Seth Abramson

Seth Abramson (born October 31, 1976) is an American professor, attorney, author, and political columnist.[1][2][3][4]

Seth Abramson
Born (1976-10-31) October 31, 1976
Concord, Massachusetts, U.S.
OccupationAttorney, professor, author
EducationDartmouth College (BA)
Harvard University (JD)
University of Iowa (MFA)
University of Wisconsin–Madison (MA, PhD)
GenreCuratorial journalism, metajournalism
Literary movementMetamodernism

Early life and education

Abramson is a graduate of Dartmouth College (1998), Harvard Law School (2001), the Iowa Writers' Workshop (2009), and the doctoral program in English at University of Wisconsin-Madison (2010; 2016).[1]

Career

Abramson is an assistant professor of Communication Arts and Sciences at University of New Hampshire and affiliate faculty at the New Hampshire Institute of Art.[5] His teaching areas include digital journalism, post-internet cultural theory, post-internet writing, and legal advocacy.[5]

Prior to entering academia in 2015, Abramson was a trial attorney for the New Hampshire Public Defender from 2001 to 2007. Although still an attorney and member in good standing of the New Hampshire Bar Association and the Federal Bar for the District of New Hampshire, he no longer practices law.[6][7]

Abramson has been a columnist at Indiewire, The Huffington Post, and Poets & Writers.[8][9] He has published additional work in such outlets at The Washington Post, The Dallas Morning News, The Seattle Times, and The Guardian.[10][11][12][13] In 2011, Publishers Weekly wrote that he had "picked up a very large following as a blogger and commentator, covering poetry, politics, and higher education, and generating a controversial, U.S. News-style ranking of graduate programs in writing."[14] In November 2018, Abramson became a political columnist for Newsweek.[3]

In a 2019 interview, a Playboy interviewer said that "Abramson helped pioneer the literary form of the Twitter 'thread'" and, speaking of his 2018 book Proof of Collusion, credited "the eccentric New Hampshirite" for "his meticulous attention to the evidence of Trumpworld’s alleged collusion with the Kremlin."[15] The magazine added that Abramson was a "left-brained gonzo."[16]

Claims about President Donald Trump
Further information: Special Counsel investigation (2017–2019)

After the 2016 U.S. presidential election, Abramson received widespread attention for his Twitter threads alleging collusion between the Trump campaign and foreign governments, especially Russia, but also Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Israel.[17][15] According to The Washington Post, Abramson suggests that "After trying for many years to expand his business empire into Russia...Trump visited Moscow in 2013 to personally meet agents of Russian President Vladmir Putin, using his beauty pageant as cover. There...a secret deal was struck: Putin agreed to open up his country's rich real estate market to Trump, and Trump agreed to campaign for president while promoting pro-Russian policies."[18] Avi Selk of the Post writes that Abramson "has become virally popular by reframing a complex tangle of public reporting on the Russia scandal into a story so simple it can be laid out in daily tweets."[18]

Writers at The New Republic, The Atlantic, and Deadspin have described Abramson as a conspiracy theorist.[19][20][21] Ben Mathis-Lilley of Slate argues that Abramson is "not making things up, per se; he's just recycling information you could find on any news site and adding sinister what-if hypotheticals to create conclusions that he refers to... as 'investigatory analyses.'"[22]

Other media outlets have offered different analyses. The Chronicle of Higher Education notes that Abramson often "feuds with anti-Trump conspiracy theorists whom he sees linking to dubious sources and making claims without evidence."[23] Virginia Heffernan writes in Politico that Abramson's "theory-testing" is "urgently important."[24] Der Spiegel calls Abramson "a quintessential American figure: an underdog who became an involuntary hero."[25] The New York Observer writes that "events like Trump's 2013 trip to Russia for Miss Universe were covered extensively on Abramson's feed prior to the mainstream media catching on, a fact that has given him a reputation for being early to connect events within the broader Russia story."[26]

