Derek Royal - Curriculum Vitae

Education

2000: Ph.D., English, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana
1994: M.A., English, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana
1986: B.A., Psychology and English, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Charlotte,
North Carolina

Professional Experience

2007-present:     Associate Professor of English, Texas A&M University-Commerce
2006-2008:        Director of Liberal Studies, Texas A&M University-Commerce
2003-2007:        Assistant Professor of English, Texas A&M University-Commerce
2001-2003:        Assistant Professor of English, Prairie View A&M University
1999-2001:        Assistant Professor of English, North Georgia College and State University

Research Interests

Twentieth-Century and Contemporary American Literature
American Multi-Ethnic Literature and Theory
Comics and Graphic Narrative
Narrative Theory

Publications (When available, click the hyperlink for full text.)

Monographs and Collections

Philip Roth: New Perspectives on an American Author. Editor and contributor. Praeger-Greenwood, 2005.

The Hernandez Brothers: Conversations. University Press of Mississippi. Signed contract. (Projected publication date, 2010)

Unfinalized Moments: Essays in the Development of Contemporary Jewish American Fiction. Editor and contributor. Purdue University Press. Signed contract. (Projected publication date, 2011)

More Than Jewish Mischief: Narrating Subjectivity in Philip Roth’s Later Fiction. In progress. Based on preliminary chapters, Ohio State University Press has requested to review entire manuscript for publication.

Essays in Peer Reviewed Journals

*Under Submission*
	“Sequential Sketches of Ethnic Identity: Will Eisner’s A Contract with God as Graphic Cycle.” Submitted to Studies in Comics. (31 page manuscript)
	“Narrating a Lay of the Land: Space and the Ethnic Subject in Ben Katchor’s The Jew of New York.” Preparing for publication in a special issue of College Literature.
	“Comedy beyond the Pale: Working the Jewish in Larry David’s Curb Your Enthusiasm.” Preparing for publication in Journal of Popular Film and Television.
*In Print or Forthcoming*
	“The Dream of Cultural Documentation: Rereading the Aesthetic in Charles Brockden Brown’s Wieland.” The Midwest Quarterly: A Journal of Contemporary Thought. Forthcoming. (15 page manuscript)
	“Falsifying the Fragments: Narratological Uses of the Mockumentary in Woody Allen’s Husbands and Wives and Sweet and Lowdown.” Post Script: Essays in Film and the Humanities. Forthcoming 2009. (17 page manuscript)
	“Meddling with ‘hifalut’n foolishness’: Capturing Mark Twain in Recent Comics.” The Mark Twain Annual 7 (2009): 22-51.
	“What to Make of Roth’s Indignation; Or, Serious in the Fifties.” Philip Roth Studies 5.1 (2009): 125-33.
	“To Be Continued...: Serialization and Its Discontent in the Recent Comics of Gilbert Hernandez.” International Journal of Comic Art. 11.1 (2009): 262-80.
	“Sequential Poe-try: Recent Graphic Narrative Adaptations of Poe.” Poe Studies/Dark Romanticism 39-40 (2007-2008): 55-67.
	“Coloring America: Multi-Ethnic Engagements with Graphic Narrative.” MELUS 32.3 (2007): 7-22.
	“Fragmenting the Post-Holocaust Subject: The Uses of the Short-Story Cycle in Thane Rosenbaum’s Elijah Visible.” Modern Jewish Studies/Yiddish 14.4 (2006). 72-89.
	“Plotting the Frames of Subjectivity: Identity, Death, and Narrative in Philip Roth’s The Human Stain. Contemporary Literature 47 (2006): 114-40.
	“Philip Roth’s America” Studies in American Jewish Literature 23 (2004): ix-xii.
	“Literary Genre as Ethnic Resistance in Maxine Hong Kingston’s Tripmaster Monkey.” MELUS 29.2 (2004): 141-56.
	“Unfinalized Moments in Contemporary Jewish American Narrative.” Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 22 (2004): 1-11.
	“Eruptions of Performance: Hank Morgan and the Business of Politics.” The Midwest Quarterly: A Journal of Contemporary Thought 45 (2003): 11-33.
	“An Absent Presence: The Rewriting of Hawthorne’s Narratology in John Updike’s S.” Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction 44 (2002): 73-85.
	“The Clinician As Enslaver: Pudd'nhead Wilson and the Rationalization of Identity.” Texas Studies in Literature and Language 44 (2002): 414-31.
	“Postmodern Jewish Identity in Philip Roth’s The Counterlife.” Modern Fiction Studies 48.2 (2002): 422-43.
	“Fictional Realms of Possibility: Reimagining the Ethnic Subject in Philip Roth’s American Pastoral.” Studies in American Jewish Literature 20 (2001): 1-16.
	“Camusian Existentialism in Arthur Miller’s After the Fall.” Modern Drama 43 (2000): 192-203.
	“Texts, Lives, and Bellybuttons: Philip Roth’s Operation Shylock and the Renegotiation of Subjectivity.” Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 19 (2000): 48-65.
	“Terrible Dreams of Creative Power: The Question of No. 44.” Studies in the Novel 31 (1999): 44-59.
	“Shakespeare's Kingly Mirror: Figuring the Chorus in Olivier's and Branagh's Henry V.” Literature/Film Quarterly 25 (1997): 104-110.
	“Forgetting of Pictures Over a Long Retention Interval in Young and Older Adults.” (with Denise C. Park, William Dudley, and Roger Morrell) Psychology and Aging 3.1 (1988): 94-95.

