Courses taught from 1989 to the present, Howard University (1989-1992), University of Northern Colorado (1992-2003), and SUNY Brockport (2003-present):
Legacies of Slavery
Advanced Writing in the Discipline (graduate research methods)
After the Slave Narrative
Honors Composition
Captivity and Slavery in Early America
Senior Seminar: Pain and Plague
Senior Seminar: Madness and Pain
American Gothic
Early American Gothic
American Literature I (graduate and undergraduate)
Business Writing
Survey of American Literature
Introduction to Cultural Studies
Introduction to Literature
Introduction to Literary Analysis
Critical Approaches to Literature
Masterpieces of American Literature
Techniques of the Novel
African-American Literature
American Modernism and Postmodernism (separate graduate and undergraduate courses)
American Literature to 1865 (graduate)
Antiquity and the Classical Age
The Waste Land (course in background texts to this iconic poem)
Books:
The Multiple Worlds of Pynchon’s Mason & Dixon: Eighteenth-Century Contexts, Postmodern Observations, Ed. Boydell and Brewer, 2005. Paperback edition released Fall 2008.
Private Property: Charles Brockden Brown and the Gendered Economics of Virtue, University of Delaware Press, 1997.
Articles and Book Chapters:
“American Frontier Gothic,” Chapter in Cambridge Companion to American Gothic, ed. Jeffrey Weinstock, forthcoming 2017.
“Late Biography and Reception,” Chapter in Oxford Handbook to Charles Brockden Brown, ed. Philip Barnard and Stephen Shapiro, forthcoming 2017.
“Dr. Rush and Mr. Peale: The Figure of the Animal in Late Eighteenth-Century Medical Discourse,” in Early American Literature, 48.3 (Winter 2013): 641-670.
“The Nature and Culture of Species: Eighteenth-Century and Contemporary Views,” in What Are the Animals to Us? Approaches from Science, Religion, Folklore, Literature, and Art, ed. Dave Aftandilian, University of Tennessee Press, 2007. 95-110.
“Animal, Vegetable, Mineral: The Play of Species in Pynchon’s Mason & Dixon,” in Humans and Other Animals, ed. Frank Palmeri, Ashgate Press, 2006.
“Deb’s Dogs: Animals, Indians, and Postcolonial Desire in Brown’s Edgar Huntly. Early American Literature 39.3 (Fall 2004): 323-54.
“Sari, Sorry and the Vortex of History: Calendar Reform, Anachronism and Language Change in Mason & Dixon.” American Literary History, Spring 2000, Vol. 12.1- 2: 187-215.
“‘That High Magic to Low Puns’: Thomas Pynchon, Wit, and the Work of the Supernatural.” Rocky Mountain Review Vol. 54.1 (Spring 2000): 23-40.
“The Spirit of Trade: Olaudah Equiano’s Conversion, Legalism, and the Merchant’s Life.” African-American Review 32.4 (Winter 1998): 635-647.
“The Wrath of Ahab; or, Gene Roddenberry Meets Herman Melville,” Journal of American Culture 20.1 (Spring 1997): 43-46.
“Charles Brockden Brown’s Revenge Tragedy: Edgar Huntly and the Uses of Property,” Early American Literature 30.1: 51-70.
“Charles Brockden Brown and the Frontiers of Discourse.” In Frontier Gothic in America: Terror and Wonder at the Fronteir in American Literature. Book ed. by David Mogen, Scott P. Sanders, and Joanne B. Karpinski. Madison: FairleighDickinson UP; London and Toronto: Associated University Presses, 1993). 109-125.
“The Devil Sings the Blues: Heavy Metal, Gothic Fiction and ‘Postmodern’ Discourse.” Journal of Popular Culture 26.3 (Winter 1992): 151-164.
“Charles Brockden Brown’s Economics of Virtue,” Studies in the Humanities 18.2(Winter 1991): 165-79.
“Visible Tracks: Historical Method and Thomas Pynchon’s Vineland,” College Literature 19.1 (February 1992): 91-103.
Reviews:
Review of Charles Brockden Brown’s Revolution and the Birth of American Gothic, by Peter Kafer, Eighteenth-Century Fiction 18.3 (Spring 2006).
“Merely Extraordinary Beings,” Review essay of Andrew Miller’s Ingenious Pain for ebr. Vol. 10 (Fall 2001): online Sept. 1, 2001.
“Making the Rounds of History,” Review essay of Thomas Pynchon’s Mason & Dixon for ebr. Vol. 8 (Winter 98/99): online Nov. 2, 1998.
Review of The Romance of Real Life (a biography of Charles Brockden Brown), by Steven Watts, Studies in the Novel 28.1 (Spring 1996).
Review of Apparition in the Glass: Charles Brockden Brown’s American Gothic, by Bill Christopherson. Early American Literature 29.3 (Fall 1994).
Review of Narrating Discovery: The Romantic Explorer in American Literature, 1790- 1855, by Bruce Greenfield. Studies in the Novel 26.3 (Fall 1994).
