The Quad

This special issue is to introduce to the A&S community and its friends those A&S faculty who are either new to UMKC and the College or who are new in the full-time positions they fill for the first time in AY 2011-2012. With a significant number of retirements during and after AY 2010-2011, a large number of vacancies occurred. In addition, pursuant to a campus commitment to reduce the number of part-time teaching positions, the College chose to convert a number of those to create full-time teaching positions for outstanding adjuncts in departments with growing enrollments. We welcome all of those whose stories and photos appear here and wish them well in their careers in A&S and at UMKC.

Muhammad N. Ahmad (Lecturer, Mathematics and Statistics) earned his Ph.D. in Mathematics from Kansas State University (KSU) in Summer-2011 with a dissertation titled “Cobordism Theory of Semifree Circle Actions on Complex N-Spin Manifolds.” In 2006, he was awarded the Outstanding Graduate Teaching Assistant Award in Academics by KSU. His doctoral work was in Topology and he worked in Algebra and Analysis and has publications in those areas. He has presented at and attended several national and international conferences in Mathematics. While a GTA at KSU, he taught College Algebra, Business Calculus, Calculus I-III, and Ordinary Differential Equations. Based on his consistently high teaching evaluations, he was hired as an Organizational GTA at KSU from 2007-2011. This semester (Fall-2011) he is enjoying teaching Calculus I-III at UMKC.

Robin L. Aupperle (Assistant Professor, Psychology) received her B.A. from Oklahoma State University and her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Kansas in 2009. She completed a clinical internship and a postdoctoral research fellowship at the University of California – San Diego (UCSD) and the VA San Diego Healthcare System. Her research combines neuropsychological and translational methods with functional neuroimaging to understand the development and treatment of anxiety disorders and posttraumatic stress disorder. Of particular interest is the relation between anxiety and emotional decision-making as well as the identification of novel treatments based on neuropsychological perspectives.

Paul Barron (Assistant Teaching Professor, Chemistry) received his B.S. in Chemistry from North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND and his Ph.D. in 2010 from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in inorganic chemistry. His research has focused primarily around the self-assembly of three dimensional porphyrin-based materials. Joining UMKC as an assistant teaching professor, he works as the general chemistry laboratory coordinator and as an academic advisor for undergraduate chemistry majors.

Charles Bell (Assistant Teaching Professor, Theatre) teaches Structural Design, Automation, AutoCAD, Introduction to Technical Production and Advanced Materials. He received a B.A. in Theatre from Southwest Baptist University and a M.F.A. in Theatre Design and Technology from UMKC in 2011. In his time at UMKC, he served as the technical director for Great Expectations, Arcadia, Spooky Dog (a UMKC/Coterie co-production), and two UMKC Conservatory Operas (Dialogue of the Carmelites and Don Giovanni).

Eve Benavides Clark (Visiting Assistant Professor, Sociology) received her Ph.D. from the University of Kansas in 2010. Her research interests include globalization, social inequalities, gender and the impact of neoliberal policies on women’s work and social activism. Her interest in gender and masculinities includes an analysis of the murders of Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. in the anthology Introducing the New Sexuality Studies (2006) exploring the intersection of racism, sexism, heterosexism and violence in the United States. Work from her dissertation on globalization and gender in Chile influenced the theoretical analysis on a forthcoming article on globalization and production in the United States. As a graduate teaching instructor at the University of Kansas, she was honored by the graduate studies department by winning their Outstanding Graduate Teacher Award in 2008. At UMKC she is teaching introduction to sociology, sociology of deviance, social change, families through the life course, and gender, work, and social change.

Mark Brodwin (Assistant Professor, Physics) received his B.Sc. degree in Physics from McGill University (Montreal, Canada), and his M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Astronomy & Astrophysics from the University of Toronto (Canada) in 2004. Prior to joining the UMKC faculty, he held prize fellowships at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. His work involves the observational discovery and study of massive, rare galaxy clusters, primarily at infrared and millimeter wavelengths. These most massive collapsed systems are interesting both as unique astrophysical objects, which permit the study of galaxy formation and evolution in extreme environments, and as cosmological probes of the growth of large-scale structure in the Universe. He is an author of over 70 refereed publications in top-tier journals, and has co-led the discovery of the majority of the most distant, massive galaxy clusters known.

