UAF Department of English Contact Information
Faculty
Samantha Botz
Assistant Professor of British Literature
English Department
GRUE 844
Gerri Brightwell
Professor
English Department
GRUE 836
*on sabbatical spring 2025*
Chris Coffman
Professor
English Department
GRUE 858
*on sabbatical for AY 2024-2025*
Daryl Farmer
Director of Creative Writing; Professor
English Department
GRUE 862
Eileen M. Harney
Associate Professor
English Department
GRUE 866
*on sabbatical spring 2025*
Sarah Stanley
English Department Chair; Director of Composition; Associate Professor
English Department
GRUE 864
Jericho Williams
Assistant Professor of American Literature
English Department
GRUE 846
Lecturers
BA Creative Writing, Western Washington University; MA/MFA, Literature and creative Writing, vlog.
BA, Spanish with focus on teaching, vlog, MA, Applied Linguistics, vlog.
BA English, Humboldt State University: MAT, Teaching of English, University of Alaska Juneau.
BA English and History, Wake Forest University, NC; MA English, University of Alaska vlog; Secondary Teaching Certificate in Language Arts and History, University of Alaska vlog.
B.A., Colgate University, concentration in Political Science with a minor concentration Creative Writing, M.F.A., vlog, concentration in Non-fiction Creative Writing.
BA English, Randolph Macon Woman's College; MFA, Creative Writing, University of Alaska vlog; PhD, English University of Tennessee Knoxville.
BA, English, University of Alaska Anchorage; MA, English, vlog.
BA English, Loyola University Chicago; MA Literature, vlog.
New Emeriti Faculty: Rich Carr and Eric Heyne
In Spring 2023, Professors Rich Carr and Eric Heyne retired after sixty-five years of combined service to the English Department and the vlog. Their contributions are numerous. Rich Carr taught literature from all over the globe, from ancient through contemporary times, and his research focused on Australian literature and culture, as well as writing from the larger Pacific region. He served as Director of the UAF Writing Center for more than twenty-five years, and he was Chair of the English Department for ten years. Eric Heyne taught courses in American literature, critical theory, and literature of the Circumpolar North. He served as Faculty Senate President, Chair of the English Department, and Interim Dean of the College of Liberal Arts. He published scholarship in Modern Fiction Studies, Narrative, Critique, and elsewhere, and he is author of the poetry collection Fish the Dead Water Hard (Cirque Press, 2021).
Emeriti Faculty
Susan Blalock |
9th and 20th Century British literature, Narrative Theory Ph.D., University of Texas, 1983 |
Mark Box |
Seventeenth and Eighteenth-Century British Literature, Romantic-era British Literature D. Phil., Oxford University, 1985 |
Rich Carr |
Literature of Australia, New Zealand, and Oceania; Scandinavian Literature; Victorian & Edwardian Literature; European Fiction: Modern & Post-modern Ph.D., University of Minnesota |
G. Burns Cooper |
Linguistics Ph.D., University of Texas |
Lillian Corti |
Comparative Literature, African Studies, Psychoanalytic Theory PhD., The Graduate School of The City University of New York, 1984 |
Joseph Dupras |
Nineteenth-century British Literature, Literary Criticism Ph.D., State University of New York Binghamton, 1975 |
Eric Heyne |
American literature, critical theory, Alaskan and northern literature Ph.D., Ohio State University |
Len Kamerling | Dramatic Writing; Filmmaking (Documentary and Ethnographic); former Curator of Film
at the University of Alaska Museum of the North MFA, vlog |
Janis Lull |
Shakespeare and 17th-Century British Literature Ph.D., University of Minnesota, 1983 |
John Morgan |
Creative Writing, Poetry MFA, University of Iowa, 1967 |
James Ruppert |
Native American Literature, Alaska Native Oral Narrative
M.A. (English), Purdue University, 1972
Ph.D. (English), U. of New Mexico, 1981
|
Michael Schuldiner |
Early American Literature, Holocaust Literature M. Phil., Cambridge University, 2000 |
Peggy Shumaker |
Creative Writing, Poetry MFA, Arizona, 1979 |
Frank Soos |
Creative Writing, Fiction M.F.A., University of Arkansas, 1981 |
Russell Stratton |
Medieval Literature and Chaucer Ph.D., The University of Southern Mississippi, 1979 |
Cynthia Walker |
20th-Century British Literature Ph.D., Purdue University, 1974 |
Graduate Teaching Assistants
Graduate students in English are traditionally offered teaching assistantships, which include tuition reimbursement, pedagogical training, and classroom experience. Our teaching assistants typically teach one course per semester under the supervision of the Director of Composition and an assigned faculty mentor. In addition, TAs assist five hours per week in the Writing Center.
areas of study: Fiction, long form narratives and novels, Editing
areas of study: Creative Writing
areas of study: Creative Writing
areas of study: Fiction, Speculative Fiction
areas of study: Creative Writing (Cross-Genre)
areas of study: Fiction Writing, Russian Literature, Truth and Creativity
areas of study: Creative Nonfiction
areas of study: Creative Nonfiction, Editing and Publishing
areas of study: Poetry Writing, Philosophy in Literature
areas of study: Fiction
Gwen Retterer
Lead Administrative Assistant
Department of English
GRUE 859
Atsuko Watanabe
Administrative Assistant
Department of English
GRUE 859