Essays in Edited Book Collections

*Invited Contributions in Progress*
	“Narrating the Stuff of Dreams: Autobiography and Narrative Authority in Kim Deitch’s Recent Comics.” Drawing from Life: Memory and Subjectivity in Comic Art. Ed. Jane Tolmie. Publisher forthcoming.
	“Drawing Attention: Comics as a Means of Approaching U.S. Cultural Diversity.” Teaching Graphic Narratives: Critical Approaches. Ed. Lan Dong. Publisher forthcoming.
	“Exhuming the Horror of Waking: The Actual as a Comic Retelling of James’s ‘The Beast in the Jungle.’” Saul Bellow as Comic Writer. Ed. Ben Siegel and Elaine B. Safer. Publisher forthcoming.
	“Of Time and the Liver: Portnoy’s Complaint and the ‘Problem’ of Canonicity.” Re-assessing the Contemporary Canon: From Joseph Conrad to Zadie Smith. Ed. David Simmons and Nicola Allen. Rodopi. Forthcoming.
	“(Real) Life, in Pictures: The Autobiographic Fiction of Will Eisner.” Graphic Subjects: Critical Essays on Autobiography and Graphic Novels. Ed. Michael Chaney. University of Wisconsin Press. Forthcoming.
*In Print or Forthcoming*
	“Plots against America: Language and the Comedy of Conspiracy in Philip Roth’s Early Fiction.” Playful Seriousness: Philip Roth as Comic Writer. Ed. Jay L. Halio and Ben Siegel. University of Delaware Press. Forthcoming 2010. (22 page manuscript)
	“Plotting a Way Home: The Jewish American Novel.” A Companion to the American Novel. Ed. Alfred Bendixen. Wiley-Blackwell. Forthcoming 2009. (24 page manuscript)
	“Contesting the Historical Pastoral in Philip Roth’s American Trilogy.” American Fiction of the 1990s. Ed. Jay Prosser. London: Routledge, 2008. 121-34.
	“Portnoy’s Neglected Siblings: A Case for Postmodern Jewish American Literary Studies.” Complicating Constructions: Race, Ethnicity, and Hybridity in American Texts. Ed. David S. Goldstein and Audrey Thacker. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2007. 250-69.
	“Roth, Literary Influence, and Postmodernism.” The Cambridge Companion to Philip Roth. Ed. Timothy Parrish. Cambridge University Press, 2007. 22-34.
	“Texts, Lives, and Bellybuttons: Philip Roth’s Operation Shylock and the Renegotiation of Subjectivity.” Turning Up the Flame: Philip Roth’s Later Novels. Ed. Jay L. Halio and Ben Siegel. University of Delaware Press, 2005. 68-91. (Reprint from Shofar 19.1 [2000]: 48-65)
	“Fouling Out the American Pastoral: Rereading Philip Roth’s The Great American Novel.” Upon Further Review: Sports in American Literature. Eds. Michael Cocchiarale and Scott D. Emmert. Westport, CT: Praeger-Greenwood, 2004. 157-68.
	“Rebel with a Cause: Albert Camus and the Politics of Celebrity.” Car Crash Culture. Ed. Mikita Brottman. Ed. Mikita Brottman. New York: Palgrave, 2001. 285-303.
Published Panel Discussions
	“Zuckerman Unsound?: A Roundtable Discussion on Philip Roth’s Exit Ghost.” Ed. Derek Parker Royal. Philip Roth Studies 5 (2009): 3-30. (With Alan Cooper; Bernard F. Rodgers, Jr.; Michael Rothberg; Ruth Knafo Setton; and Debra Shostak)
	“Grave Commentary: A Roundtable Discussion on Everyman.” Ed. Derek Parker Royal and Bernard F. Rodgers, Jr. Philip Roth Studies 3 (2007): 3-24. (With David Brauner; Bernard F. Rodgers, Jr.; Mark Shechner; and Debra Shostak)
Forewords
	“Foreword; Or, Reading within the Gutter.” Foreword for Approaches to Multicultural Comics: From Zap! to Blue Beetle. Ed. Frederick Luis Aldama. University of Texas Press. Forthcoming 2009. (3 page manuscript)
	“Foreword: Of Panels and Patrons.” Foreword for Graphic Novels in Libraries and Archives: Ideas and Issues. Ed. Robert Weiner. McFarland. Forthcoming 2010. (3 page manuscript)