Miguel A. Carranza (Professor, Sociology and Director, Latina/o-Chicana/o Studies Program) was appointed this fall as the founding Director of the Latina(o)-Chicana(o) Studies Program. He comes from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln where he was Professor of Sociology and Ethnic Studies. He was awarded M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in Sociology from the University of Notre Dame. His most immediate goal is to create a Latina/o Studies program that has a solid foundation for establishing curriculum and outreach scholarship components that are attractive and beneficial for all students, but especially Latina/o students, and also creating strong ties with Kansas City’s growing Latino population. His research centers on the cultural, economic and social integration of Latino immigrants to the Midwest and Great Plains regions of the U.S. With several colleagues, he developed and implemented a nine year mentoring program for Latino middle school and high school youths. The overall research questions he addresses in his work – “What ‘sense of community’ do long-time and recent immigrants have in urban and rural Midwestern and Northern Great Plains communities?,” and “What impact do their experiences have in influencing their ‘quality of life’ in the U.S.?”

Xiaobo Chen (Assistant Professor, Chemistry) obtained his Ph.D. from Case Western Reserve University in 2005, followed by research at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley until 2011. His research interests include developing high-performance nanomaterials and understanding the fundamental mechanisms for sustainable energy generation (solar hydrogen fuel and electricity generations), efficient energy storage (chemical fuel and electrical energy storage), and sustainable energy utilization (solar clean building technology, solar air purification, environmental and water cleanings) in a dream to create a sustainable solar powered clean city.

Lorna Condit (Lecturer, English Language and Literature) teaches courses in composition and literature. She completed her interdisciplinary Ph.D. in English and Religious Studies at UMKC in 2011 with a primary focus in 19th century British literature. Her research interests are eclectic, ranging from gothic fiction to spiritual autobiography to visionary narratives to early pacifist writings. She tells us her educational philosophy can be briefly captured in a quote from Virginia Gildersleeve, Dean Emeritus of Barnard College, that says, “The ability to think straight, some knowledge of the past, some vision of the future, some skill to do useful service, some urge to fit that service into the well-being of the community—these are the most vital things education must try to produce.”

Jean Dufresne (Lecturer, Communication Studies) received her M.A. in Communication Studies from the University of Iowa and her Ph.D. in Communication Studies from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in 1999. Her research interests include cultural, interpersonal, and gender communication, as well as organizational communication. She has taught, as an adjunct and as full-time faculty, for the past 25 years, eight at UMKC. This year she will serve on the Veterans Advisory Board for the UMKC Student Veterans Organization.

John Eck (Assistant Teaching Professor, Architecture, Urban Planning + Design) received his B.A. in Architecture from Kansas State University and his M.A. in Architecture from the University of Virginia in 1995. He is a practicing architect and has practiced in Kansas City and Chicago for over 22 years, specializing in both commercial and residential projects. Local projects of note include the Boulevard Brewery, Community America Ballpark and a new office for Design Ranch graphic design. His practical experience informs his academic focus on building materials and assembly, especially in foundation curriculum. In addition to his time at UMKC, he has taught at Kansas State University and the University of Illinois/Chicago. He also maintains an art studio in Kansas City, working primarily with hand-built ceramics in studies of archetypal architectural forms.

Matthew Edwards (Visiting Assistant Professor, Foreign Languages and Literatures) is a graduate of McGill University and the University of Ottawa. He received his Ph.D. from Emory University (2009) in Contemporary Latin American Literature and was Assistant Professor of Spanish at Concord University before coming to UMKC. He is currently editing the first volume of critical work on Argentine journalist and cultural critic, María Moreno, and is finishing a book manuscript, titled Pleasure Points: Memories of Latin America’s Queer Pasts, that addresses how homosexual, lesbian, bisexual and transgender subjects engage history and disrupt traditional ways of speaking about the past.

Lyn Elliot (Associate Professor, Communication Studies) received a Ph.D. in English (2000) and an M.F.A. in Film and Video Production from the University of Iowa. She taught film production and screenwriting classes at Penn State University for eight years before coming to UMKC. As an independent filmmaker, Lyn works primarily in the short form, creating films that bring to the surface the strange undercurrents of everyday life. Over the past 15 years, Lyn’s work has screened widely at national and international venues. In 2007, she was awarded an Individual Artist Fellowship from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts. Her most recent film, Another Dress, Another Button (2011), is a stop-motion animation that documents the lonely plight of spare buttons. Her specialties are short-form narrative and documentary media production and screenwriting.

