into the mainstream of American history."
Recently Liz spoke with Presstime about her convictions as an editor and her experience at the Press.
Tell us how you got into publishing.
Total accident. Out of high school I got a job as a proofreader for Books in Print, which was then a revolutionary new reference work that R. R. Bowker was putting together in Ann Arbor, my hometown. I worked on Books in Print for five summers. The last year I worked on it I was managing editor of the thing. That was before computers, so that it was all hand work--typing each entry on a card and alphabetizing the cards and then mounting them on huge sheets which were then photographed. That's how they made the pages.
After graduating from Bryn Mawr College I started a master's in voice at Michigan. Then I met Don, and when he left for the army I decided to go to New York and try my hand there. I was an editorial assistant at E. P. Dutton, working for three senior editors. One of my duties was to take manuscripts home at night, read them, write reports on them, and take them back in the morning. Anything that came in not represented by an agent, I read. So when I came to Champaign, the Press seemed the natural thing to try first.
Was working as an acquiring editor your aim all along?
I didn't know what an acquiring editor was when I came to Illinois. I was a copy editor, then I was managing editor. Miodrag Muntyan was director then, Don Jackson the editor. The staff was very small. When Dick Wentworth became director I started going to the western history meetings and the anthropology meetings, and I added some acquisitions work to my activities. I was managing editor and acquisitions editor for about fifteen years, till I became associate director and gave up managing. I loved copyediting and the whole process of producing a book--working with the author, seeing the manuscript all the way through to the finished book--I hated having to give that up. As acquisitions editor, of course, finding a really good or provocative work and succeeding in getting it signed up is still a thrill.
What are the most striking changes you've lived through at the Press?
One was when Miodrag just came in one day and announced that henceforth we were going to start producing fifty books a year instead of twenty-five (of course we have more than doubled that output since then!). Moving from the old Press building [at 54 East Gregory, Champaign], which I watched being built, to this one [1325 South Oak] would have to rank up there somewhere near the top also. But computers are the biggest change for everybody. Every aspect of the operation has changed, from the way the manuscript is produced to the way we communicate with the author to how the book is designed, how it's set, how it's sold--everything, every single aspect has changed.
Do you think the printed word is destined to die out?
No. I have a feeling that the publish-or-perish aspect of university press publishing may need to change. But I don't think the printed word is going to go away.
What are you most proud of?
The Mormon list. The Native American list I'm developing. The twenty-seven volumes of the American Bottom Archaeology series edited by Chuck Bareis and John Walthall--a model for mitigation archaeology throughout the country. Many, many other things . . .
Why is it important to have a list in Mormon studies like ours?
Because I think that history in general neglects religion as a factor in it. Sometimes when you're talking to historians and you mention religion they turn pale, or change the subject. In western history this is evident in the way the Great Basin has tended to be neglected, though Mormons played a major role in the development of the West. Plenty of work done all around it: Northwest, Southwest, West Coast, Midwest. Jan Shipps calls this the doughnut theory of western history. Well, we publish the hole in the doughnut.
What has been the biggest thrill in your work?
My biggest thrill, hands down, was winning the Grace Fort Arrington award. Everybody else who has won this prize is a fairly renowned scholar. And the only other non-Mormon who's won it is Jan Shipps. So you know, people like Michael Quinn and Tom Alexander and Jan Shipps and this whole list of scholars--one feels quite humbled.
How did you feel when you realized that you were the one who was getting the award?
I couldn't believe it. It was a total surprise. The most thrilling thing of all was when the entire ballroom of people stood up and clapped--a standing ovation!
What's next?
Well, I hope to continue a relationship with the Press that will enable me to maintain one or two of the lists I've developed. And then, one of my authors is trying to persuade me to collaborate on a writing project with him . . .
We know our authors and friends will join us in saying thanks to Liz for her leadership and guidance at the Press and in wishing her a wonderful retirement. Here's looking at you!