Review of The Autonomous Male of Adam Smith, by Stewart Justman. Genre 26.2-3 (Summer/Fall 1993).
Review of From Sin to Salvation: Stories of Women’s Conversions, 1800 to the Present, by Virginia Lieson Brereton, and The Work of Self-Representation: Lyric Poetry in Colonial New England, by Ivy Schweitzer. Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature 12.1 (1993).
Review of Gothic Fiction/Gothic Form, by George Haggery. Genre 23.1 (Spring 1990).
1995-present only:
October 2013, “Intestinal Worms and the Natural Philosopher: Elizabeth Drinker,” The Revolutionary Atlantic: Acts of Alienation and Sedition, 1780-1830: Charles Brockden Brown Society Conference, Paris, France
October 2010, “Madness, Medicine, and the Body (Politic): Benjamin Rush,” Weird America: Charles Brockden Brown Society Conference, Pasadena, CA
May 2007, “Improving Idle Time: Charles Willson Peale, Benjamin Rush, and the Culture of the Animal,” Joint Conference of the Society for Early Americanists and the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture, Williamsburg and Jamestown, VA. Panel sponsored by the Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment.
March 2005, “Charles Willson Peale: Display, Natural History, Class,” Society for Early Americanists conference, Philadelphia, PA
December 2003, Chair of Charles Brockden Brown panel at Modern Language Association conference, San Diego, CA (organized, selected, and proposed panel)
March 2003, Chair of Charles Brockden Brown panel at Society of Early Americanists conference, Providence, RI (organized, selected, and proposed panel)
December 2002, “Captivity and Capital in Olaudah Equiano’s Interesting Narrative,” Modern Language Association conference, New York, NY
August 2002, “Race, Species, and Class: Charles Brockden Brown’s Transgressions,” New Frontiers in Early American Literature conference, hosted by University of Virginia E-Text Center, Charlottesville, VA
August 2002, Chaired Charles Brockden Brown panel at New Frontiers in Early American Literature conference, hosted by University of Virginia E-Text Center, Charlottesville, VA
April 2002, “New World Wonders: Thomas Pynchon’s Mason & Dixon,” American Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies, Colorado Springs, CO
November 2001, “Eighteenth-Century Taxonomy and the Place of Natural History,” Group for Early Modern Cultural Studies, Philadelphia, PA
August 2001, “Species-Crossing: Eighteenth-Century Views,” Nature in Legend and Story, Davis, California.
December 2000, “Toward a More Visible Future: Part-Time Faculty in the New Millennium,” Modern Language Association, Washington, DC.
February 2000, “You Can Never Be Too Rich or Too Thin: All-Consuming Images in Gourmet Cooking Magazines,” Far West Popular Culture/American Culture Conference, Las Vegas, Nevada.
October 1999, “Captivity and Capital in Olaudah Equiano’s Interesting Narrative,” Group for Early Modern Cultural Studies, Miami, Florida.
July 1999, “The Aesthetics of Trade and Spirit in Olaudah Equiano’s Interesting Life,” Colloquium on Early American Culture and History, Brunel University, Twickenham, England.
March 1999, “Leveling the Fields: A Commentary on Annette Kolodny’s Failing the Future,” Society for Early Americanists conference, Charleston, SC.
October 1998. Co-chair of the Charles Brockden Brown Bicentennial Conference in Philadelphia. Read all submissions of manuscripts (approx. 120) and helped to select 40 for the conference. Chaired the final session of the conference and contributed to summary remarks on the two days of papers.
December 1998, co-authored and co-presented with John Loftis, “Redrawing the Past: Anachronism, Direction, and What Might Have Happened in Mason & Dixon,” Modern Language Association, San Francisco, CA.
February 1998, “Canards, Canards, and Long Division: Language Loss and Lost Time in Mason & Dixon,” Twentieth-Century Literature Conference, Louisville, KY, February 1998.
December 1997, ” In the Eyes of the Law: Olaudah Equiano, The Life and the Juridical Self,” Modern Language Association, Toronto, Canada. *Due to a family health crisis, this paper was read at the meeting by someone else.
October 1997, Chair of Early American Literature session, Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association, Denver.
May 1997, “Teaching Early American Literature: Equiano, Print Culture & Authorship,” American Literature Association, Baltimore.
March 1997, “Transformation and Immortality: The Gods of Star Trek: The Next Generation and Deep Space 9, Popular Culture Association, San Antonio.
December 1995, “The Specter of Value: Equiano, Adam Smith, and the Cost of Living,” Modern Language Association convention, Chicago, IL
October 1995, “Specular fictions: Olaudah Equiano, Arthur Mervyn, and Enlightenment Individualism,” Rocky Mountain Modern Language Assocation convention, Spokane, WA.
May 1995, Panel Chair and commentary for “Aesthetics, Ideology, Early American Literature,” American Literature Association conference, Baltimore, MD,
April 1995, “The Wrath of Ahab; or Gene Roddenberry Meets Melville,” Popular Culture Association conference, Philadelphia, PA. I also chaired a Star Trek panel.