David Freeman (Assistant Professor, History) earned his Ph.D. from Emory University in 2002. He is a Dutch/German historian specializing in the late Reformation period. He teaches courses on early modern Europe and the history of Christianity. His research interests focus on refugee/immigrant identities and their influences on host communities. He is currently working on a study of Dutch republican influences on seventeenth century German state formation.
   

Marc Garcelon (Associate Professor, Sociology) earned his Ph.D. at the University of California at Berkeley in 1995. He is a sociologist who works on social theory, political revolutions in different societies, and how social movements, voluntary associations and political parties use the Internet. He has published a book on the collapse of the Soviet Union and what happened afterwards in urban Russia in the 1990s entitled Revolutionary Passage: From Soviet to Post-Soviet Russia, 1985-2000 (Temple University Press 2005), as well as articles on social theory, late and post-communist Russia, and the Internet and various movements and advocacy organizations. His teaching interests include social theory, social movements, social ecology and the environment, media and society, sociology of political life, and developing countries.

    
Crystal Gorham Doss (Lecturer, English Language and Literature) earned her Ph.D. from the University at Buffalo (SUNY) in 2011. Her dissertation explores the relationship between modernism and the sentimental in novels of the 1920s. Her research and teaching interests include modernism, autobiography, and critical theory, specifically feminist and gender theory.
    

Andrew Graham (Assistant Professor, Philosophy) did his undergraduate work at Acadia University in Canada and received his Ph.D. in philosophy from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2011. His research examines the interaction between language and metaphysics; in particular, it focuses on whether questions about the existence and essences of things are substantive questions about the things themselves or are instead merely verbal questions about the languages we use to describe them. He also has wide-ranging interests in the history of philosophy and enjoys teaching classes on many different topics, from ancient Greek philosophy to 20th century analytic philosophy. He is married to Susanna Rinard, who is also joining the philosophy department.

Nicole Higgins (Lecturer, English Language and Literature) earned an M.A. in English from the University of Missouri-Kansas City and then earned her M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Georgia in 2011. She has received fellowships from the Cave Canem Foundation and the Callaloo Creative Workshops. Recent poems of hers appear in Natural Bridge, Passages North, TORCH and elsewhere. She is excited to be returning to UMKC.
    

Megan Littrell-Baez (Assistant Teaching Professor, Psychology) earned her Ph.D. from Colorado State University in 2011. She teaches courses in General Psychology, Experimental Psychology, and Cognitive Psychology. Her research Interests include: student learning, memory, and metacognition. She has a particular interest in the effect that taking tests has on memory retention, memory accuracy, and metacognitive judgments.
   

Greg Mackender (Assistant Teaching Professor, Theatre) attended Kansas State University in the late 1960s and has composed extensively for theater in the Kansas City area. He has most recently composed music for the Talley plays (Talley’s Folly, Fifth of July, and Talley and Son) running in repertory by the Kansas City Actors Theatre, of which he is a founding member. He was the resident composer for the Missouri Repertory Theatre (now Kansas City Repertory Theatre) from 1995-2000, and is currently beginning his 13th year for the Heart of America Shakespeare Festival. He has been the Sound Designer and Composer for a number of animated films, including Boing! and Farkleberry Farm, both achieving awards at various international film festivals. Mr. Mackender has taught an evolving course at UMKC, based on the use of the computer as a recording and editing tool for audio as it is applied to music and sound design for film, video, and theater.

Stephanie N. C. Márquez, (Lecturer, Foreign Languages and Literatures) received her M.A. in Romance Languages & Literature (2010), her B.A. in Communication Studies, and her B.A. in Spanish, all from UMKC. She has traveled extensively and has completed coursework abroad at La Universidad Veracruzana in México. In addition to teaching part-time in the past UMKC, she has also been an adjunct Spanish instructor at other area post-secondary educational institutions and a self-employed Language Consultant with extensive experience in cross-cultural competency, curriculum development, language proficiency assessments, and occupational and workplace language training (holding a nationally-recognized certification from Command Spanish®). Stephanie is also a professional interpreter and translator specializing in the industries of healthcare, immigration law, human resources, and education. She is committed to community outreach and has volunteered in the United States and México with immigrant populations and Latino youth.