Bibliographic Scholarship

Philip Roth: An Annotated Bibliography, 1984-2005. Scarecrow Press. Signed contract. (Projected publication date, 2011)

“Woody Allen: A Selcted Bibliography.” Post Script: Essays in Film and the Humanities. Forthcoming 2009.

“Philip Roth: A Bibliography of the Criticism, 1994-2003.” Studies in American Jewish Literature 23 (2004): 145-59.

“Contemporary Jewish American Narrative: A Selected Bibliography.” Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 22.3 (2004): 121-30.

“Annual Bibliography, Philip Roth Criticism and Resources.” Published annually in the fall issues of Philip Roth Studies, 2004-present.

Philip Roth: A Bibliography and Research Guide. 2004. Dept. of Literature and Languages, Texas A&M University-Commerce.

Interviews

	Interview with Kim Deitch. In progress, with plans to submit to Contemporary Literature.
	“Palomar and Beyond: An Interview with Gilbert Hernandez.” MELUS 32.3 (2007): 221-46.
	“Tugging at Jewish Weeds: An Interview with Steve Stern.” MELUS 32.1 (2007): 139-61.
	“An Interview with Thane Rosenbaum.” Contemporary Literature 48 (2007): 1-28.
	“The Blood before the Stain: An Interview with Joel Rapp.” Philip Roth Studies 2.1 (2006): 3-11.

