2016, MA English, University of Virginia
2013, BA English, University of California Berkeley
Stephanie Kinzinger is a third-year PhD student, who focuses on nineteenth-century American literature and science. Her background in both areas of study informs her research on how scientific and technological advancements during the nineteenth century engendered significant shifts in interpreting reality and consequently in writing fiction.
2014, BA English & Psychology, Wesleyan University
Rachel Warner is a doctoral student in English and Teaching Fellow at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her work lies at the intersection of queer and transgender studies, poststructuralist feminist theorizing, and American culture studies. She is particularly interested in representations of non-normative gendered embodiments and transgressive sexualities in 20th century multiethnic American literature. In May of 2017, Rachel received the Winchester Fellowship from her alma mater to prepare for comprehensive exams and conduct preliminary research for her prospectus. She has also worked in the emerging field of health humanities by helping convene the 2016 Health Humanities Exchange conference at UNC-CH and serving as director of the of Literature, Medicine, and Culture Colloquium for the 2016-2017 academic year.
MA English, York University
BA English (Honors), University of Alberta
BA Music, University of Alberta
Christina Lee is a PhD candidate and Teaching Fellow in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her dissertation, tentatively titled “Towards a Language of Therapoetics” constructs a language of therapeutic recovery from trauma through investigations of the late nineteenth-century writings of Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Herman Melville, and Emily Dickinson.
American Literature from 1789 to 1900 | Literature, Medicine and Culture | Poetry and Poetics
BA English, The Ohio State University
MTS Theology and Ethics, The Methodist Theological School in Ohio
While working on my masters at the Methodist Theological Shool in Ohio, I studied the role of narrative (especially autobiography) in religious ethics. My primary focus was on stories of marginalization; however, I became acutely aware of the theme of finitude in many personal narratives. When I came to UNC, I knew I wanted to explore these themes from a new angle. Rather than focusing on religious narratives, I investigate how people tell stories about health and the role of religion in medicine for patients, providers, and healthcare systems.
At UNC, I have studied the significance of chapels (particularly “interfaith” or psychospiritual spaces) within hospitals. Also, I was the Study Coordinator for the Writing Diabetes Study, and I have written (with my collaborators) about the impact of writing as an intervention for people with chronic illness. Finally, my dissertation investigates the rhetorical history of neonatal medicine in order to reveal the influence of antecedent religious rhetoric on the development of this subfield and to demonstrate the convergence of religion and science in contemporary accounts of premature infants.
I conceive of my research as appealing to three audiences: 1) scholars of rhetoric, 2) scholars of religion, and 3) scholars and practitioners of medicine. Thus, my research falls within the broad scope of the Medical/Health Humanities. Finally, I am exploring an interdisciplinary [or transdisciplinary] approach to rhetorical research that enacts my commitment to feminist, intersectional values.
Literature, Medicine and Culture | Rhetoric, Composition and Literacy
2011, B.A. Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Cornell University
2012, M.A. History, Carnegie Mellon University
Mark Collins is a PhD student in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He works in the fields of contemporary American and multi-ethnic literature and women’s and gender studies. His academic interests include: feminist theory, science and technology studies, critical race theory, and cultural studies. Mark is currently working on his dissertation project, called “Nuclear Reproduction: Race, Gender, and Reproductive Control in US Cold War Speculative Fiction,” which explores the relationship between the discourses of nuclear warfare and reproduction in literary and cultural texts from the decades spanning the Cold War period.
African American Literature | Asian American Literature | Contemporary American Literature | Contemporary Multiethnic American Literature | Critical Race Studies | Critical Theory and Cultural Studies | Feminist Theory And Gender & Sexuality Studies | Latina / Latino Literature | Literature and Science | Literature, Medicine and Culture | Queer Theory | Science Fiction
2012, BA English (Honors), The George Washington University
I am a PhD candidate in English who specializes in nineteenth-century American literature and poetry and poetics. I am currently completing a dissertation entitled “American Contentment (and Its Discontents),” which stages a claim for the recuperation of contentment within literary studies through an engagement with American literature from the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.
At UNC, I have taught introductory composition courses and TA’d for Professor Thrailkill’s Literature, Medicine, and Culture course.
• “ ‘There Is No Miracle More Cruel Than This’: Read, Relaxation, and Maternal Agency in Plath’s Three Women” (Literature and Medicine 36.1: 2018)
• Hartsell Award for excellence in teaching first year composition, 2015
2014, BA English, Colgate University
Carlie Wetzel studies British literature from the long nineteenth century, focusing on elegiac poetry.
2011, BA English, Colby College
Michael J. Clark is a PhD candidate in Comparative Literature at UNC-Chapel Hill who specializes in Renaissance drama. In his dissertation, Michael examines how trust and distrust between patients and physicians are depicted in Italian, English, and French Renaissance comedy.
As a comparatist, Michael has studied Italian, Spanish, ancient Greek, Latin, Old English, and Irish, but his primary literatures are English and Italian. His research interests include Renaissance literature, the history of medicine, classical reception, performance studies, translation studies, and pedagogy.
At UNC, Michael’s teaching experience has been cross-disciplinary and has included Italian language courses, first-year composition courses, and introductory literature courses. In addition to these teaching responsibilities, Michael has served as a coach at the UNC Writing Center.
When not teaching, writing, or conducting research, Michael likes to travel and to sing.