Born in the suburbs of Chicago, I lived my whole life in the Midwest until 2020 when I moved to Cedar City to begin teaching at Utah Tech University. After receiving my Bachelor’s degree in Creative Writing from Illinois Wesleyan University in 2012, I went to Northern Illinois University for my Master’s in Victorian Literature.
My work with Postcolonialism led me to pursue my Ph.D. in Indigenous Literature and Film, which I completed in the spring of 2020. My research employs Indigenous and feminist methodologies to highlight alternative, Indigenous answers to colonialism and recent discourses of reconciliation in North America.
I have been teaching college courses in literature, film, composition, and grammar for almost a decade. My research into Indigenous methodologies informs my philosophy as a teacher. With feminist and Indigenist theorists of epistemology and methodology like Kathleen Absolon and Margaret Kovach, I believe that learning is a reflexive and holistic process. Comprehension requires understanding of the complex web of interrelationships that gives context to the world and our place in it.