EDUCATION
Ph.D. in American Studies, University of Texas at Austin, 2019
Dissertation: “Hyperaural Blackness: Black Pop Stars, New Musical Technologies, and Vibrational Negotiations of Identity in the Mid-1980s and Beyond”
Co-supervisors: Ann Cvetkovich and Shirley Thompson
M.A. in Performance Studies, New York University, 2014
B.S. in Economics; Minor in Gender, Culture & Society, University of Pennsylvania, 2009
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
2023-Present Assistant Professor of African American Studies, California State University, Fullerton
2022-2023 ACLS Assistant Professor of African American Studies, California State University, Fullerton
2021-2022 ACLS Visiting Assistant Professor of African American Studies, California State University, Fullerton
2020-2021 Visiting Assistant Professor of Communication and Gender & Sexuality Studies, Tulane University
2019-2020 Andrew W. Mellon Engaged Scholar Initiative Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Texas at Austin
PUBLICATIONS
Peer-Reviewed Publications
“Adrian Piper, Kelela, and the Necessity of Rhythm Work,” Women & Performance: a journal of feminist theory.
“‘Where Do You Go When the Radio’s Down?’: Black Women Experimental Pop Artists, ‘Alternative R&B,’ and the Simultaneous Dissolution and Persistence of Musical Genre,” AMP: American Music Perspectives.
“‘Gimme a Beat!’: Janet Jackson, Hyperaurality, and Affective Feminism,” Journal of Popular Music Studies.
“Starting Something: Synthesizers and Rhythmic Reorientations in Michael Jackson’s ‘Billie Jean’,” Souls: A Critical Journal of Black Politics, Culture, and Society.
Book Chapters
“Finding a Home in House: Tracing Vibrations of Black Queer Femmeness from Chicago to Robin S. to FKA twigs,” Oxford Handbook of Electronic Dance Music, Luis-Manuel Garcia and Robin James (editors), Oxford.
“Future Sounds: Janelle Monáe and Cyberpunk Synthetics,” Routledge Companion to Cyberpunk Culture, Lars Schmeink, Anna McFarlane, and Graham Murphy (editors), Routledge.
Essays
“Lana Del Rey, Fragile Feminism, and White Fragility in a Moment of Black Lives Matter,” Los Angeles Review of Books.
Book Reviews
Review of Marcus Boon, The Politics of Vibration: Music as Cosmopolitical Practice, Journal of Popular Music Studies (forthcoming).
AWARDS, GRANTS, AND FELLOWSHIPS
2021-2023 American Council of Learned Societies Postdoc to Tenure Track Award, Cal State Fullerton
2017-2021 Andrew W. Mellon Engaged Scholar Initiative Fellowship
2017-2018 Dissertation Fellowship, College of Liberal Arts, UT Austin
2016 Dissertation Award, Department of American Studies, UT Austin
2015 TA Top Off Award, Department of American Studies, UT Austin
INVITED TALKS AND CURATIONS
2023 Guest curator for VCAMbient, Haverford College, Haverford, PA (rescheduled).
2023 Dual book project talk with Lauren Cramer in Popular Music Books in Process.
2022 “Breathe to the Rhythm”: Grace Jones, Black Objecthood, and the Rhythms of 1980s Capitalism,” Faculty Noon Talk, California State University, Fullerton, CA.
2021 “So In The Long Run, It All Ends Up The Same Way”: Janet Mock, Venus Xtravaganza, and a Sonic Black and Brown Transness,” Tulane University, New Orleans, LA.
2020 “‘If I Was Your Girlfriend’: Prince, Androgyny, and Female Collaborators,” University of New Orleans, New Orleans, LA.
2020 “‘We’ll Try to Imagine What Silence Looks Like’: Prince, Femininity, and Vibrationally Navigating the 1980s,” Loyola University, New Orleans, LA.
2017 “Janet Jackson as a Vibrational Precursor to Beyoncé and Solange Knowles,” Texas State University, San Marcos, TX.
PAPERS AND PRESENTATIONS
*panel organizer
2023 *Chair of “An Archive of Feelings @ 20” roundtable, American Studies Association Annual Conference, Montreal, PQ.
2023 *“‘Cause your love’s got me fucked up’: FKA twigs, Crying in the Club, and Holding the Traumas of the Ongoing Pandemic,” Pop Conference, Brooklyn, NY (unable to attend).
2023 *“Dawn Richard, Sonic Femmeness, and Pandemic Touch,” Humanities & Social Sciences Dean’s Lecture Series, California State University, Fullerton, CA.
2022 *“Dawn Richard, King Creole, and a Sonic New Orleans,” American Studies Association Annual Conference, New Orleans, LA.
2022 “‘You Slave to the Rhythm’: Grace Jones, Black Rhythms, and the Long 1980s,” IBII Annual Conference, California State University, Fullerton, CA.
2020 *“Blackness, Hip Hop, and American Dreaming in Lana Del Rey’s Discography,” Pop Conference.
