I am a Professor of English at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville where I teach courses on all sorts of topics, but just a few include nineteenth-century literature, young adult literature, literature and sustainability, technology and literature, book history, and animal studies.
I also co-direct of SIUE’s IRIS Center for the Digital Humanities. Where I work with community partners, high school students, and SIUE faculty and students to share their research and their stories using digital tools.
Here are a few highlights:
- I am the author of Nineteenth-Century Transatlantic Reprinting and the Embodied Book (Routledge, 2014).
- I edited a book of essays, Teaching with Digital Humanities with my colleague Jennifer Travis about how to teach nineteenth-century American literature using digital pedagogies.
- I founded the Goshen Market Foundation in 2016 alongside some great friends, and we started a mobile food truck that travels around Metro East St. Louis to increase access to affordable, fresh local veggies. The Foundation is still doing excellent work with a strong group of leaders at the helm!
- I direct Community-Oriented Digital Engagement Scholars (CODES). It is a program at SIUE for students who are Black, Latinx, Pell-eligible, or first generation who want to use their general education coursework to become change makers and work alongside community partners. I started CODES because I was a first-generation college student too, and the CODE Scholars are exactly who I want to work with everyday!
- With colleagues here at SIUE, at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and at St. Catherine University, I lead the Recovery Hub for American Women Writers. The Recovery Hub is about supporting people who are recovering and teaching the neglected texts, experiences, and voices of American Women online.