Book Reviews

	Review essay on The Jewish Graphic Novel, edited by Samantha Baskind and Ranen Omer-Sherman; Jews and American Comics: An Illustrated History of an American Art Form, edited by Paul Buhle; Disguised as Clark Kent: Jews, Comics, and the Creation of the Superhero I, by Danny Fingeroth; From Krakow to Krypton: Jews and Comic Books, by Arie Kaplan; and Up, Up, and Oy Vey!: How Jewish History, Culture, and Values Shaped the Comic Book Superhero, by Simcha Weinstein. MELUS. Forthcoming.
	Review of A Comics Studies Reader, edited by Jeet Heer and Kent Worcester. Studies in American Humor. Forthcoming.
	Review essay on 500 Essential Graphic Novels: The Ultimate Gide, by Gene Kannenberg; and The Rough Guide to Graphic Novels, by Danny Fingeroth; The 101 Best Graphic Novels, by Stephen Weiner; and Graphic Novels: Everything You Need to Know, by Paul Gravett. International Journal of Comic Art. Forthcoming.
	Review of Reading Comics and What They Mean, by Douglas Wolk, and This Book Contains Graphic Language: Comics as Literature, by Rocco Versaci. ImageTexT: Interdisciplinary Comics Studies. Forthcoming.
	Review of Two Covenants: Representations of Southern Jewishness by Eliza R. L. McGraw. The Journal of Southern History 72 (2007): 727-28.
	Review of Philip Roth — Countertexts, Counterlives by Debra Shostak. Studies in American Jewish Literature 24 (2005): 222-24.
	Review of Up Society’s Ass, Copper!: Rereading Philip Roth by Mark Shechner. Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 24.1 (2005): 152-55.
	Review of The Visionary Moment: A Postmodern Critique by Paul Maltby. Symplokē: A Journal for the Intermingling of Literary, Cultural and Theoretical Scholarship 10.1-2 (2002): 208-10.
	Review of Woody Allen: A Casebook by Kimball King, ed. Film Criticism 26.3 (2002): 77-80.
	Review of Latent Destinies: Cultural Paranoia and Contemporary U.S. Narrative by Patrick O’Donnell. Symplokē: A Journal for the Intermingling of Literary, Cultural and Theoretical Scholarship 9.1-2 (2002): 195-97.
	Review of The Soup Has Many Eyes: From Shtetl to Chicago – A Memoir of One Family’s Journey through History by Joann Rose Leonard. Studies in American Jewish Literature, 19 (2000): 82-83.

Encyclopedic Entries

	Blackwell Encyclopedia of Twentieth Century American Fiction. Ed. Patrick O’Donnell, Justus Nieland , and David Madden. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. Forthcoming. Entry on Philip Roth.
	Student’s Encyclopedia of Great American Literary Characters. Ed. Matthew J. Bruccoli, Judith S. Baughman, and Charles Brower. New York: Facts on File, 2008. Entries on “Wittman Ah Sing (Tripmaster Monkey),” “David Shearl (Call It Sleep),” and “Henry Bech (Bech: A Book).”
	Encyclopedia of Jewish American Literature. Ed. Gloria Cronin and Alan Berger. New York: Facts on File, 2009. Entries on Philip Roth, Steve Stern, American Pastoral, and Lazar Malkin Enters Heaven.
	Companion to the American Novel. Ed. Abby H. P. Werlock. New York: Facts on File, 2006. Entries on Philip Roth’s American Trilogy, The Plot Against America, Portnoy’s Complaint, and Sabbath’s Theater.
	The Literary Encyclopedia. Ed. Robert Clark. Literary Dictionary Co. (2005). Entry on Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America.
	Encyclopedia of American Literature. Ed. Steven R. Serafin. New York: Continuum, 1999. “Sholem Asch” (49-50), “E. M. Broner”(126-27), “Daniel Fuchs” (410-11), “Herbert Gold” (452-53), “John Hawkes” (494-95), “Mark Helprin” (509), “Cynthia Ozick” (861-62), “Chaim Potok” (910), “Isaac Bashevis Singer” (1047-48), “John Updike” (1166-67).

