Folklore Instructors | Grad Student Instructors and Interns
CORE FACULTY:
These faculty are full time Folklore faculty; they design the core courses and the program, the Ph.D. reading lists, write and grade comprehensive exam questions, and chair folklore graduate student committees.
NOTE: Faculty profiles, photos, course offerings, and publications are available on the University of Missouri website, www.missouri.edu, on departmental websites.
Elaine J. Lawless
Curators’ Distinguished Professor, English and Women’s and Gender Studies; Director, Folklore Program; Director, Center for Arts and Humanities; 2006 Elected President, American Folklore Society. Areas include: Women’s folklore, religious folklore and belief, narrative, domestic violence, performance studies, ethnographic writing.
John Miles Foley
Curators’ and Byler Professor, English and Classics. Director, Center for Studies in Oral Tradition; Editor, Oral Tradition; Director, Center for e-Research. Areas include: Oral Tradition, Beowulf, Chaucer, classics.
Sw. Anand Prahlad
Professor, English, Poetry, and Black Studies.
Areas include: African American folklore and poetry, film, creative writing, creative nonfiction, fetish, cultural diversity and academics. *On leave Fall 2009/Spring 2010*
Joanna Hearne
Assistant Professor, English. Areas include: Film studies, Native American studies and folklore, with research interests in Indigenous media, Western and documentary film genres, animation, early cinema and issues of ethnicity in film history and theory.
ASSOCIATE FACULTY:
These faculty regularly offer courses of particular interest to folklore students; cross-list their courses with English/Folklore Studies; and serve on graduate committees, often writing and grading exam questions for individual graduate students.
Robert "Bob" Baum
Associate Professor, Religious Studies. Areas include: African religious history, particularly West African prophetic movements; oral traditions, indigenous religions and Islam.
Richard "Chip" Callahan
Associate Professor, Religious Studies. Areas include: religious folklore and folklife, American religious culture, maritime studies, occupational cultures, New England, Appalachia, ethnographic history, haunting.
M. Heather Carver
Associate Professor, Performance Studies/Theater. Areas include: performance studies, authethography, autobiography, performative writing.
Karen Piper
Associate Professor, English. Areas include post-colonial theory, diasporic literature, creative nonfiction, environmental writing.
J. Sanford "Sandy" Rikoon
Professor, Rural Sociology. Areas include: rural culture, sustainable agriculture, material culture, rural life, poverty food security, intellectual property rights.
Kristin Schwain
Associate Professor, Art History and Archeology. Areas include: American art and culture, popular culture, material culture, American photography, material culture of religion, visual culture.
AFFILIATED FACULTY:
These faculty have expressed an interest in the Folklore Studies program, courses, and students. They regularly teach courses that may be of particular interest to our students.
Mamadou Badiane
Assistant Professor of Hispanic Studies, Romance Languages and Literatures. Areas include: Afro-Caribbean people and culture in literature, the poetics of Negrismo and Negritude, national identities, Creolite. Teaches courses in Spanish.
Vicki Carstens
Associate Professor, English. Areas include: linguistics, African languages and linguistics, Bantu, Noam Chomsky.
Juanamaria Cordones-Cook
Associate Professor of Spanish, Afro-Romance Languages and Literatures. Areas include: Spanish American literature and critical theory, Afro-hispanic and Afro-Cuban literature and poetry, visual culture, culture and politics, theatre and postcolonial identity.
John Evelev
Assistant Professor, English. Areas include: American literature and culture theory, travel narratives, popular culture, political culture, aesthetics, theatre and social crisis, New England, cultural geography.
Matthew Gordon
Associate Professor, English. Areas include: linguistics, socio-linguistics, phonology, slang, regional and social dialects.
April Langley
Assistant Professor, English and Black Studies. Areas include: Africana and American literature and poetry, post-colonial theory, black aesthetics, poetics and oral traditions.
Chris Okonkwo
Assistant Professor, English and Black Studies. Areas include: African and Africana literature, African diaspora, African American fiction, post-colonial theory.
Maureen Stanton
Assistant Professor, English. Areas include: Creative nonfiction, creative arts.
