Degrees

2022, BA English, Belmont University

2024, MA English, Wake Forest University

Bio

Holly (she/her/hers) is a Ph.D. student and Teaching Fellow in the Department of English and Comparative Literature, with a focus in Rhetoric, Composition, and Literacy. Her primary interests are in disability studies, the rhetoric of health and medicine (RHM), health humanities, and composition pedagogy.

Recently, Holly’s research has focused on the discursive construction of psychiatric diagnoses and neurodivergent identities. Her first refereed article, forthcoming in the Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies, investigates so-called “Aspergian” positionalities as ideal products of the technocapitalist dystopia in Margaret Atwood’s MaddAddam trilogy.

In composition studies, Holly focuses on writing transfer, writing in the disciplines (WID), and writing about writing (WAW). She has a particular interest in the interpersonal dynamics of writing instructors and students, with a focus on the impact of these dynamics on student perceptions of competence and confidence in writing tasks. Through her work as a Writing Center tutor in her Master’s program, Holly developed specialties in working with students who self-identified as neurodivergent and/or learning disabled. As a Teaching Fellow, Holly strives to use those pedagogical strategies to create learning opportunities that are accessible and equitable for a diverse population of students.

Publications:

• Thompson, Holly. “‘Demi-autistic, genetically speaking’: Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake and the ‘Aspergian’ Loop.” Journal of Literary and Cultural Disability Studies. In press.

Awards

• Erika Lindemann Fellowship, 2025
• Gordon A. Melson Outstanding Master’s Student Award, Wake Forest University, 2024
• Richter Scholarship Travel Fund, Wake Forest University, 2023
• James and Sarah King Writing Award, Belmont University, 2022

Degrees

2024, Honors BA English Literature and Philosophy, Marquette University

Bio

Margarita Buitrago is a PhD student in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She focuses on Anglo-French-Iberian medieval literature and is especially interested in allegories and travel literature. Her research explores how the role of vernacular texts, history, translation, and visual culture shaped medieval transnational identities. 

In addition to medieval studies, Margarita is also interested in pedagogy, the digital humanities, and the history of the book. Currently, she works in writing center research and as an editorial assistant at the William Blake Archive. 

Publications:

(co-author) Eugenia Afinoguénova and Margarita Buitrago, “Child Refugees and the Transnational Iconographies of a Better Future During the Spanish Civil War, 1936-1939.” (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, forthcoming 2025).

Awards

• Doctoral Merit Fellowship, University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill (2024)
• Outstanding English Major Award, Marquette University Department of English (2024)
• Undergraduate Research Assistantship, Marquette University (2024)
• Honors Research Fellowship Award for Summer 2023, Marquette University Honors Program (2023)

Degrees

2019, B.A. English, Clemson University

2023, M.A. English, Wake Forest University

Bio

Jenny is a Ph.D. student in the Department of English and Comparative Literature at UNC-Chapel Hill. Her scholarship focuses on the rhetoric of health and medicine and bodily rhetoric. She is particularly interested in the language surrounding the treatment of mental and physical health disorders affecting women and the related ways in which women use writing to assert autonomy in literary and popular culture contexts.

Jenny worked as a writing tutor for many years while completing her undergraduate and master’s degrees in English, and now she enjoys helping college students hone their reading and writing skills as an English 105 teaching fellow.

Awards

Graduate Assistant of the Year Award, Wake Forest University Writing Center, 2023

Curriculum Vitae / Resume

Degrees

2018, BA English, Nicholls State University

2022, MA English, University of New Orleans

Bio

Shelby is a doctoral student and teaching fellow focusing in Rhetoric and Composition. Primarily, Shelby develops interdisciplinary research on writing transfer with an emphasis on first-year composition pedagogy. Her work on transfer-focused pedagogies thus far has intersected methodologically with other fields of interest such as the Digital and Health Humanities.

Years of teaching writing in different learning settings led to Shelby’s interest in writing transfer. As a teaching fellow for the ECL Writing Program, she designs her first-year course with a transfer objective to prepare her students for future research and writing demands.

Shelby’s other scholarly interests include basic writing, academic research writing, instructional design, knowledge and skill retention, memory processes, metacognition, composition lexicon, and neuro terminologies (e.g., neuroeducation and neuropedagogy).

Curriculum Vitae / Resume

Degrees

BA English, Andrews University

MA English, University of Oklahoma

Bio

I am currently interested in video game studies, digital rhetoric, and digitial composition pedagogy. My previous work looked at the horror video game Amnesia: The Dark Descent and its uses of virtual spaces to generate affects of fear and anxiety. Currently, I’m interested in studying competitive e-sports titles such as League of Legends and Starcraft II to understand how their fast-paced forms of gameplay require and generate new forms of literacies.

Publications:

Lee, Charles (2021), ‘Running scared: Fear and Space in Amnesia: The Dark
Descent’, Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds, 13:1, pp. 93–112.

Degrees

BA English, Clemson University

Bio

Matt Duncan is a second-year PhD student and teaching fellow at the UNC Chapel Hill. His research explores the unique role of digital tools in shaping the composition classroom, with an emphasis on a low-bridge approach to the application of technology in writing curriculum. He is also Co-Editor of Fiction for Carolina Quarterly and is a Carolina Digital Humanities Initiative Project Management Fellow.

Awards

• CDHI Project Management Fellowship
• CDHI Recruitment Fellowship
• Fred W. Shilstone Memorial Award
• Lucy K. Rollins Award

Curriculum Vitae / Resume