Editorial Experience

Journals and Other Publications Edited
	2009-present: Editor of all Philip Roth entries, The Literary Encyclopedia.
	2004-present: Executive Editor and Founder, Philip Roth Studies. Published by the Purdue University Press. Washington, D.C.
	2002-2004: Editor and Founder, The Philip Roth Society Newsletter. Commerce, Texas.
	1998: Editorial Assistant at Kappa Delta Pi, an International Honor Society in Education. West Lafayette, Indiana. Publications edited: The Educational Forum, Kappa Delta Pi Record, New Teacher Advocate.
	1989-1990: Editorial Intern at Dissent magazine. New York, New York.
Guest-Edited Journal Issues
	2009-present: Guest Editor (along with Christopher Gonzales), ImageTexT: Interdisciplinary Comics Studies. Devoted the the Hernandez brothers. Projected publication, 2010.
	2008 -present: Guest Editor, Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies. Devoted to Jewish comics and graphic novels. In progress.
	2005-present: Guest Editor, Post Script: Essays in Film and the Humanities. Devoted to Woody Allen’s films after 1990. Projected publication, 2010.
	2005-2007: Guest Editor, MELUS 32.3 (2007). Devoted to multi-ethnic American graphic narrative.
	2003-2004: Guest Editor, Studies in American Jewish Literature 23 ( 2004 ). Devoted to images of America in Philip Roth’s recent fiction.
	2002-2004: Guest Editor, special issue of Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies 22.3 ( 2004 ). Devoted to contemporary Jewish American fiction.
Editorial Board Membership
	2008-present: Editorial Board member, ANQ: A Quarterly Journal of Short Articles, Notes, and Reviews.
	2008-present: Editorial Board member, International Journal of Comic Art.
	2008-present: Editorial Board member, Saul Bellow Journal.
	2008-present: Editorial Board member, MELUS: The Journal of the Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States.
	2007-present: Editorial Board member, ImageTexT: Interdisciplinary Comics Studies.
	2005-present: Editorial Board member, Shofar: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Jewish Studies.
	2005-present: Editorial Board member, Studies in American Jewish Literature.