Ricardo Marte (Assistant Teaching Professor, Sociology) received his degree from the Interdisciplinary Ph.D. Program in Social Psychology at the University of Nevada, Reno in 2005. He teaches two core undergraduate courses for the Sociology major (Sociological Research Methods, Introduction to Statistics) as well as other content areas: life span development, diversity, social psychology, determinants of crime and delinquency, and contemporary American issues where his interest in working with technology in the classroom and beyond surfaces. In addition, Ricardo serves as the faculty advisor to the Sociology Club and an Avanzando mentor. Ricardo’s research focuses on the risk and protective factors surrounding adolescent problem behaviors (e.g., delinquency, aggression, and drug use). Using data from a multi-state sample of 8th graders, he published a model of adolescent problem behaviors as a book, Adolescent Problem Behaviors: Delinquency, Aggression, and Drug Use (LFB Scholarly Publishing, 2008). He also looks forward to extending his research to the Kansas City area in collaboration with UMKC faculty across several disciplines.

Jason Martin (Assistant Teaching Professor, Communi-cation Studies) received his B.A. in Communication and Business Administration from the University of Kentucky, his M.A. in Journalism and Communication from The Ohio State University, and a Ph.D. in Communication from the University of Kentucky in 2011. He served as an editorial assistant for “Communication Teacher,” research assistant for the Director of Undergraduate Studies in Communication at the University of Kentucky, president of UK’s Communication Graduate Student Association, and chair of the University of Kentucky Communication Mentoring Program. He has collaborated on various projects addressing an array of communication topics, has presented his work at national and regional conferences, and co-authored a chapter in The Sage Handbook of Communication and Instruction (2010).  He will present a paper about the cultural transition of first-semester college students and student retention at the International Conference of Education, Research, and Innovation in Madrid, Spain this November. His teaching experience includes courses in public speaking, persuasion, interpersonal communication, and intercultural communication.

Steven Melling (Lecturer, Communi-cation Studies) is currently completing a Ph.D. in Communication Studies at the University of Kansas, where he previously earned his M.A. His research focuses on the intersection of rhetoric, culture and policy. This is evident in his dissertation, which examines the role rhetoric played in the evolution of Kansas City’s Crossroads Arts District. Steven currently teaches Fundamentals of Effective Speaking and Listening at UMKC. He has previously taught communication courses at the University of Kansas, Metropolitan Community College and William Jewell College.

Ben Moats (Lecturer, English Language and Literature) graduated from Rockhurst University in December of 2007, where he double-majored in Spanish and English. He obtained his M.F.A. in English at UMKC in May 2011, where he had served as a GTA and adjunct instructor. This year he will also serve as faculty mentor for the Undergraduate English Council.
  
  

Lindsy L. Myers (Assistant Teaching Professor, Foreign Languages and Literatures) earned her B.A. in French from the University of Kansas and her Ph.D. in French Linguistics from the University of Texas at Austin (2007). She is beginning her third year at UMKC where she has taught all levels of French language courses plus advanced French (and Romance) Linguistics courses. Additionally, she currently serves as coordinator of the first year French language program, undergraduate French advisor and departmental assessment coordinator. Her primary areas of interest within French linguistics are pragmatics and spoken language. She also has worked extensively in foreign language pedagogy and materials development; here at UMKC she works with the Foreign Language Education students as they create and submit their final teacher work samples.

Matthew Warner Osborn (Assistant Professor, History) received his Ph.D. from the University of California at Davis in 2007. Prior to joining the UMKC history department in 2011, he taught at Occidental College in Los Angeles, CA. A historian of early America, his research interests include medicine and disease; alcohol, drugs, and addiction; popular and literary culture; urban history; and social inequality. His current book project is an intellectual, social, and cultural history of the intervention of the medical profession into the social response to alcohol abuse between 1784 and 1850. He is currently developing research on early American theater and popular culture, looking at how developments in science and medicine shaped new forms of popular theatricality.

Curtis Proctor (Visiting Assistant Professor, Social Work) received his B.A. from the University of Oklahoma, his M.A. in Social Work from the University of Iowa, and his Ph.D. from Case Western Reserve University in 2005. He is currently teaching social work practice and program evaluation for the MSW program. Curtis’ research interests include social work practice with the Indian Child Welfare Act, the intersection of performing arts with gerontology, and GLBT community issues. He’s also an avid stage performer, having recently played “Mr. Mushnik” in a summer stock production of “Little Shop of Horrors.”

