EDUCATION
Ph.D. English and American Literature, New York University, expected May 2014
M.A. English Literature, University of Delaware, 2007
B.S. Secondary Education in Literature and History, Northwestern University, 2001
DISSERTATION
“At the Bookstore: Literary and Cultural Experience in Antebellum New York City”
Director: Thomas Augst
This project pursues literary and cultural history from within the walls of the antebellum New York City bookstore. Dimensionalizing the space of the antebellum urban bookstore though examining its commercial locations and networks of trade, its built environments and marketing strategies, and its buyers and sellers, I envision and explore a dynamic literary habitat grounded in space, practices, and artifacts. My project thus traces materials and methods for analyzing and describing a local geography of culture and asserts the radical materiality of literary and cultural formation.
FELLOWSHIPS AND AWARDS
2012
Stephen Botein Fellowship, American Antiquarian Society; Visiting research fellow
Millicent Bell Award, New York University; competitive departmental award for dissertation work in any area of English and American literature
Lind American Literature Fellowship, New York University; competitive departmental award for dissertation work in American literature
Carnwath-Callender Award, New York University; competitive departmental award honoring a female student writing a dissertation on American literature
2011
William Reese Company Fellowship in American Bibliography, Library Company of Philadelphia; Visiting research fellow
Tuttleton Award, New York University; competitive departmental award for dissertation work on American Literature
Lind American Literature Fellowship, New York University; competitive departmental award for dissertation work in American literature
2008
Dean’s Student Travel Grant, New York University
2007-12
MacCracken Graduate Fellowship, New York University
CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS
“Literacy’s Material Histories: American Sites and Scenes,” co-chair and presenter on roundtable at Northeast Modern Language Association, Boston, 21 March 2013.
“Finding New York City in the Bookstore,” presentation at Networked New York, New York University, 9 Mar 2012.
“Risky Business: The Great Gift Book Enterprise in 19th-Century Bookselling,” at the Center for Historic American Visual Culture (CHAViC) conference, Before Madison Avenue: Advertising in Early America, American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, MA, 4 Nov 2011.
Conference co-organizer and panel chair, The Formative Years: Children’s Literature in the University, Graduate Student Conference at New York University. 27 March 2009.
“’For the Love of Study or the Prospect of Gain’: The Nineteenth-Century Gift Book Enterprise and the Cultural Work of Books,” Midwest Modern Language Association, Minneapolis, 15 Nov 2008.
“‘A Halo of Scented Soap’: Olfactory Subjectivity in Great Expectations,” at Bodies and Things: Victorian Literature and the Matter of Culture, British Association for Victorian Studies, University of Oxford, 27 Sep 2008.
“The Plot of a Nation-Text: Reading the Tomb of Charlotte Temple Through the Nineteenth Century News Media,” Colloquium in American Literature and Culture, New York University, Sep 2007.
DIGITAL PROJECTS
The Susanna Rowson Digital Compendium. In cooperation with Spencer Keralis, Director for Digital Scholarship at the University of North Texas Digital Scholarship Co-Operative. Project currently under consideration for an NEH Digital Humanities Start-Up Grant.
NewYorkSCAPE. Co-founder of NYU working group dedicated to exploring the relationships between the literary culture and physical space of New York City through the methods of Spatial Humanities.
PUBLICATIONS
Review: Joan Shelley Rubin, Songs of Ourselves: The Uses of Poetry in America. SHARP News, Vol. 19, No. 1. 2010.
“Gotham: The Other New York” in Lost New York: 1609-2009, an essay volume accompanying an exhibition and conference at New York University, 2009.
TEACHING APPOINTMENTS
Instructor
Critical Reading and Writing (Freshman Composition Course), University of Delaware: Fall 2005, Winter 2006, Spring 2006
Teaching Assistant
Writing New York, New York University: Spring 2010
American Literature I, New York University: Fall 2009
PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES
Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Intern, Spring 2009-Fall 2012. Selective appointment processing archives in Prints and Photographs Department.
Immersive Course in Experimental Critical Writing, Plangere Culture Lab, Rutgers University, May 2012.
Graduate English Organization, PhD Representative, NYU, 2010-2011.
Rare Book School, University of Virginia, July 2010. Participant in Michael Winship’s seminar,“The American Book in the Industrial Era, 1820-1940.”
Cambridge Companion to the Literature of New York, eds. Cyrus R.K. Patell and Bryan Waterman, compiler of the published Chronology, 2010.
New York City Rare Book Workshop, Graduate Organizer, Fall 2009-Spring 2011.
Summer Seminar in the History of the Book in American Culture, American Antiquarian Society, June 2008. “The Newspaper and the Culture of Print in the Early American Republic”; awarded a competitive travel grant.
Colloquium for American Literature and Culture, Co-Organizer, NYU, Fall 2008-Spring 2010.
Winterthur Museum and Library, Graduate Assistant, Fall 2006-Spring 2007. Competitive appointment performing functions relating to the preservation and cataloguing of rare books and new acquisitions and pursuing independent research projects on Early American Material Culture.
Research Assistant: Microhistories of New York (graduate course), Tom Augst & Bryan Waterman, NYU, Fall 2010; to Professor Elizabeth McHenry, NYU, 2008; to Martin Brückner, University of Delaware, 2006.
Professional Associations: Society of Early Americanists; Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture; Society for the History of Authorship, Reading & Publishing; Modern Language Association.
RELATED PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
English Teacher, Lake Forest High School, Lake Forest, IL, 2003-2005. Taught freshmen through junior students American, British, and classical literature on the Skills, Traditional, and Honors tracks; taught senior elective courses in Contemporary Reading, Mass Media, and College Composition.
Community Resource Network, Chicago, IL, 2002. Coordinator for corporate and individual volunteer opportunities at area non-profits.
AmeriCorps*VISTA, Greater Homewood Community Corporation, Baltimore, MD, 2001-2002. Served as Community Resource Organizer in Margaret Brent Elementary School. Organized community events, coordinated volunteer and sponsorship opportunities, founded mentoring program for 4th and 5th grade boys.
REFERENCES
Professor Thomas Augst
Professor Bryan Waterman
Professor Patricia Crain
(Letters available upon request.)