Conference Papers

	“(Real) Life, in Pictures: Creating Counterselves in the Autobiographic Fiction of Will Eisner.” To be presented at the Modern Language Association Convention. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. December 2009.
	“Bringing It All Back Home?: Placing Indignation within Roth's Oeuvre.” American Literature Association Conference. Boston, Massachuetts. May 2009.
	“What a Body of Work!: Sexuality and the Latino Subject in Jaime Hernandez’s Recent Comics.” To be presented at the Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS) Conference. Spokane, Washington. April 2009.
	“More Than One Way to Skin a Cat: The Function of Metadiegetic Narrative in the Works of Kim Deitch.” To be presented at the Southwest/Texas Regional Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association. Albuquerque, New Mexico. February 2009.
	“Amazing Adventures in Adaptation: Constructing History in Michael Chabon's Escapist Comics.” Modern Language Association Convention. San Francisco, California. December 2008.
	“‘Other’ Illustrations: Using Graphic Narrative to Teach Ethnoracial Literature.” Modern Language Association Convention. San Francisco, California. December 2008.
	“Detecting Discourse: Adaptation and Narrative Voice in City of Glass: The Graphic Novel.” American Literature Association Conference. San Francisco, California. May 2008.
	“To Be Continued...: Serialization and Its Discontent in the Graphic Narrative of Gilbert Hernandez.” International Conference on Narrative. Austin, Texas. May 2008.
	“Drawing Attention or Slumming in the Gutters?: Representing the Ethnic Other in Jessica Abel’s La Perdida and Mark Kalesniko’s Mail Order Bride.” Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS) Conference. Columbus, Ohio. March 2008.
	“Reading between the (Panty) Lines: The Body as Ethnographic Text in Jaime Hernandez’s Recent Narratives.” University of Florida Conference on Comics. Gainesville, Florida. March 2008.
	“Comic(s) Relief?: Capturing Mark Twain in Recent Graphic Narrative.” Southwest/Texas Regional Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association Conference. Albuquerque, New Mexico. February 2008.
	“Narrating a Lay of the Land: Space and the Ethnic Subject in Ben Katchor’s The Jew of New York.” Modern Language Association Convention. Chicago, Illinois. December 2007.
	“Comedy Beyond the Pale: ‘Working’ the Jewish in Curb Your Enthusiasm.” Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS) Conference. Fresno, California. March 2007.
	“What’s in a Name?; or, Gutter Talk: The Problem of Critical Language in the Study of Comics.” Southwest/Texas Regional Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association Conference. Albuquerque, New Mexico. February 2007.
	“Falsifying the Fragments: Narratological Uses of the Mockumentary in Woody Allen’s Films.” Film & History Conference: The Documentary Tradition. Dallas, Texas. November 2006.
	“Cycling the Schlemiel: Uses of the Short-Story Cycle in Gerald Shapiro’s Bad Jews and Other Stories.” American Literature Association Conference. San Francisco, California. May 2006.
	“There Goes the Neighborhood: Recycling Ethnic Tensions in Will Eisner’s Dropsie Avenue.” Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS) Conference. Boca Raton, Florida. April 2006.
	“Composite Sketches of Ethnic Identity: Will Eisner’s A Contract with God as Cycle Narrative.” Southwest/Texas Regional Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association Conference. Albuquerque, New Mexico. February 2006.
	“(Re)cycling Tradition: Uses of the Short-Story Cycle in Recent Jewish American Fiction.” Modern Language Association Convention. Washington, D.C. December 2005.
	“What Nathan Knew; or, Narrative Secrets in The Human Stain.” American Literature Association’s Jewish American & Holocaust Literature Conference. Boca Raton, Florida. October 2005.
	“Structuring Post-Holocaust Identity: Thane Rosenbaum's Elijah Visible as Short-Story Cycle.” American Literature Association Conference. Boston, Massachusetts. May 2005.
	“Toward a Workable Futility: Uses of Eastern Europe in Thane Rosenbaum’s Second Hand Smoke.” American Literature Association Conference. Boston, Massachusetts. May 2005.
	“Lost, in a Sense: Traumatic Fragmentation in Thane Rosenbaum’s Elijah Visible.” Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS) Conference. Chicago, Illinois. April 2005.
	“Philip Roth as Science Fiction Writer?: Negotiating (Alternate) Histories in The Plot Against America.” Southwest/Texas Regional Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association Conference. Albuquerque, New Mexico. February 2005.
	“Plotting America in The Plot Against America.” To be presented at the American Literature Association’s Jewish American & Holocaust Literature Conference. Boca Raton, Florida. October 2003.