Susanna Rinard (Assistant Professor, Philosophy) did her undergraduate work at Stanford and received her Ph.D. from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2011. Her most recent research focuses on radical skepticism, which argues we know nothing at all. Rinard’s position is that the skeptical position is untenable because it is internally self-undermining. She also has interests in the philosophy of science, including the philosophy of biology, and plans to begin work on the question of whether group selection is required to explain the evolution of altruism. She looks forward to teaching a broad range of courses, including philosophy of religion and Asian philosophy. She is married to Andrew Graham, also a new addition to the UMKC philosophy department.

Andrés Rodriguez (Lecturer, English Language and Literature) earned degrees in English from the University of Iowa, Stanford University, and, in 1990, his Ph.D. from the University of California, Santa Cruz. He is the author of a study of Keats, Book of the Heart (Lindisfarne Press, 1993), a collection of poetry, Night Song (Tia Chucha Press, 1994), and his essays and poems have appeared in numerous journals and magazines, including Harvard Review, Sagetrieb, and Bilingual Review.
  

Swati Deb Roy (Lecturer, Mathe-matics and Statistics) completed her M.S. in mathematics from University of Florida in 2007 where she is currently finishing her Ph.D. Her interest is in mathematical biology, where she has three publications on Hepatitis C and HIV/AIDS. She has given conference talks at national and international meetings. Prior to coming to UMKC, she taught Mathematics for Liberal Arts, Calculus I, and Calculus III at the University of Florida, Gainesville. Her teaching philosophy encourages active learning, problem solving in groups, a positive learning environment, and, whenever possible, inquiry based teaching. She has enjoyed teaching since her first teaching experience when, fresh out of high school, she was asked to step in at her high school in Kolkata, India, to teach Statistics to seniors while a teacher recovered from a broken leg.

Paul Rulis (Assistant Professor, Physics) received his B.Sc. in Computer Science from the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, VA. He then moved to UMKC where he received an Interdisciplinary Ph.D. with Physics as the Coordinating Discipline in 2005. His main area of research involves computational approaches to the theoretical study of condensed matter. In particular, he is focused on developing advanced density functional theory based computer programs for predicting the atomic structures of materials, as well as their electronic and spectroscopic properties with an emphasis on biologically relevant materials and those containing complex microstructures. He also is looking forward to incorporating modern computational methods and resources into his statistical mechanics and thermal physics course offerings.

Michael W. Schaefer (Lecturer, Communication Studies) earned his M.A. in Adult Education (1987) and B.A. in Communication Studies from UMKC. He has taught at UMKC over 20 years as an adjunct faculty member in Communications Studies. His courses have included: Communication 110, Rhetorical Theory and Criticism, Writing for the Media Writing Intensive Class, and Advanced Public Speaking. He has also taught at Johnson County Community College and Kansas City, Kansas Community College. He has many years of corporate experience as a corporate trainer from Occupational Health Inc. in Emergency Medicine and Occupational Medicine. He is also a published author with McGraw Hill Publishing Company and wrote the book, Child Snatching: How to Prevent it from Happening to Your Child (1984) and has written over 50 corporate seminars in the business sector.

Scott Stackhouse (Assistant Teaching Professor, Theatre) is a 1999 graduate of UCLA’s M.F.A. Acting program and teaches acting and directing for the Undergraduate Theatre program. He spent the first part of this summer in Santa Rosa Beach, Florida, directing for the Seaside Repertory Theatre. Scott has worked regionally and nationally as an actor, director, vocal coach and fight choreographer. Some of his recent directing credits include Macbeth, The Shape of Things, Scapino!, A Comedy of Errors, a children’s adaptation of The Tempest, The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged) and the Midwest premiere of Scott Sieffert’s comedy, The Atomic View Motel. Some of his principle acting credits include Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing, Trigorin in The Seagull, Stanley in A Streetcar Named Desire, Adrian in Private Eyes, Bottom in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Charlie Fox in Speed the Plow and his one-man show, Conan the Banana Man. For the last three years, Scott has cultivated an active career in the voice over industry as well as continuing to work towards certification as Master Teacher in the Linklater Voice method.

Lorena Hidalgo Summerville (Lecturer, Foreign Languages and Literatures) has an M.A. in Romance Language from the University of Missouri-Kansas City in 2008; a B.A in Spanish Language with a minor in Criminology from the University of Missouri-Kansas City. Lorena’s academic career started at the Universidad Autónoma de Centroamérica, where she studied law for three years. Her future goal is to earn a Ph.D. Lorena has been teaching Spanish at UMKC since 2005, and has a real passion for that. She enjoys traveling with her family and visiting different places.