In November 2018, Abramson published the New York Times bestselling book Proof of Collusion (Simon & Schuster), which sought to establish "proof of collusion in the Trump-Russia case."[27] A Playboy interviewer wrote of Proof of Collusion that "not one error has been found in the book."[28] According to a review in the Herald (Scotland), "Amassed theories and suggestive juxtapositions notwithstanding, we end up with something closer to the Scottish 'not proven' verdict with its unique mix of moral conviction of guilt and inability to conclusively prove the case."[29] A sequel to Proof of Collusion, Proof of Conspiracy, was published by St. Martin's Press in September 2019, and was also a New York Times bestseller.[30]

2016 Democratic Primary writings

During the 2016 Democratic primary race between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, Abramson supported Sanders.[31] He authored what Jonathan Chait of New York Magazine called "a cult-favorite series of Bernie [Sanders] delegate-math fan fiction."[32] Philip Bump of The Washington Post took issue with Abramson's analyses, calling them "empty theory, unproven...but innovative."[33] Writing in The Chicago Tribune, Stephen Stromberg called Abramson a "Sanders zealot...[in] reality-denial."[34] The Atlantic, citing an article by Abramson in which he referred to his writing on the Democratic primary as "experimental journalism," attributed Abramson's articles not to his political leanings but his self-identification as a "metamodernist creative writer."[35][36] Politico concurred, referring to Abramson's political commentary as "verses from the abstract."[37]

Creative writing and editorship

Abramson has published a number of poetry books and anthologies. Publishers Weekly describes Abramson as "serious and ambitious...uncommonly interested in general statements, in hard questions, and harder answers, about how to live."[38] Colorado Review called Northerners, Abramson's second collection of poetry, "alternately expansive and deeply personal...of crystalline beauty and complexity," terming Abramson "a major American voice."[39] Notre Dame Review echoed the sentiment, calling Abramson "a powerful voice."[40]

Abramson won the 2008 J. Howard and Barbara M.J. Wood Prize from Poetry. Editor Don Share said of Abramson's "What I Have," "The poem absorbs certain details but doesn't fasten upon them the way poets are tempted to do; it's not adjectival, it's not descriptive, it's not painting a kind of canvas with scenery on it, and yet those details are really fascinating."[41]

In May 2014, Abramson was criticised for his Huffington Post piece "Last Words for Elliot Rodger", a "remix" of words taken from the final YouTube video of the perpetrator of the Isla Vista killings, which Abramson published less than two days after they took place.[42] Both the reuse of Rodger's words and the timing of the poem caused offense.[43] Although Abramson called the work "a vehicle for amity and compassion", Omnidawn, Abramson's publisher at the time, issued a statement saying that it was "dismayed, disheartened, distressed", adding that "his actions in this matter are not in alignment with our principles."[44][45]

Abramson and poet Jesse Damiani have been series co-editor of the annual anthology of innovative verse, Best American Experimental Writing, since its inception with Omnidawn in 2012.[46][47] The series was picked up by Wesleyan University Press in 2014.[48] Guest editors for the series have included Cole Swensen (2014), Douglas Kearney (2015), Charles Bernstein and Tracie Morris (2016), Myung Mi Kim (2018), and Carmen Maria Machado and Joyelle McSweeney (2019).[49] In 2018, The Rumpus called the anthology "meaty, daring, and beautiful."[50] Nicole Rudick, managing editor of The Paris Review, has called the series "just my kind of rabbit hole."[51]

The MFA Research Project

Between 2007 and 2014, Abramson authored The MFA Research Project (MRP), a website that published indexes of creative writing Master of Fine Arts (MFA) programs based on surveys and hard-data research.[52] Indexes appearing on the MRP included ordered listings of program popularity, funding, selectivity, fellowship placement, job placement, student-faculty ratio, application cost, application response times, application and curriculum requirements, and foundation dates. The MRP also published surveys of current MFA applicants, and of various creative writing programs. Writing for The Cambridge Companion to American Poetry Since 1945, Hank Lazer described Abramson's project as "a daring and data-rich endeavor."[53] The Missouri Review observed that Abramson, along with novelist Tom Kealey, "had done a tremendous amount of work to peel back the layers of MFA programs and get applicants to make informed decisions."[54]