FOLKLORE INSTRUCTORS:
Lisa L. Higgins, Director, Missouri Folk Arts Program
Deborah Bailey, Folk Arts Specialist at the Missouri Folk Arts Program, program of MU’s Museum of Art and Archaeology and the Missouri Arts Council, supervisors of graduate student internships in public folklore. Lisa recieved her PhD from the University of Missouri in May 2008. Her research areas include: women’s oral narratives; festival; arts administration; and public arts policy. Debbie’s areas include: women’s religious traditions; material culture; and new immigrant and refugee arts. For information about the Missouri Folk Arts Program, see http://maa.missouri.edu/mfap/
LuAnne Roth
Instructor, English Department. Associate Editor, Center for eResearch. Areas include: American folklore and culture, foodways, film, material culture, feminist, postcolonial, and critical race theory.
Current Folklore and Oral Tradition
GRADUATE STUDENT INSTRUCTORS AND INTERNS:
NOTE: The University of Missouri offers a wide variety of teaching opportunities for graduate students in folklore, including teaching several different levels/courses in writing and composition, introductory folklore courses, and topics courses designed around their own particular interests. The following students currently teach folklore courses in the program or will be teaching them in the near future, including 1700 Introduction to Folklore Genres; 2700 Introduction to Folklore Fieldwork; and other topics courses as available.
Constance Bailey
Ph.D. student, 20th century African American literature and Folklore. Areas include literature of the African Diaspora, post-colonial literature, humor, and 19th century American literature.
Tahna Henson
MA recieved May 2008, Folklore. Areas include: folklore and deaf culture, performance studies, folklore and literature, ethnographic and creative nonfiction writing. Former intern at the Missouri Folk Arts Program. Tahna has worked as the Assistant to the Director of the Center for Arts and Humanities, has served as a videographer for the CAH, and will be teaching folklore courses in the future.
Holly Hobbs
Ph.D. student, Folklore. Managing Editor of the journal Oral Tradition. Has served as videographer for the Center for Arts and Humanities and coordinator for the Arts and Humanities digital editing lab and currently teaches film/videography/editing to other folklore students and interns. Research areas include: folk musics, hip hop, music and community development, film, and public sector folklore.
Darcy Holtgrave
Ph.D. student, Folklore. Areas include narrative studies, social justice, public sector folklore, ethnographic writing, and creative non-fiction. Video Intern, Center for Arts and Humanities, 2007-08; currently interning for the Missouri Folk Arts Program. Teaches undergraduate folklore courses, including Introduction to Folklore Fieldwork.
Shelley Ingram
ABD, Folklore and Literature. Regularly teaches several undergraduate folklore courses. Served as Program Director, Missouri Folklore Society Centennial Meeting, 2006. Also served as Book Review Editor, Journal of American Folklore, 2003-06. Areas include: southern folklore and culture, fiction, postcolonial theory, race theory.
MA/PhD, Folklore. Areas of interest include: recreational folklore, ethnographic fieldwork and writing, folklore and literature, electronic media, and environmental ethicsFolklore and ethnography.
Scott Mitchell
Ph.D. Candidate, Folklore. Regularly teaches several undergraduate folklore courses. Areas include: religion and belief, material culture, fiction, folklore and literature, oral tradition.Video Intern, Center for Arts and Humanities, 2007-08.
Willow Mullins
ABD, Folklore. Regularly teaches several undergraduate folklore courses. Has served as an Intern for the Missouri Folk Arts Program and as Assistant to the Director, Center for Arts and Humanities. Also served as an editor, Journal of American Folklore, 2005-06. Areas include: visual and material cultures, global indigenous media, postcolonial theory, and public sector folklore.
Peter Ramey
Ph.D. student, Folklore. Areas include: music, rap, hip-hop, oral tradition, oral poetry, slam poetry. Currently works with the Center for Studies in Oral Tradition and will be teaching folklore courses in the future.
Todd Richardson
Ph.D. candidate, Folklore and Literature. Areas include: native fiction, ethnographic writing, surrealism, folk music movement. Regularly teaches folklore courses.
Claire Schmidt
Ph.D. student, Folklore and Medieval Literature. Assistant to the Director of the Center for Arts and Humanities, 2007-08. Areas include: occupational folklore, humor, Midwestern folklore, folklore and literature, postcolonial theory, medieval literature and oral tradition. Currently teaching Intro to Folklore Genres.
Jennifer Spitulnik
Ph.D. student, Folklore. Areas include: personal narrative, bodylore, occupational folklore, vernacular art, performance studies, musical theater, gender, and sexuality.
