Hiram English Faculty
FACULTY
 HIRAM COLLEGE
ENGLISH DEPARTMENT

Back row: Amberly Hyden, Administrative Assistant; Kirsten Parkinson; Joyce Dyer; Front Row: Mary Quade; Willard Greenwood; Paul Gaffney

  • Joyce Dyer
  • Paul Gaffney
  • Willard Greenwood
  • Arlene Hilfer
  • Kirsten Parkinson
  • Mary Quade
  • Jeffrey Swenson
  • Emeriti Faculty

    Joyce Dyer
    John S. Kenyon Professor of English
    Director, Lindsay-Crane Center for Writing and Literature
    B.A., Wittenberg University; Ph.D., Kent State University
    E-mail Prof. Dyer

    Courses:

  • Fiction Writing
  • Nonfiction Writing
  • Memoir
  • Literary Journalism
  • Writing for Publication
  • Professional Editing
  • Grammar and Style for Writers
  • Writing About Illness
  • Appalachia in Literature and Film

    Research Interests:

  • Appalachian culture and literature
  • Contemporary fiction and poetry
  • Nonfiction studies
  • Writing theory
  • Documentary film
  • Edna St. Vincent Millay, John Brown, Hart Crane
  • Akron history
  • The nature of memory

    Publications:

  • "The Awakening": A Novel of Beginnings (1993)
  • In a Tangled Wood: An Alzheimer's Journey (1996)
  • Bloodroot: Reflections on Place by Appalachian Women Writers (1998)
  • Gum-Dipped: A Daughter Remembers Rubber Town (2003)
  • Over a hundred essays in magazines such as North American Review, High Plains Literary Magazine, Seventeen, and Southern Literary Journal
  • Essays in books, including Politics, Gender, and the Arts; Contemporary Poets, Dramatists, Essayists, and Novelists of the South; Teachers and Writers Guide to Frederick Douglass; Dictionary of Midwestern Literature; Encyclopedia of Appalachia; Crossing Troublesome; After the Bell: Contemporary American Prose about School; Southern Writers: A New Biographical Dictionary; What's Normal: Narratives of Mental and Emotional Disorders; Twentieth Century Literary Criticism; Body Outlaws: Rewriting the Rules of Beauty and Body Image

    Recent Presentations:

  • Writers Series, Otterbein College (2007)
  • Speaker at the College Club of Akron (2007)
  • Writer-in-Residence at the Antioch Writers' Workshop (Memoir), Yellow Springs, Ohio (Summer 2005 and 2006)
  • Eleanor Mincks Wolf Lecturer, Mount Union College(2005)
  • Lecture in honor of poet Maggie Anderson and her work at the Emory & Henry Literary Festival, Abingdon, VA (2004)
  • Featured speaker at the 5th Annual Akron Traditions, E.J. Thomas Hall (2004)
  • Panelist in the 2nd Ohio River Festival of Books, Huntington, WV (2004)
  • Speaker at Fairchild Center, University Hospitals, “Keeping Cognitively Vital: A Study About Reading to Remember”
  • Interviewed by Time/Warner Cable, Civic Forum series (2004) and by NPR (Dee Perry), WCPN Cleveland, 90.3 FM (2003)
  • Speaker at Author, Author luncheon, Akron (October 2003)
  • Workshop leader at 2003 Wright State Institute on Writing and Teaching
  • Writer-in-residence at 22nd, 25th, 26th, and 30th Appalachian Writers Workshop at Hindman Settlement School in Kentucky
  • Writer-in-residence at Highland Summer Conference, Radford University (2000)
  • Distinguished Alumni Writing Fellows Residency, The Wittenberg Series (1998-99)

    Awards:

  • Vencl-Carr Award for Excellence in Teaching (2006)
  • First Place, Best of Ohio Writers Contest (Writers on Writing category) (2005)
  • Distinguished Alumna Award, Kent State University English Department (2004)
  • Gum-Dipped nominated for Book of the Year by ForeWord Magazine (honoring literary achievements of independent presses and their authors) and the Appalachian Writers Association (2004)
  • Gum-Dipped selected as required reading for all in-coming freshmen at University of Akron (2004)
  • Pushcart nominations in essay (2001, 2006)
  • Susan B. Koppelman Award
  • Appalachian Writers Association 1999 Book of the Year
  • Appalachian Studies Award 1997
  • Individual Artists Grant from the Ohio Arts Council (1997)
  • Michael Starr Award for Teaching Excellence, Hiram College (1996)
  • Paul Martin and Michael Dively Awards, Hiram College
  • Biography included in Contemporary Authors

