Areas of Research Interest

• American Literature
• Modernism
• Popular Culture
• Film

Recent Courses Taught

• English 2820 Vampire in Lit and Film
• English 2224 American Literature From the Civil War to the Present
• English 2227 Modern European Literature
• English 1154 Film as Literature
• English 1135 Intro to Film Art
• English 2226 Masterpieces of World Literature
• English 2290 Postmodernism
• English 1101, 1102, 1103
   

Current Projects

• Researching and writing Chicago and the Making of American
  Modernism: Cather, Hemingway, Faulkner, and Fitzgerald in Conflict. Under contract with Bloomsbury Press 
   

Selected Publications, Presentations, Performances, Books

• "The Case For Dreadful Hollow: Reading Faulkner's Vampire Screenplay." Literature/Film Quarterly: forthcoming
• "Thea in Wonderland: Willa Cather's Revision of the Alice Novels and the Gender Codes of the Western Frontier." Cather Studies 11. Eds. Ann Moseley, John Murphy, and Robert Thacker. Lincoln: U of Nebraska P: forthcoming
• "Chicago's Cliff Dwellers and The Song of the Lark" Cather Studies 9. Eds. Melissa J. Homestead and Guy J. Reynolds. Lincoln: U of Nebraska P: 2011. 93-113.
• "'The Unsleeping Cabal': Faulkner's Fevered Vampires and the Other South" The Faulkner Journal 24.2 (Spring 2009): 55-76.
• "'If This Was a Rape, Then Why Would She Be a Whore?': Rape in Todd Solondz's Films" Rape in Art Cinema, Ed. Dominique Russell. New York: Continuum Press, 2010. 129-144.
• "Killers and Diers: White Noise, Violence, Genre" Academic Exchange Quarterly 11.1 (Spring 2007): 66-71.
• "'The Most Extraordinary Effect': Teaching Ambiguity in The Turn of the Screw," Approaches to Teaching James' The Turn of the Screw, Daisy Miller, and Other Short Fiction, Eds. Kimberly C. Reed and Peter G. Beidler, New York: MLA, 2005. 127-131.
• "Bharati Mukherjee," Great World Writers: Twentieth Century, Ed. Patrick M. O'Neill Tarrytown, New York: Marshall Cavendish, 2004. 937-952.
• "Cracking the Case: Erupting Bodies in Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho," Proceedings of the Federation Rhetoric Symposium: Emerging Rhetorics, April 30- May 7, 1999, Ed. William E. Tanner. Mesquite, Texas: Caxton's Modern Arts Press, 1999. CD-ROM
   

Recent Presentations

• "My Swift and My Armour: Hemingway's Critique of the Art and Literature Scene"  17th Biennial International Hemingway Conference, Oak Park IL, July 2016.
• "Creating Scholars: Online Learning Design that Fosters Student Success and Retention" Enriching Learning Environments with Technology Conference, Elgin IL, March 2016.
• "Alice in the American West: Modernism and the Northern Pacific Railroad's Wonderland Route." Modernist Studies Association Conference 17, Boston, MA, November 2015.And this older one too.  It's been left out for awhile.  Could it go in the appropriate time place, by the DH Lawrence entry from the same conference?  Thanks.
• "Hemingway, Faulkner, and Chicago" Modern Language Association Convention, Boston MA, January 2013. Peer reviewed panels jointly given by the Faulkner Society and the Hemingway Society.
• "'A Patch of Dried Blood': Vampires, Veterans, and The Sun Also Rises" 16th Biennial International Conference of the Hemingway Society, Venice, Italy, June 2014.
• Invited to speak on "The Fictional Earnest Hemingway" at the Hemingway Foundation of Oak Park 2014 Spring Program, April 2014.
• "Hemingway, Edgar Lee Masters, and Chicago" Modern Language Association Convention, Chicago IL, January 2014. Peer reviewed Panel given by the Hemingway Society.
• "Death Comes for the Archbishop and the Western Film" 14th International Willa Cather Seminar, Northern Arizona University, June 2013.
• "Modernist Patron/Artist, Celebrity/Audience: Mabel Dodge Luhan, D. H. Lawrence, and 'The Vampire of Taos'" Modern Language Association Convention, Boston MA, January 2013. Peer reviewed panel given by the D. H. Lawrence Society.
• "'I Only Want Impossible Things': Thea and Alice in Wonderland" 13th International Cather Seminar, Smith College, MA, June 2011.
• "Horror and Outrage: Gothic Masculinities in Absalom, Absalom! and The Song of the Lark" American Literature Association Conference, Boston, MA, May 2011.
• "'The Ultimate Degradation': Spiritualism in the Aftermath of the Civil War, Absalom, Absalom!, and Beloved" read in absentia at the Faulkner and Morrison Conference held in Cape Giradeau, MO October 2010.
• "'Consider Me Dead': The Female Vampire in Cather's The Song of the Lark," American Literature Association Conference, San Francisco, CA, May 2010.
• "Immigration and the Scandinavian Vampire in Let the Right One In" Global Flicks Film Festival, Glen Ellyn, IL, February 2010.
• "Like the Buildings in a City Block: Chicago's Cliff Dwellers and The Song of the Lark" 12th International Cather Seminar, Chicago, IL, July 2009.
• "Hot for Teacher: Film Representations of the Student Sex Scandals" Teachers, Teaching, and the Movies Conference, Charleston, SC, October 2007.
• "The Man Whom He Would Be if He Could Metamorphose Into: Vampires, Slavery, and Male Sexuality in Absalom, Absalom!" Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference, Oxford, MS, July 2007.
• "Unlimited Quantities of M-M-M Food": The Modern Artist as Cannibal in the Postwar American Novel," Midwest Modern Language Association Convention, Chicago, IL, November 2006.
• "'I Drank Your Blood': Vampires, Violence, and Beloved," Twentieth-Century Literature Conference, Louisville, KY, March 2003.

Education

• Ph.D. SUNY at Binghamton
• M.A. SUNY at Binghamton
• B.A. Dickinson College 

Awards and Recognitions

Academic and Teaching Honors

• Outstanding College of DuPage Faculty for 2010-2011
• College of DuPage Technology Award Grant 2007, 2008
• Spirit of Service Award. College of DuPage 2007
• Who's Who Among America's Teachers 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005
• Mellon Fellowship Finalist, Grinnell College 2002
• Graduate Teaching Assistant Award 1995-2001
• Tuition Scholarship Award 1995-2001