Stephanie Van Rhein (Lecturer, Mathematics and Statistics) received her degrees in Applied Mathematics (B.S. in 2009, M.S. in 2011) from Missouri University of Science and Technology. She also taught there as well as at Willow Springs High School prior to coming to UMKC. Stephanie has taught College Algebra, Trigonometry, Physic, and Differential Equations and has worked on new student programs for orientation and retention. She is currently teaching Pre-calculus, Calculus I, and Mathematics for Teachers: Elementary Geometry.

Greg Vonnahme(Assistant Professor, Political Science) received his Ph.D. from Rice University in Houston, TX, in 2008. His research and teaching interests include state politics, elections, campaign finance, and research methods.
        
      
  

Ye Wang (Assistant Professor, Communications Studies) earned her Ph.D. in 2011 from the School of Journalism at the University of Missouri – Columbia. Her research interests are in interactive advertising, sponsorship, and health communication. She has a published book chapter on electronic word-of-mouth, and a coming chapter on online health communities. She gave conference presentations at major conferences in journalism and mass communication. Her dissertation investigates website navigation and congruity of sponsorship promotion on corporate websites. She is also interested in health communication targeting minorities and teaches two classes: Principles of Advertising and Internet Advertising.

Ann Wood (Assistant Teaching Professor, Sociology) received her Ph.D. in sociology from the University of Kansas in 2008. Her research often includes the intersection of race, class, sexuality, and disease. Her master’s work on the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment was published in the anthology Medicalized Masculinities (Temple University Press, 2006). Her doctoral research focused on the theoretical and structural reasons why older adults are absent from HIV/AIDS prevention education at the local and state levels. This research, funded by a grant from The Horowitz Foundation, is currently being expanded to include other U.S. regions, specifically the South. Along with her teaching and research, Ann is also the undergraduate advisor for Sociology majors and minors. She regularly teaches introduction to sociology, race and ethnic relations, contemporary American issues, aging in contemporary society, sociology of death and dying, and sociology of human sexuality.

Henrietta Rix Wood (Lecturer, English Language and Literature) received an Interdisciplinary Ph. D. from UMKC in English and History in 2011. She teaches courses in writing, literature, and women’s and gender studies. Her research addresses the rhetorical and social history of young women in the United States during the late 19th and early 20th century.
  
   

Jacqueline Wood (Associate Professor, English Language and Literature/Black Studies) has an M.A. in English literature; an M.A. in French literature and earned her Ph.D. in English from the University of Florida in 1998. She specializes in contemporary African American women dramatists. She served for two years as Assistant/Interim Director of the African American Studies Program, University of Alabama at Birmingham. She teaches African American literature survey courses, drama, and poetry as well as Black Studies foundation courses, and African Diaspora literature. In addition, she has taught courses on early American immigrant experience, women writers of color, and composition and culture. Her scholarship addresses resistant rhetoric in contemporary African American women’s drama, particularly the influential role of playwright Sonia Sanchez. She has published an edited collection of Sonia Sanchez’s plays, I’m Black When I’m Singing, I’m Blue When I Ain’t and Other Plays (Duke University Press, 2010). She has also published articles in journals including Studies in the Humanities, Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism, The African American Review, and in the critical anthologies Contemporary African American Playwrights (Routledge, 2007) and Suzan-Lori Parks: Essays on the Plays and Other Works (MacFarland, 2010). Professor Wood is currently working as co-editor on a reader anthology of Sonia Sanchez’s works.

Kelley Young (Lecturer, Foreign Languages and Literatures) earned a B.A. in Spanish Language and Literature and her M.A. in Romance Languages and Literature in 2010, both from UMKC. She taught elementary and intermediate Spanish classes at UMKC as a Graduate Teaching Assistant from 2008 to 2010. As an undergraduate, Kelley lived for some time in Buenos Aires, Argentina and studied at La Universidad de Palermo. As a graduate student, one summer was spent at El Centro de Lenguas Modernas at La Universidad de Granada, Spain. She has volunteered as an ESL tutor to Spanish speakers in Milan, MO, and has been a volunteer translator for the Kansas City Worker Justice Center and the school district in Kansas City, KS.