    Current Writing Projects: Goosetown (memoir); Makeover (essay collection); Funeral Home (essay collection); assorted essays

    Paul Gaffney
    Assistant Professor of English
    B. A. (Linguistics and English Literature), Western Washington University; M.A., Ph.D. (2007) University of Virginia
    E-mail Prof. Gaffney

    Courses:

  • Introduction to Literary Studies
  • British Literature I
  • Medieval Literature
  • Shakespeare
  • Shakespeare on Film
  • Arthurian Literature through the Centuries
  • Medieval Romance
  • The English Language: A Linguistic Introduction
  • Introduction to Linguistics
  • American Languages

    Research Interests:

  • Medieval popular literature
  • Chaucer in context
  • Shakespeare
  • Arthurian traditions
  • Medieval chronicle
  • Fabliaux
  • Modern medievalism
  • Renaissance textual studies
  • Narratology
  • Orality
  • Linguistics
  • The history of English
  • Uses of literary theory

    Publications:

  • The Uses of the Loathly Lady.” The English “Loathly Lady” Tales: Boundaries, Traditions, Motifs. Ed. Elizabeth Passmore. Kalamazoo: Medieval Institute Publications, 2006. (forthcoming)
  • “Sir Degaré and Composite Romance.” Medieval Romance. Ed. Ad Putter. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2006. (under consideration)
  • Entries in St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture. Gale, 1999.
  • Book reviews for Virginia Quarterly Review, Winter 2000-Winter 2004, including:

    Recent Presentations:

  • “King Orfeo: How a Classical Myth Becomes A Popular Tale.” National Meeting of the Popular Culture/American Culture Associations, San Diego, California, 24 March 2005.
  • “Sir Degaré and Composite Romance.” Ninth Biennial Conference on Medieval Romance, University College Dublin, 23 April 2004.
  • “Sir Gawain and the Mysteries of Folk Culture.” Panel: Primitivism. Thirteenth Annual Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque Interdisciplinary Symposium: Superstition. University of Miami, 20 February 2004.
  • “What Really Frees Dame Ragnelle.” Loathly Lady Panel. 38th International Congress on Medieval Studies. Western Michigan University, May 2003.

    Willard P. Greenwood II
    Chair
    Associate Professor of English
    Editor, Hiram Poetry Review
    B.A., University of Maine (English major, Classics minor); M.A., Georgia State University; Ph.D., Purdue University
    E-mail Prof. Greenwood

    Courses:

  • Creative Writing (Poetry)
  • American Literature
  • Introduction to Literary Studies

    Research Interests:

  • Ecocriticism
  • Postmodernism
  • Contemporary American fiction and poetry

    Publications: "Pelagic Mania" in Seneca Review (April 2002), "Biographical Details" forthcoming in 32 poems

    Other interests: I am a tennis junkie. I also enjoy literature about fishing. I fly-fish and tie my own flies as well.

    Arlene Hilfer
    Visiting Assistant Professor of English
    B.A., Cleveland State University; M.A., John Carroll University; Ph.D., Kent State University; Studies in Latin Paleography, University of Notre Dame
    E-mail Prof. Hilfer

    Courses:

  • Utopian Literature
  • First-Year Seminar: Heroes of the Middle Ages
  • Basic Exposition
  • Tutorial for First-Year Writers
  • Survey of Journalism
  • Prose and Poetry of the Harlem Renaissance
  • The Lives of the Saints and the Medieval Imagination
  • Business Writing
  • Writing in the Liberal Arts I and II

    Research Interests:

  • The Christianization of the Hebrides and Cumbria
  • The lives of St. Columba, St. Ninian, and St. Cuthbert
  • Transcribing, translating, and cataloging Latin and Anglo-Saxon manuscripts

    Publications:

  • Codicology of a 1306 Land Grant. An addition to the catalogue of Medieval and Renaissance Manuscripts at the University of Notre Dame.

