Curriculum Vitae

Education

  • Johns Hopkins Care School of Business, Executive Certificate, Organizational Leadership, January 2024

  • University of Chicago, Ph.D., Comparative Literature, June 2001

  • University of Chicago, M.A., Comparative Literature, June 1993

  • University of Pennsylvania, Post-Baccalaureate, Classics, June 1992

  • St. John’s College, B.A., Liberal Arts: Philosophy Major, Mathematics Minor, June 1990           

Academic Positions

  • Johns Hopkins University’s Peabody Institute, Chair and Associate Professor of Liberal Arts, 2019-present

  • University of East Anglia, Senior Lecturer, School of Literature, Drama, and Creative Writing, 2013-2019

  • Duke University, Associate Professor, Dept. of Theatre Studies and Center for European Studies, 2003-2012

  • European College of Liberal Arts, Lecturer, 2002-2003

  • Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow and Lecturer, University of Pennsylvania, 2001-2002

Publications

Books

  • From Bards to Blackface, or How the Minstrel Changed His Tune (in progress)

  • Wagner’s Ring Cycle and the Greeks, Cambridge University Press, 2010

Articles

  • “The Cyclopes in the Food Court Or, How to Get Your Students to Go to Their GenEd Classes,” Public Seminar, February 6, 2024.

  • “Taking a Hammer to History: The Wagnerian Leitmotif and Nietzsche as Public Intellectual,” An Anthology on Nietzsche and Music: Philosophical Thoughts and Musical Experiments, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2022.

  • “Post Weinstein, a Discussion of Ethics in Drama is Badly Needed,” Times Higher Education, January 26, 2018.

  • Review of Jeff Porter’s Lost Sound: The Forgotten Art of Radio Storytelling, Theater Journal 69-1 (March 2017): 116-7.

  • “Opera in a Post-Weinstein World,” Paris Review, December 5, 2017.

  • “Bob Dylan’s Nobel Speech Reminds Us That Songs Are for Listening, Not Reading,” Zocalo Public Square, July 14, 2017.

  • “How Alpine Yodeling Mutated into American Minstrelry,” coauthored with Anne Bramley, Zocalo and Smithsonian's "What It Means to Be American," December 27, 2016.

  • “How to Turn Trump Fans? Show Them a Greek Tragedy,” Huffington Post, May 31, 2016.

  • “Blackface Sheet Music Iconography and Idiom: The Evolution of Minstrelsy from Theater to Performance,” Modern Language Quarterly (Spring 2009).

  • “From Minstrel Shows to Radio Shows: Racism and Representation in Blackface and Blackvoice.” Journal of American Drama and Theatre 17-2 (Spring 2005): 7-16.

  • “Film Adaptation: From I, Robot to I Pagliacci,” Association of Literary Scholars and Critics Newsletter 11-1, (Winter 2005): 8.

  • “Bleeding the Past, Building the Future: Epic and National Identity in Richard Wagner’s Ring Cycle,” The McNeese Review, vol. 42 (2004): 1-19.

  • “Performance Communities: Franz Schubert’s Die Winterreise and the British Romantics,” in Inventing the Individual, edited by Larry Peer, International Conference on Romanticism (2002).

  • “Music Drama or Music Parody? The Operatic Chorus in Richard Wagner’s Götterdämmerung,” Text and Presentation, vol. 22 (2001): 31-44.

  • Review of Frederic Spotts’ Bayreuth: A History of the Wagner Festival. Qui Parle 10-1 (1998): 113-118.

Fellowships, Grants, Awards

  • University of East Anglia Enterprise and Engagement Grant, 2014-15

  • Duke University Theater Studies Faculty Enrichment Grants, 2006-13

  • Cambridge University Visiting Fellowship-Corpus Christi College, autumn 2011

  • Oxford University Visiting Fellowship-Mansfield College, autumn 2011 (declined)

  • University of Edinburgh Fellowship at the Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, autumn 2011 (declined)

  • Duke University European Studies Grant, 2011     

  • Andrew Mellon Assistant Professor of Theater Studies, 2010-11

  • Mary Duke Biddle Foundation Grant, 2010-11

  • Mellon Fellowship for Franklin Humanities Book Workshop, 2010

  • American Academy of Arts and Sciences Fellowship, 2008-09

  • Duke University Collaborative Arts Grant, 2008

  • Duke University Arts and Sciences Faculty Research Grants, 2007-09

  • Duke University Center for Informational Technology, Audio/Video Capture Grant, 2007

  • Duke University Center for Informational Technology Special iPod Investigation Grants, 2005-07

  • Duke University Instructional Technology Fellowship, 2004-05

  • Duke University Franklin Humanities Institute Grant, 2004

  • University of Chicago Society of Fellows Harper and Schmidt Fellowship, Univ. of Chicago, 2003 (declined)

  • Mellon Postdoctoral Fellowship, University of Pennsylvania, 2001-02                             

Select Dramatic Performances and Musical Compositions

  • The Accrington Pals, Peter Whelan, University of East Anglia, Producer, Autumn 2014

  • Darlings: Four Women, Four Years, Devised, University of East Anglia, Producer, Autumn 2014

  • The Gods of Smoke and Earth, Devised, University of East Anglia, Producer, Autumn 2014

  • As You Like It, William Shakespeare, University of East Anglia, Musical Director, Autumn 2013

  • Arcadia, Sir Philip Sidney, University of East Anglia, Composer and Musical Director, Autumn 2013

  • Woyzeck, Georg Büchner, Duke University, Director-audio performance, Spring 2012