	“Why Philip Roth Will Probably Never Be Read in Oprah’s Book Club (and Why That May Not Be Such a Bad Thing).” American Literature Association Conference. San Francisco, California. May 2004.
	“Gentile on My Mind; or, Bech, a Bulba?” Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS) Conference. San Antonio, Texas. March 2004.
	“Ethnoracial Constructions in Philip Roth's American Trilogy.” Modern Language Association Convention. San Diego, California. December 2003.
	“Fouling out the Pastoral in Philip Roth's and Bernard Malamud's Baseball Novels.” American Literature Association’s Jewish American & Holocaust Literature Conference. Boca Raton, Florida. October 2003.
	“But Some of My Best Friends Are…: The Place of Jewish American Literature in Multi-Ethnic Literary Studies.” American Literature Association Conference. Cambridge, Massachusetts. May 2003.
	“Fragmented Home-Place in Thane Rosenbaum’s Second Hand Smoke.” Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS) Conference. Boca Raton, Florida. April 2003.
	“Framing the Ethnic Subject in Philip Roth's The Human Stain.” American Literature Association’s Jewish American & Holocaust Literature Conference. Boca Raton, Florida. October 2002.
	“Steve Stern, Thane Rosenbaum, and the Dialects of Cultural Memory.” American Literature Association Conference. Long Beach, California. May-June 2002.
	“Creating Narrative Golems in Michael Chabon's The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay.” American Literature Association Conference. Long Beach, California. May-June 2002.
	“Literary Genre as Ethnic Resistance in Maxine Hong Kingston’s Tripmaster Monkey.” Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS) Annual Conference. Seattle, Washington. April 2002.
	“The Burdens of Cultural Memory: Thane Rosenbaum and the Weight of Post-Holocaust Writing.” Twentieth-Century Literature Conference. Louisville, Kentucky. February 2002.
	“Hemorrhaging Memories: Steve Stern and the Fabula of Return.” Jewish American & Holocaust Literature Annual Conference. Boca Raton, Florida. October 2001.
	“The Uses of Memory in The Joy Luck Club.” Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS) Annual Conference. Knoxville, Tennessee. March 2001.
	“Engendering Cultural Memory: Ethnicity, Gender, and Paternal Relationships in Philip Roth’s Patrimony.” Annual Conference on Film and Literature. Tallahassee, Florida. February, 2001.
	“Deconstructing Harry and the Disintegration of Identity.” The West Georgia University’s International Conference in Literature and the Visual Arts. Atlanta, Georgia. November, 2000.
	“Fictional Realms of Possibility: Reimagining the Subject in Philip Roth’s American Pastoral.” Annual Conference on Film and Literature. Tallahassee, Florida. January, 2000.
	“Eruptions of Performance: Hank Morgan and the Business of Politics.” The West Georgia University’s International Conference in Literature and the Visual Arts. Atlanta, Georgia. November, 1999.
	“The Romance of War in Kenneth Branagh’s Henry V.” Annual Conference on Film and Literature. Tallahassee, Florida. January, 1999.
	“The Texts That Bind: Philip Roth, Claire Bloom, and the Autobiographical Impulse.” Annual Conference of the Midwest Modern Language Association. St. Louis, Missouri. November, 1998.
	“The Construction of Maleness in Philip Roth’s Middle Fiction." Twentieth-Century Literature Conference. Louisville, Kentucky. February 1998.
	“Idol Words: Cynthia Ozick and the Construction of a Postmodern Jewish Ethnicity.” American Comparative Literature Association Annual Conference. South Bend, Indiana. April 1996.
	“Portnoy’s Neglected Siblings: The Case for Postmodern Jewish American Literary Studies.” Society for the Study of Multi-Ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS) Annual Conference. Greensboro, North Carolina. April 1996.
	“An Absent Presence: The Rewriting of Hawthorne’s Narratology in John Updike’s S.” Twentieth-Century Literature Conference. Louisville, Kentucky. February 1996.
	“Texts, Lives, and Bellybuttons: Philip Roth’s Operation Shylock and the Renegotiation of Subjectivity.” Twentieth-Century Literature Conference. Louisville, Kentucky. February 1995.
	“Mark Twain and Politics of Authority: The Example of Pudd’nhead Wilson.” Popular Culture and American Culture Associations’ Annual Conference. Chicago, Illinois. April, 1994.
	“The Centripetal and Centrifugal Search for Identity in Henry Roth’s Call It Sleep and Philip Roth’s Goodbye, Columbus.” Popular Culture and American Culture Associations’ Annual Conference. New Orleans, Louisiana. April, 1993.
	“Identity in Twentieth-Century Jewish American Literature.” American Studies Symposium on Race and Ethnicity in America. Purdue University, March, 1993.
	“Literary Terms of the Cultural Cold War: Sartre, Camus, and the American Intelligentsia.” Popular Culture and American Culture Associations’ Annual Conference. Louisville, Kentucky. March 1992.