Data from the MRP was regularly published by Poets & Writers between 2008 and 2013. The Chronicle of Higher Education termed the Poets & Writers national assessment methodology "comprehensive" and "the only MFA ranking regime."[55][56] The data was not without its critics. In September 2011, a critical open letter signed by professors from undergraduate and graduate creative writing programs was published.[57] In their response, Poets & Writers asserted that it adhered to the highest journalistic standards.[58] The magazine's Editorial Director Mary Gannon said of Abramson, the rankings' primary researcher, that he "has been collecting data about applicants' preferences and about MFA programs for five years, and we stand behind his integrity."[58]

Awards

Selected works

Books

Anthologies

Interviews
gollark: Just vaguely ask someone "hey, want some help with your educational stuff?" then launch some convoluted scheme to cheat for them where nobody actually has the full picture.
gollark: And the question-answering is spread across random people who don't know they're helping cheat either?
gollark: What if you devise some ridiculously convoluted scheme where the person in the university doesn't even know you're cheating for them?
gollark: Yes.
gollark: Or, well, it can, CC:T has the `utf8` library.

References
  1. Plenda, Melanie (2015-03-24). "Acclaimed Author and Poet Seth Abramson joins UNH Manchester English Program". University of New Hampshire at Manchester. Archived from the original on 2018-05-25.
  2. Seth Abramson (2017-02-08). "Listen up, progressives: We need to be smart in the digital age". The Dallas Morning News. Archived from the original on 2018-05-25.
  3. "Seth Abramson archive at Newsweek". www.newsweek. Retrieved 22 December 2018.
  4. "Combined Print & E-Book Nonfiction NYT Bestsellers for December 2, 2018". www.nytimes. Retrieved 27 November 2018.
  5. New Hampshire Institute of Art (2018-06-05). "Seth Abramson Joins NHIA MFA Faculty". Retrieved 2018-06-23.
  6. "Seth Abramson". UNH at Manchester. 2016-02-24. Archived from the original on 2017-07-08. Retrieved 22 June 2018.
  7. "Seth Abramson - HuffPost". www.huffingtonpost.com. Retrieved 22 June 2018.
  8. "On American Metamodernism," The Huffington Post (February 7, 2014).
  9. "A New Press Play Column: Seth Abramson's 'Metamericana'", Indiewire (January 31, 2014).
  10. "How Orange Is the New Black Humanizes Inmates." The Washington Post (July 26, 2013).
  11. "Listen Up, College Applicants: Don't Worry About Your Major." The Dallas Morning News.(March 15, 2017).
  12. "Fellow Progressives, Let's Be Models of Mature Political Discourse." The Seattle Times.(February 10, 2017).
  13. "Trump-Russia Is Too Complex to Report. We Need a New Kind of Journalism." The Guardian (November 22, 2018).
  14. Review of Northerners, Publishers Weekly (May 2011).
  15. Interview with Seth Abramson. Playboy (March 2019).
  16. Interview with Seth Abramson. Playboy (March 2019).
  17. Heffernan, Virginia. "The Rise of the Twitter Thread". POLITICO Magazine. Retrieved 2019-05-07.
  18. Selk, Avi (December 6, 2017). "People can't stop reading a professor's theory of a Trump-Russia conspiracy — true or not". The Washington Post. Retrieved May 25, 2018.
  19. Dickey, Colin (8 June 2017). "The New Paranoia". The New Republic. Retrieved 2017-07-03.
  20. McKay Coppins (2017-07-02). "How the Left Lost Its Mind". The Atlantic. Retrieved 2018-05-25.
  21. Blest, Paul (2017-04-04). "Trump Conspiracy Tweetstorms Are The Infowars Of The Left". Deadspin. Retrieved 2018-05-25.
  22. Ben Mathis-Lilley (2017-12-05). "Democrats: Please, Please Stop Sharing Seth Abramson's Very Bad Tweets". Slate. Archived from the original on 2018-05-25.
  23. Kolowich, Steve (2017-05-15). "What Is Seth Abramson Trying to Tell Us?". The Chronicle of Higher Education. ISSN 0009-5982. Retrieved 2017-07-03.
