2019, BA Classics and Literature, University of North Carolina Asheville
Grace Derenne is a first-year Ph.D. candidate and research assistant in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her research interests include horror studies, sexuality studies, film and media studies, and depictions of the child in literature and film.
2009, BA English with Teacher’s Certification, Eastern Illinois University
2020, MA English, Wayne State University
Originally from central Illinois, Lindsay is a PhD student and teaching fellow focusing on post-conquest (c. 1100-1300) medieval literature. Previous research has focused on food in medieval literature, early modern broadside ballads, and perceptions of mental illness in medieval Europe. Outside of medieval literature, Lindsay is also interested in teaching pedagogy and taught high school English and special education before returning to academia. She has also worked extensively with a group of instructors at UNC who design coursework focusing on publication in the PIT Journal.
Miller, Lindsay, Sarah Chapman and Lynn Losh 2019. Going beyond Lear: Performance and Taming of the Shrew. Dividing the Kingdoms:Interdisciplinary Methods for Teaching King Lear to Undergraduates: Performance: Wayne State University. https://guides.lib.wayne.edu/folgerkinglear/performance
Ragle-Miller, Lindsay et. Al. The Warrior Women Project: Wayne State University. https://s.wayne.edu/warriorwomen/
British Literature from 1485 to 1660 (including Milton) | British Literature from its beginning to 1485 | Children’s Literature | Disability Studies | Early Modern Literature And Culture | Feminist Theory And Gender & Sexuality Studies | History of the Book | Literature and Education | Literature and History | Literature, Medicine and Culture | Pedagogy | Queer Theory | Science Fiction | The English Language | Women Writers | Writing In The Disciplines
2018, AA Liberal Arts, Northern Virginia Community College
2020, BA English/History, Mary Baldwin University
Toni DiNardo is a third year PhD student in the department of English and Comparative literature. A “medievalismist,” in the words of one colleague,” Toni’s work is predominantly concerned with the reception of medieval thought and perceptions of the Middle Ages as they have been mediated in modern genre fantasy. In particular, they explore the ways in which various audiences attempt to recuperate the Middle Ages through fantasy in order to construct and sustain identities, from queer rehabilitation of the medieval to white nationalist idealization of the Middle Ages as a putative ethno-nationalist paradise. They are also interested in the subjective experience – particularly among queer players – of the tabletop fantasy role-playing game. Other interests include the role of sexuality in Jacobean historiography, the queerness of faith in Donne’s ouevre, and anything to do with Margery Kempe.
British Literature from 1485 to 1660 (including Milton) | Children’s Literature | Critical Race Studies | Critical Theory and Cultural Studies | Disability Studies | Early Modern Literature And Culture | Feminist Historiography | Feminist Theory And Gender & Sexuality Studies | Film and Media Studies | Genre Theory | Literature and History | Literature and Philosophy | Literature and Religion | Post-Colonial Literature and Theory | Posthumanism | Queer Theory | Science Fiction | Social Justice | Women Writers
2016, MA English, University of Missouri at Columbia
2014, BA English (French minor), Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge
I am a PhD candidate studying American literature of the long nineteenth century. In my dissertation project, “If you are always kind”: Animals and Becoming Human(e) in Nineteenth-Century American Children’s Literature, I am exploring the influence of children’s literary texts upon the development of humane education and animal welfare initiatives in the United States. I investigate how these texts were foundational in establishing definitions of the “humane” that are still very much present with us today.
In my future work, I am interested in exploring how we might connect the field of animal studies with modern veterinary science; I thus wish to connect theory with practice with respect to animal care. I am also more broadly interested in efforts to incorporate humane education within educational curriculums.
2019, Honors BA English Literature and History, Marquette University
Katherine Stein is a third-year PhD student whose work is absorbed in the lines between historical fact and fictional narrative, with a special focus on Victorian historiography and the figure of the child. Reaching forward from the Victorian period into the early twentieth century, she has interests in historical fiction, national identity, and children’s literature. Katherine’s work is invested in the public humanities; at UNC, she works with the Jane Austen Summer Program, a public humanities outreach program, and also works in various public-facing communications roles.