Invited Lectures

	“Drawing Attention: Comics as a Means of Approaching U.S. Cultural Diversity.” Engaged Citizenship Common Experience Speakers Series. University of Illinois at Springfield. November 2009.
	“Philip Roth: Jewish American Novelist?” Philip and Muriel Berman Center Lecture Series. Lehigh University, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. October 2006.
	“Philip Roth’s American Pastoral.” Nextbook/American Library Association’s Jewish Literature Discussion Series. Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas. October 2006.
	“Philip Roth’s Ambiguous Pastoral.” Jewish Studies Lecture and Discussion Series, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana. April 1998.

Academic Honors and Grants

	H. M. Lafferty Distinguished Faculty Award for Scholarship and Creative Activity – Texas A&M University-Commerce, 2008
	Faculty Research Enhancement Grant – Graduate School, Texas A&M University-Commerce, 2007-2008
	H. M. Lafferty Distinguished Faculty Award for Scholarship and Creative Activity – Texas A&M University-Commerce, 2006
	Texas A&M University-Commerce’s nominee for the Council of Graduate School’s Gustave O. Alt Award for a Book in the Humanities, 2006
	Faculty Research Enhancement Grant – Graduate School, Texas A&M University-Commerce, 2005-2006
	Graduate Studies and Research Mini-Grant, Texas A&M University-Commerce, 2004 (a total of three individual mini-grants)
	Purdue University’s Nominee for the Midwest Association of Graduate Schools Distinguished Master’s Thesis Award, 1995
	UNCC Psychology Department’s Outstanding Senior Award, 1986

Teaching Experience

2003-present: Texas A&M University-Commerce
2001-2003: Prairie View A&M University
1998-2001: North Georgia College and State University
1992-1998: Purdue University

Texas A&M University-Commerce (including online and distance education classes)

Graduate courses taught:

Recent American Fiction, Contemporary Literature, Multicultural Literature and Languages, Modern American Literature, American Literary Realism, American Renaissance, African American Literature, Race/Ethnicity and Comics, Contemporary American Drama, Narrative Theory, Bibliography and Methods of Research, as well as advanced seminars on Philip Roth, Mark Twain, and Nathaniel Hawthorne

Undergraduate courses taught:

Survey of American Literature II; The American Novel after WW I; The American Novel before WW I; African American Literature; Multi-Ethnic American Literature; Literary and Research Methods; Comics, Comix, and Graphic Novels; American Ethnicity through Comics; Introduction to Literature; Written Argument and Research; College Writing and Reading; Introduction to College Reading and Writing

Prairie View A&M University.

Courses taught:
	The Novel, American Literature I, Advanced Composition, English Composition I & II

North Georgia College and State University
Courses taught:
	Modern and Contemporary American Literature, American Literature II, World Literature II, Introduction to Film Studies, Literary Research and Writing, English Composition I & II


Purdue University
Courses taught:
	Great American Books, The Movies (introduction to film), Science Fiction and Fantasy, Sports and Literature, Composition I & II

Academic Service

National and International Organizations
	2009-present. Member of Board of Directors, the John Updike Society. Elected position.
	2006-present. Member of Executive Board, Jewish American Literature Discussion Group (with standing sessions at the Modern Language Association Convention). Elected position
	2003-present. Membership Chair, Society for the Study of Multi-ethnic Literatures of the United States (MELUS). Elected position
	2003: Book exhibit coordinator, MELUS Conference. Boca Raton, Florida
	2002-2009: President and Founder of the Philip Roth Society
Texas A&M University-Commerce
*University and College*
	2008-present. University Research and Creative Activities Advisory Committee (university-wide committee)
	2007-present. Member of the Hearing Committee
	2007-2009. Chair of the Graduate Council’s Graduate Faculty, Research, and Instruction Committee
	2006-2009. Member of the Graduate Council. Elected position
	2005-present. Member of the Academic Appeals Committee
	2004-2005. Member of the William A. Owens Committee (planning committee for the 2005 William A. Owens Celebration)

*Department of Literature and Languages*
	2009-present. Member of the Workload Reduction Feasibility Committee.
	2008-2009. Chair of the Departmental Advisory Committee
	2007-2009. Member of the Scholarships Committee
	2006-2008. Member of the Graduate Committee
	2006-2007. Member of the Undergraduate Committee
	2006-2007. Member of the Department Head Search Committee
	2005-2006. Member of the Professional Development Committee
	2004-present. Co-founder and Co-sponsor of Junto, an organization of graduate student support and development
	2004-2005. Member of the Executive Committee
	2004-2005. Member of the Student Development Committee
	2004. Member of the Modern British Literature Search Committee,
	2003-2004. Member of the Undergraduate Recruitment Committee
	2003-2004. Member of the Curriculum Committee