    Presentations:

  • "The Production of a Manuscript: The Lindisfarne Gospels.” Ursuline College, December 14, 2001.
  • “’Sitten ane & Halden hire stille:’ Mouth and Tongue as Instruments of Sanctity in Ancrene Wisse.” 34th International Congress on Medieval Studies. Kalamazoo, MI. May 1999.
  • “Stone Stille at God’s Feet: The Conflict Between the Spiritual and Material in Part VIII of Ancrene Wisse.” Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies Conference. Phoenix, AZ. February 1999.
  • “The Rule of Mary: Ancrene Wisse.” Medieval Association of the Midwest Annual Conference. Kent State University, Stark Campus. September 1998.
  • “The Ancrene Wisse as an Adaptation of Eastern Monasticism.” Leed’s International Medieval Congress. Leeds, England. July 1998.
  • “Transformation and Fulfillment: Parts II and VII of Ancrene Wisse.” Michigan State University Medieval Consortium. MSU, East Lansing, MI. October 1996.
  • “Transforming Chattering Eve into Humble Mary: Authorial Control of Woman’s Language and Speech in Ancrene Wisse.” 31st International Congress on Medieval Studies. Kalamazoo, MI. May 1996.
  • “Changing Audience, Changing Text: A Late Fifteenth-Century Reworking of the Ancrene Riwle.” The South Eastern Medieval Association Conference. Marymount College. Arlington, VA. October 1994.
  • “The Structural Significance of the Mouth and Tongue in Part IV of Ancrene Wisse.” The Sixteenth Annual Medieval Forum. Plymouth State College. Plymouth, NH. April 1994.
  • “Persuading Men to Virtue: Aventure, Patience, and Trouthe in The Franklin’s Tale.” The Thirteenth Annual Medieval Forum. Plymouth State College. Plymouth, NH. April 1991.

    Kirsten Parkinson
    Associate Professor of English
    Department Webmaster
    B.A., Harvard University; M.A., Ph.D., University of Southern California; Graduate Certificate in Gender Studies, University of Southern California
    E-mail Prof. Parkinson

    Courses:

  • Introduction to Literary Studies
  • British Literature II
  • World Literature
  • Angels and Whores: Gender in Victorian Literature
  • Jane Austen, Then and Now
  • Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins
  • Creeps and Castles: Gothic Fiction
  • Literature of War
  • Visions of India
  • Literary Perspectives on Women
  • Masculinity, Femininity and the Body
  • Ghouls and Goblins: The Cultural Meanings of Monsters

    Other Campus Activities:

  • Faculty advisor for GAIA
  • Performer in campus production of The Vagina Monologues (February 2003)
  • Study-abroad trip to England with Prof. Rodney Hessinger (History) (Fall 2005)

    Research Interests:

  • Victorian literature
  • The novel
  • Gender studies
  • Postcolonial literature
  • War literature

    Publications:

  • "Art or Craft: Class, Gender, and Constructions of the Artist in Victorian Needlework Manuals" (under submission)
  • "The Pot Roast Is Political: Domestic Ideology in Victorian and World War II Cookbooks" in Midwestern Folklore (Fall 2003)
  • Entries in American Masculinities: A Historical Encyclopedia (Sage Publications, 2003)

    Recent Presentations:

  • "'What do you play, boy?': Card Games in Great Expectations," Midwest Victorian Studies Association Conference, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (April 2007)
  • "Viewer, I Married Him: Translating Jane Eyre to the Silver Screen," Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association Conference, San Diego (March 2005) and Midwest Victorian Studies Association Conference, Chicago (April 2005)
  • Invited panelist, "Medical Ethics: From Frankenstein to the 21st Century," Discussion associated with the exhibit “Frankenstein: Penetrating the Secrets of Nature,” Cuyahoga County Public Library at Parma Community General Hospital, Parma, Ohio (September 2003)
  • Guest on "Around Noon," WCPN (NPR), Cleveland (July 2003)
  • "The Pot Roast Is Political: American Cookbooks and World War II," Southwest/Texas Popular Culture Association, Albuquerque (February 2002)

    Awards:

