Welcome! I am an Associate Professor of English at Western Michigan University, where I teach both graduate and undergraduate seminars in American literature, cultural studies, and film.
My teaching and research interests include: the periods marked by the literatures of American Realism, Naturalism, and Modernism; the literature and culture of the American West; Cultural Studies; Environmental Literature; and theories of literary history. My book, Traces of Gold, argues for reading the history of literary realism in the American West as a figurative engagement with the material, economic, and cultural value of natural resource industries.
I also have published articles and presented conference papers on authors such as Henry James, Mary Austin, Mark Twain, Willa Cather, William Dean Howells, John Muir, Sinclair Lewis, and Raymond Chandler, and on topics such as western realism, landscape representation, natural resources and literature, and WPA guidebooks.
Please consult my curriculum vitae, as well as my teaching materials from both present and past semesters, for more detailed information on what I do professionally.