  • All That Fall, Samuel Beckett, Duke University, Director-audio performance, Spring 2012

  • Frozen, Bryony Lavery, University of Cambridge ADC Theatre, Sound Designer, November-December 2011

  • Orpheus against the Sirens, Daniel H. Foster, Composer, April 2006

  • Words and Music, Samuel Beckett, Duke Performances, Composer/Performer, September-October 2005

  • Angels in America, Tony Kushner, Duke University, Dramaturge, Spring 2005

  • Hapgood, Tom Stoppard, Duke University, Dramaturge, Fall 2004         

  • Ghosts, Henrik Ibsen, Duke University, Dramaturge, Fall 2004

  • Why Things Burn, Marlane Meyer, Duke University, Dramaturge, Fall 2003

  • Singing Through the Veil, Daniel H. Foster, Duke University, Composer, December 2003

Administrative Experience

  • Chair, Liberal Arts Department, Johns Hopkins University’s Peabody Institute, 2019-present

  • Academic Manager, Media Suite, University of East Anglia, 2016-2018

  • Director of Undergraduate Studies, Department of Theater Studies, Duke University, 2005-07

  • Arts and Sciences Council, Representative, Duke University, 2007-12

  • Information Technology Advisory Council, Representative, Duke University, 2009-12

  • McNeese Review, Editorial Board Member, 2005-07

  • Technology Ambassador for Center for Informational Technology, Duke University 2007-08

  • Graduate Student Theater and Performances Studies Workshop, Founder and Coordinator, Duke, 2006-07

Select Conferences

  • War of the Worlds: The Night That Terrified America,” Hopkins at Home, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRgpuhIcMMY, October 2023

  • “Turning ‘Zoombies’ into Students: Encouraging Community and Engagement in the Virtual University,” DELTA Symposium, Johns Hopkins University, May 2021

  • Jane Austen Symposium, “Transformation: Trials and Triumphs of Treating Jane Austen’s Works in Various Media,” Moderator, Peabody Institute, November 2019“Opera and the Working Classes,” Voice and Identity – Touches, Textures, Timbres: A Symposium, University of Winchester, January 2017

  • “The Orphic Turn: Acousmatic Sound and the Need to See,” Sound/Image, University of Greenwich, October 2015

  • “Lights Out: Radio and the Sound of Retribution,” To Be Continued…, University of East Anglia, June 2014

  • “World Theatre and New Media,” What Is Performance Studies? Duke University, September 2010

  • “Historical Vertigo: The Case of Transatlantic Minstrelsy,” Performance and History: What History? University of Washington, Winter 2007

  • “‘I see a voice’: Radio and the Need for Narrative,” Modern Language Association Conference, Chicago, Winter 2007

  • “When the Means Become the Ends: Technology in Cinema and Opera,” Modern Language Association Conference, Chicago, Winter 2007

  • “The Transatlantic Minstrel Show: British Romanticism and American Blackface,” Modern Language Association Conference, Philadelphia, December 2006

  • “Interlinear Music: Claude Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande,” Modern Language Association Conference, Philadelphia, Winter 2006

  • “Bards in Blackface: Minstrelsy in the U.S. and the U.K.,1765 to 1928,” John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute, Duke University, September 2005

  • “Old-time Radio Meets New-Fangled Technology: Teaching Radio with an iPod,” Duke University, The Duke Podcasting Symposium, September 2005

  • “iDentity and the iPod: The Performance of Identity in Broadcasting and Podcasting,” Duke University, The Duke Podcasting Symposium, Presenter, September 2005

  • “The Institutions of French Opera: Methodologies, Issues, Contexts,” The Institutions of Opera in Paris From the July Revolution to the Dreyfus Affair: An International Symposium, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University, Round Table Discussant, October 2004

  • “Opera into Film: An Evolutionary Model of Adaptation,” Association of Literary Scholars and Critics, New Orleans, November 2004

  • “From Minstrel Shows to Radio Shows: Racism and Realism in Blackface and Blackvoice,” Modern Language Association, Philadelphia, December 2004

  • “Poetic Frogs and Musical Princes: The Transmemberment of Poetry and Music,” Modern Language Association, Philadelphia, December 2004

  • “Reaches of the Mind: Knowledge and its Limits,” Duke University, Conference Organizer, November 2004

  • “Melopoetics in the Long Nineteenth Century: An Intermedial Study of Literature, Music, and the Visual Arts,” University of Pennsylvania Humanities Forum, February 2002

  • “The Politics of Form: Drama and Narrative in Nineteenth-Century Theory and Practice,” University of Pennsylvania German Department Colloquium, January 2002

  • “Opera Goes to the Movies: Song and Cinematic Technology,” Contemporary Music Festival: Sights and Sounds, Indiana State University, Presenter, November 2001

  • “Escaping the Individual: A Noumenal Journey in Franz Schubert’s Die Winterreise,” American Conference on Romanticism: Inventing the Individual, Miami University, Presenter, November 2001

  • “Failed Music Drama as Successful Music Parody: Wagner’s Götterdämmerung and Aristophanes’ Frogs,” Comparative Drama Conference, Ohio State University, Presenter, April 2001

  • “Nothing Is But What Is Not: Greek Epic and German National Identity in Wagner’s Ring Cycle,” Bratwurst und Döner: Perspectives on German National Identity, University of Wisconsin, Presenter, March 2001

References

  • Joseph Roach, Sterling Professor of Theater, Yale University

  • Sander Gilman, Distinguished Professor of Arts and Sciences, Emory University

  • David Bevington, Professor of English and Comparative Literature, University of Chicago