  • Paul E. Martin Award (2004, 2006)
  • Michael Starr Award for outstanding service and potential (2004)
  • NOCHE Award for Excellence in Teaching, Northeast Ohio Council on Higher Education (2004)

    Current Project: Article on legal contract theory and marriage in Charles Dickens's Bleak House

    Mary Quade
    Assistant Professor of English
    A.B. University of Chicago; M.F.A, The University of Iowa Writers’ Workshop
    E-mail Prof. Quade

    Courses:

  • Introduction to Creative Writing
  • Fiction Writing
  • Advanced Poetics
  • Training the Writer’s Eye
  • Literary Journalism

    Research Interests:

  • Contemporary American literature
  • Contemporary and historical perspectives on the American frontier
  • History of American nuclear science

    Publications:
    Poetry:

  • Guide to Native Beasts (2004)
  • “Air Show: F-16s above Cleveland” in the anthologies On the Wing: American Poems of Air and Space Flight (2005) and Cleveland in Poetry and Prose (2005)
  • “Amnesiac Woman Remembers Oregon” in the anthology Portland Lights (1999)
  • Poems in the literary journals FIELD, Black Warrior Review, Mid-American Review, North American Review, Notre Dame Review, The Iowa Review, Fine Madness, North Dakota Review, New Delta Review, Poet Lore, Willow Springs, Columbia: A Journal of Literature and Art, AGNI online, Sycamore Review, Epoch, The Massachusetts Review, The Cream City Review, Swink, Chicago Review, Third Coast, Colorado Review, Tar River Poetry, River Styx, and Crab Orchard Review Essays:
  • “Poetry Speaking with Science” in Isotope: A Journal of Literary Nature and Science Writing (2006)

    Recent Presentations:

  • Reading at University of Portland (2006)
  • Reading with John Donoghue at John Carroll University (2005)
  • Reading with Morri Creech at West Chester University (2005)
  • Moderator and panelist for “Poetry Speaking with Science: A Dialogue of Discovery” at the Association of Writers and Writing Programs (AWP) Conference in Vancouver, British Columbia (2005)
  • Reading with Marilyn Krysl at Cleveland State University (2004)
  • Guest on “Around Noon,” WCPN (NPR) Cleveland (2004)
  • Artist-in-residence at Caldera, Sisters, Oregon (2002)

    Awards:

  • Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award (2006)
  • Cleveland State University Poetry Center First Book Prize (2003)
  • Oregon Literary Fellowship (2001)

    Jeffrey Swenson
    Assistant Professor of English
    Director, Writing Across the Curriculum
    B.A., St. John’s University; M.A., University of Alaska, Fairbanks; Ph.D., University of Iowa
    E-mail Prof. Swenson

    Courses:

  • Teaching and Supervising Writing
  • Introduction to Creative Writing
  • Sex, Murder, and Mayhem in the Midwest (University of Iowa)
  • Literature of the Native American Peoples (University of Iowa)

    Research Interests:

  • Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century American Literature
  • Midwestern Literature
  • Native American Literature
  • Material Culture in Literature
  • Writing Center Theory and Practice
  • Ecocriticism

    Publications:

  • Review. “Laboring to Play: Home Entertainment and the Spectacle of Middle-Class Cultural Life, 1850-1920. By Melanie Dawson.” M/MLA Journal (Fall 2006): 177-79.
  • “Art and the Immigrant: The Other as Muse in Cather’s My Ántonia and Rølvaag’s Boat of Longing.” MidAmerica: The Yearbook of the Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature. Vol. 32 (2005).
  • “In Good Company: The Midwestern Literary Community and the Short Fiction of Ruth Suckow and Hamlin Garland.” MidAmerica: The Yearbook of the Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature. Vol. 30 (2003).
  • “The Small Town as Reflected in Midwestern Literature.” The Dictionary of Midwestern Literature, Volume II. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
  • “Hamlin Garland’s Main-Travelled Roads.” The Dictionary of Midwestern Literature, Volume II. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

    Recent Presentations:

  • “Crafting the Canoe: Marketing Nature in Thoreau’s The Maine Woods.” Craft, Critique and Culture: Interdisciplinary Conference on Reinventing Nature. University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, April 7-9, 2006
  • “David Treuer, The Hiawatha, and Postindian Authorship” 47th Annual Midwest Modern Language Association Convention. Milwaukee, WI, November 10-13, 2005
  • “Tripping Over the Border: An Outsider’s View of the North in Sinclair Lewis’ Mantrap.” The American Village in a Global Setting: An Interdisciplinary Conference. St. Cloud State University, St. Cloud, MN, October 6-9, 2005
  • “The Passing of the Pioneer: Hamlin Garland’s ‘The Fireplace’ and the Rise of the Small-Town Myth.” The American Literature Association: 16th Annual Conference on American Literature. Boston, MA, May 26-29, 2005.

