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Faculty & Staff

Degrees

PhD, American Studies, SUNY Buffalo, 2010
MA, Women's Studies, University of Cincinnati, 1998
MA, English, University of Cincinati, 1996

Professional Publications & Contributions

• "Breaking the Rules of Discussion: Examples of Rethinking the Student-Centered Classroom." Human Architecture: Journal of the Sociology of Self-Knowledge. 9.3 (2011) : 1-15 Co-authored with Dr. Lamont Egle and Dr. Cheryl Nixon.
• “Chrystos” Greenwood Encyclopedia of American Poets and Poetry, 2005. Gray and McCorkle, eds.
• "The American International Adoptee as a Subaltern Subject." Gender Studies 1.3 (2004) : 229-251.

Additional Information

As an interdisciplinary scholar and teacher, I engage cultural mythology, history, and individual identity through literature and visual arts.  Who are “we” as “Americans?”  How do we define ourselves, and how have those definitions been challenged and transformed by writers?  My teaching ranges from early through contemporary literature, acknowledging family resemblances between authors over time.  In “Six American Authors,” I highlight intertextual conversations, like the counter-narrative written by contemporary Ojibway writer Louise Erdrich to Puritan Mary Rowlandson about “captivity.” In both sophomore-level and advanced classes, I have a very hands-on approach to learning through group work, student projects, and presentations. 
My doctoral work specialized in multi-ethnic nineteenth-century American studies, and my research engages the influences of Transcendentalism on coming-of-age novels in which work, not marriage, serves as the crucible of growth.  My dissertation, “In Labor Her Best Teacher,” synthesizes Transcendentalism with the historical work on nineteenth-century women’s labor.  I was inspired towards those research questions by my own extensive work in the non-profit world.  I have also developed courses focusing on working class literature and culture.  My continuing research excavates the possibilities and limitations of protagonists’ growth through labor across race and class.  I am grateful and inspired by working with students at UMass!  They are engaged, fascinating, and fun.   
 

Courses at UMass:

Native American Literature
Transcendentalism in American Literature
American Realism
American Women Writers and Culture
Six American Authors