Education
Doctor of Philosophy
University of Missouri-Kansas City
Awards
Betsi Brooks Krumm Faculty Award – 2013
The Barstow School
Women’s and Gender Studies Research Grant – 2012
University of Missouri-Kansas City
Clinton H. Gates Faculty Grant – 2012
The Barstow School
Chancellor’s Doctoral Fellowship – 2009-2011
University of Missouri-Kansas City
Michael Schoenecke Travel Grant – 2010
PCA/ACA Conference
Interdisciplinary Doctoral Travel Grant – 2010
MAASA Conference
Clinton H. Gates Faculty Grant – 2009
The Barstow School
Clinton H. Gates Faculty Grant – 2007
The Barstow School
Semifinalist – 2007
International Filmmakers Screenwriting Competition
Crystal Field Award for Writing – 2005-2006
University of Missouri-Kansas City
Association of Writers and Writing Programs Award – 2005
University of Missouri-Kansas City representative
Barbara Stork Writing Award – 2004
University of Missouri-Kansas City
Gary William Barger Memorial Award for Writing – 2004
University of Missouri-Kansas City
Graduate Teaching Fellowship – 2004-2006
University of Missouri-Kansas City
Publications
“Mark X: Who Killed Huck Finn’s Father?” (2018), Review, American Literary Realism, Vol. 53, Number 3, Spring 2021.
“Mark Twain in Context” (2020), Review, American Literary Realism, Vol. 53, Number 2, Winter, 2021.
“Teaching Racial Boundaries: How Mark Twain’s Characters Expose Our “Mental Attitudes” about Race and Racism,” Mark Twain Annual, Vol. 18, 2020.
Mark Twain at the Gallows: Crime and Justice in his Western Writing, 1861-1873. MacFarland Publishing, 2020.
“The Life of Mark Twain: The Early Years, 1835-1871” (2018), Review, Mark Twain Annual, Vol. 16, 2018.
“Mark Twain, American Humorist” (2017), Review, American Literary Realism, Vol. 50, Number 3, Spring 2018.
All Things Twain: An Encyclopedia of Mark Twain’s World, forthcoming, Greenwood/ABC-CLIO. Contributor.
“Teaching Transatlantic Sensations,” Teaching Transatlanticism, Edinburgh University Press, (2015). A collaborative chapter with John Cyril Barton, Jennifer Phegley, and Kristin Huston.
“Beneath Mark Twain: Detecting Sensational Residues in Twain’s Early Writing,” Mark Twain Annual 12 (2014), Penn State Press.
“Mark Twain’s ‘Laura’: A Conflation of Western Gender Performance and Justice, 1863-1873,” Mark Twain Annual 9 (2011): 65-83.
“Between the Law and the Outlaw: Mark Twain’s Anti-Gallows Sentiment, 1861-1872,” Proceedings: The Image of the Outlaw in Literature, Media, and Society (2011): 266-273.
Style, Voice, & Mechanics: A Guide to Better Writing. The Barstow School, 2011. In collaboration with Mark Luce and Lindsay Zimmerman.
“The Fall Heard in Panama,” Directions, Spring 2008.
“The Devil’s Impala,” New Letters Literary Magazine, Vol. 71 No. 2, 2005.
“Sugar Creek,” Number One, Vol. 57, 2004.
“Bone-Cages and Sandals,” Number One, Vol. 56, 2003.