    Awards:

  • College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Summer Dissertation Fellowship, University of Iowa, 2006.
  • Frederick P.W. McDowell Dissertation Scholarship, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, 2005-06.
  • Midwestern Heritage Prize, Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature (SSML), 2003.

    Current Projects:

  • Revising co-authored article for publication in the Writing Center Journal. The article makes a quantitative comparison between ESL and Non-ESL student requests for help in on-line tutoring sessions with the University of Iowa Writing Center.
  • Working on an article on Canadian poet and journalist E. Pauline Johnson.

    Emerita Faculty

    David Anderson
    Professor of English Emeritus
    B.A., Hiram College; M.A., University of California at Berkeley; Ph.D., Case Western Reserve University
    E-mail Prof. Anderson

    Courses:

  • American Literature
  • World Literature (Masterpieces of German Literature; contemporary Indian novel)
  • Regional Literature and Architecture
  • German Science and Literature (Study-abroad trips to Hamburg and Berlin)

    Publications:

  • Anthology of Western Reserve Literature with Gladys Haddad (1992)
  • "Hiram College: A View from the Hill" in Cradles of Conscience (2003)
  • "German and Science: An Interdisciplinary Model," in Germanics Under Construction: Intercultural and Interdisciplinary Prospects (1996)
  • entries in Encyclopedia of Keyboard Instruments (1994)
  • "Frontier Elegance and Democratic Plainness: Two Churches as Historical Documents," with J. R. Strassburger in Smithsonian Studies in American Art (Winter 1990)
  • "A Quaint, Picturesque Little Pile: Architecture and the Past in Washington Irving," in The Old and New World Romanticism of Washington Irving (1986)

    Recent Presentations:

  • "Some Things Never Change," Commencement Address, Hiram College (2000)
  • "A Promising Boy: Intimations of Greatness in James A. Garfield," Western Reserve Studies Symposium (1999)
  • "Hiram in the Civil War: A Dramatic Reading of Letters from Hiram Students," various venues (2000-2001)
  • "When Apollos Till the Earth: Nineteenth Century Literary Landscape," Longwood Graduate Program Symposium, University of Delaware (1999)
  • "Classicism Moves West: Federal Style Architecture in the Western Reserve," Cleveland Museum of Art, The Decorative Arts Trust Bicentennial Symposium (1996)

    Awards:

  • Vencl/Carr Award for Excellence in Teaching
  • Association of State and Local History Research Grant
  • Ohio Humanities Council Scholar
  • NEH Implementation Grant for Regionalism in the Humanities
  • Fulbright Seminar (Deutsche Landeskunde, Bonn, Germany)

    Current Projects: Completing a history of Hiram College, Classic Hill: College Life in Hiram Since 1850; preparing an edition of letters of Hiram students who served in the Civil War, particularly under James A. Garfield

    David Fratus
    Professor of English Emeritus
    B.S., St. Louis University; M.A., Ph.D., University of Iowa
    E-mail Prof. Fratus

    Research interests:

  • Medieval literature, especially Chaucer, Dante, Anglo-Saxon, romance, oral--formulaic method
  • Folklore, especially traditional ballads and tales, urban legends
  • Linguistics, especially history of English, dialect field study
  • Pop culture, especially film studies, television, advertising, genre fiction
  • Caribbean literature, especially Naipaul, Trinidad, calypso, reggae
  • Russian literature, especially Nabokov, Chekhov, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky Publications:
  • The Riverman's Wedding and Other Poems (1983)
  • More than 50 individual poems in magazines and journals, reviews, and theatre notes Current writing project: Completing a collection of Bonney Castle ghost stories

    This page last updated August 29, 2007