Position
Academic Background
Sample Courses   
Teaching Philosophy
Research & Interests   
Notable Academic Appointments & Awards
Publication Highlights     
Selected Scholarly Presentations

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• Assistant Professor of English

Academic Background        

• University of Virginia
  • Ph.D. in English Language and Literature, 2000
  • M.A. in English and Medieval Studies, 1997
• Pacific Union College, B.A. in English and French, Honors Program, summa cum laude, 1995
• Institut de Langue Française (Collonges-sous-Salève,France), Alliance Française Diplôme Supèrieur, 1993

Sample Courses Taught at Providence College

• Chaucer
• History of the English Language
• Survey of British Literature I
• Development of Western Civilization 101-102

Teaching Philosophy

At the core of my approach to all my teaching is the firmly-held belief that the study of literature, as well as the critical thinking skills it develops, is both a joy and a responsibility, a source of pleasure but also a call to think ethically about an individual's relationship to other people and other points of view. I aim to share my enthusiasm for literature with my students in the hope that they will embark upon a lifetime of serious reading and thinking -- not only about books, but about themselves and the world around them.

In the classroom, I attempt to create an environment for active learning and discovery by incorporating substantial group discussion whenever possible. I believe that students learn best when given the chance to articulate their first impressions, generic expectations, frustrations, and epiphanies (right or wrong). Above all, I endeavor to remain flexible in my teaching style, adapting to meet the requirements of a particular course format or group of students. I do not to bind myself too narrowly to my prepared class notes, so that a Socratic approach to student comments and questions can serve as a springboard to discussion. 

I constantly look for ways to show my students that literature is far more than neatly printed words on a page. Thus, while the careful reading of texts is always central to my teaching, I help my students to imagine the vibrant cultures of the Middle Ages and Renaissance through a variety of media: web sites, sound recordings, video clips, color handouts, Powerpoint slideshows, etc. Working as I do in early and potentially estranging periods of literature, I find it tremendously useful to seize any opportunity to help students "color the past," to imagine its sights, sounds, textures, and smells.  My hope, finally, is that students will engage imaginatively with literature as a way to understand its place not only in Medieval and Renaissance culture, but in our own culture as well.  

Research & Interests

• Chaucer
• Shakespeare
• Middle English poetry and romance
• Renaissance English poetry and drama
• History of the English Language
• Gender theory and sexuality studies
• Friendship and literature

Notable Academic Appointments and Awards

• Book Development Grant, Yeshiva College, summer 2006 & 2007
• Seltman Award (research grant), Pacific Union College, spring 2003
• Faculty Development Award, Pacific Union College, 2002 & 2003
• Pew Younger Scholars Doctoral Fellowship, 1995-2000

Publication Highlights

Book

• Other Selves: Theorizing Friendship from Chaucer to Shakespeare, in progress.

Articles and Reviews

• Rev. of Tom MacFaul, Male Friendship in Shakespeare and His Contemporaries (Cambridge, 2007), Renaissance Quarterly 61.2 (2008): 689-91.
• "Cupid's Wheel: Love and Fortune in The Knight's Tale," Medievalia et Humanistica 31 (2005): 59-82.
• "Cicero on Stage: Damon and Pithias and the Fate of Classical Friendship in English Renaissance Drama," Texas Studies in Literature and Language 47.4 (2005): 345-65.
• "Rewriting Perfect Friendship in Chaucer's Knight's Tale and Lydgate's Fabula duorum mercatorum," Chaucer Review 37.3 (2003): 234-52.

Selected Scholarly Presentations

• "Rough Weather: The Salutary Effect of Winter in Medieval English Literature," International Medieval Congress, Leeds, UK, 2008
• "The Chaucerian Garden as Place and Space," New Chaucer Society, Swansea, Wales, 2008
• "'A noble breeder, and a pure': Pedigree, Procreation, and Chaucerian Adaptation in The Two Noble Kinsmen," "Medieval Shakespeare" research seminar, Shakespeare Association of America, Dallas, 2008
• "Imagining Companionate Marriage in Twelfth Night and The Franklin's Tale," Shakespeare Association of America, San Diego, 2007
• "Midlife Crises:  Knighthood, Marriage, and Middle Age in Late Medieval Literature," International Medieval Congress, Leeds, 2005
• "Theorizing Friendship in Middle English Romance," International Congress on Medieval Studies, Kalamazoo, 2003

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