  24. Virginia Heffernan (September–October 2017). "The Rise of the Twitter Thread". Politico. Retrieved 2018-05-25.
  25. Christoph Scheuermann (June 4, 2018). "Army of Investigators Has Trump in Its Sights". Der Spiegel. Retrieved 2018-06-22.
  26. Mike Albanese (June 21, 2018). "Seth Abramson Is Combating Trump and the Media on Twitter". New York Observer. Retrieved 2018-06-22.
  27. "Combined Print & E-Book Nonfiction NYT Bestsellers for December 2, 2018". www.nytimes. Retrieved 27 November 2018.
  28. Interview with Seth Abramson. Playboy (March 2019).
  29. "Review: Proof of Collusion: How Trump Betrayed America, by Seth Abramson". HeraldScotland. Retrieved 2019-04-07.
  30. "Combined Print & E-Book Nonfiction NYT Bestsellers for September 21, 2019". www.nytimes. Retrieved 29 November 2019.
  31. "Sanders backers worry that Clinton will clinch nomination before California’s polls close," The Washington Post, David Weigel (May 31, 2016).
  32. "Wall Street Journal Editorial Page Feels the Bern," New York Magazine, Jonathan Chait (May 12, 2016).
  33. "Sorry, Bernie supporters. Your candidate is not 'currently winning the Democratic primary race,'" The Washington Post, Philip Bump (March 23, 2016).
  34. "Bernie Sanders, enough with your 'political revolution,'" The Chicago Tribune, Stephen Stromberg (June 1, 2016).
  35. "This Is How a Revolution Ends," The Atlantic, Molly Ball (May 26, 2016).
  36. "On Bernie Sanders and Experimental Journalism," The Huffington Post, Seth Abramson (May 23, 2016)
  37. "The 2016 Blast," Henry C. Jackson, Politico (March 23, 2016)
  38. Northerners, Publishers Weekly (Review).
  39. Northerners (review), Colorado Review.
  40. "From Ruin to Rebirth," Notre Dame Review.
  41. "You're Always Moving Toward Silence," Poetry (March 2009 Poetry Foundation Podcast).
  42. "Abramson Publisher "Distressed" by His Elliot Rodger "Remix"". Coldfront. 29 May 2014. Retrieved 28 August 2014.
  43. Kempf, Christopher (10 June 2014). "The Poetics of Tragedy". Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved 14 January 2015.
  44. "Rap Genius and Bad Poetry: It's Always Too Soon to Grab Personal Attention After a Tragedy". Flavorwire. 27 May 2014. Retrieved 14 January 2016.
  45. "Omnidawn Breaks the Sound Barrier for BAX". Poetry Foundation. 30 May 2014. Archived from the original on 2014-10-16. Retrieved 28 August 2014.
  46. "Best American Experimental Writing Anthology Announced," The Poetry Foundation (November 12, 2012).
  47. "Announcing Omnidawn's New Annual Anthology, Best American Experimental Writing," Omnidawn (November 7, 2012). "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2013-02-21. Retrieved 2012-11-21.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
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  49. "Best American Experimental Writing," Wesleyan University Press (November 20, 2017).
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  51. "Staff Picks: Nicole Rudick," The Paris Review (June 17, 2016).
  52. "Protected Blog ' Log in". mfaresearchproject.wordpress.com. Retrieved 22 June 2018.
  53. "American Poetry and Its Institutions," The Cambridge Companion to American Poetry Since 1945 (February 8, 2013)
  54. "The MFA Degree: A Bad Decision?", The Missouri Review (August 29, 2011). Archived 2014-04-19 at the Wayback Machine
  55. "What Defines a Successful Post-M.F.A. Career?", The Chronicle of Higher Education (November 3, 2011).
  56. "M.F.A. Application-Season Etiquette," The Chronicle of Higher Education.
  57. "Creative Writing Profs Dispute Their Ranking. No, the Entire Notion of Ranking!", The New York Observer, Kat Stoeffel (September 8, 2011).
  58. "Poets & Writers Responds to Open Letter". Poets & Writers. 13 September 2011. Retrieved 13 September 2011.
  59. "NCJT list of 238 most respected journalists" (PDF), NCTJ, October 11, 2018, retrieved October 11, 2018
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