2020 “‘You’ve Got to Show Me Love’: Robin S., Black Femininity, and 1990s Dance Pop,” Music Scholarship at a Distance.
2019 *“‘Breathe to the Rhythm’: Grace Jones and the Performance of Diasporic Pasts,” National Women’s Studies Association Annual Conference, San Francisco, CA.
2018 *“‘And We’ll Try to Imagine What It Looks Like’: Prince, Synthesized Femininity, and the Political Potential of Vulnerability,” American Studies Association Annual Conference, Atlanta, GA.
2018 *“‘Could We Go to a Movie and Cry Together?’: Prince, Vibrational Vulnerability, and the Political Possibility of Androgyny,” National Women’s Studies Association Annual Conference, Atlanta, GA.
2018 *“Vibrational Genealogies: Music Technology, Gender Presentation, and Racialized Sound in Grimes and Janelle Monáe’s ‘Venus Fly’ and ‘Pynk,’” Pop Conference, Seattle, WA.
2017 “‘I Like This Part’”: Janet Jackson, Digital Music Technologies, and Recrafting Black Female Sexuality in Mid-1980s America,” National Women’s Studies Association Annual Conference, Baltimore, MD.
2017 “‘Gimme a Beat!’: Janet Jackson, New Musical Technologies, and Vibrationally Breaking the Silences on Black Life in 1980s America,” American Studies Association Annual Conference, Chicago, IL.
2017 *“‘Cry and Burst My Deafness’: Blood Orange, Affective Bass Lines, and Viscerally Reconnecting with the 1980s,” Pop Conference, Museum of Pop Culture, Seattle, WA.
2017 *“‘A Warmth That I Can Feel with Him’: Blood Orange, Black Queer Potentiality, and Affectively Reaching for the 1980s,” American Studies Graduate Student Conference, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX.
2016 “Embodied Repetition: Moving with Black Queer Working Class Histories in FKA twigs’s ‘Glass and Patron,’” Protest: Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies and Media Activism Research Collective Graduate Student Conference, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA.
2016 “‘We Got Love Too Good to Throw Away’: Frankie Knuckles, House Music, and Black Queer Diaspora,” Modern Languages Association Annual Conference, Austin, TX.
2015 “‘Hold That Pose for Me’: FKA twigs, Synthesized Sounds, and Vibrational Collectivity,” Affect Theory Conference, Millersville, PA.
2015 “Starting Something: Falsettos, Synthesizers, and New Political-Cultural Potentialities in Michael Jackson’s ‘Billie Jean,’” Home/Sick: American Studies Graduate Student Conference, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX.
2015 “Feeling It in the Break: Sensing Buried Histories and Subjectivities in La Roux’s ‘Colourless Colour,’” New Directions in Anthropology Graduate Student Conference, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX.
2014 “Blackness, Queerness, and Becoming-Woman: Lingering in the Synthesizer’s Disorienting Sonic Spaces,” New York University Performance Studies MA Final Symposium, New York, NY.
SERVICE TO THE PROFESSION
2023 Co-Editor of special issue, “Sound and Affect in Times of Crisis, of AMP: American Music Perspectives with Dan DiPiero.
2023 Respondent to Dan DiPiero’s Contingent Encounters: Improvisation in Music and Everyday Life in Popular Music Books in Process.
2022 Chair and Respondent, “Messin’ Around: A Black Queer Recovery of Mess,” American Studies Association Annual Conference, New Orleans, LA.
2022 Co-founder and Co-chair of Music/Sound Studies Working Group at the Cultural Studies Association with Dan DiPiero.
2021 Chair and Respondent, “The Queers Are Revolting: Queer Cultural Labor and Performances of Worldmaking,” American Studies Association Annual Conference.
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
California State University, Fullerton
Introduction to Black Creative Expression (Fall 2022, Spring 2022)
Black Lives Matter Creative and Critical Ideas (Spring 2023)
African American Music Appreciation (Summer 2023, Winter 2023, Summer 2022, Fall 2021)
Tulane University
Sensational Theories of Bodies and Media (Spring 2021, Fall 2020)
Race, Gender, and Pop Music (Spring 2021, Spring 2020, Fall 2019)
Introduction to Gender & Sexuality Studies (Fall 2020)
Alternative Journalism (Spring 2021, Summer 2020)
University of Texas at Austin
Main Currents in American Culture Since 1865 (Summer 2019)
Teaching Assistantships
Main Currents in American Culture Since 1865 (Spring 2017, Fall 2016)
Main Currents in American Culture to 1865 (Summer 2017)
Introduction to American Studies (Spring 2016, Fall 2015, Fall 2014)
The United States: 1492-1865 (Spring 2015)
DEPARTMENTAL AND UNIVERSITY SERVICE
2021-Present African American Studies Curriculum Committee
2022 LEAP into Sophomore Year Professor
2021 African American Studies Representative on Mellon Grant Writing Committee
2014-2016 American Studies Graduate Student Committee
2015-2016 American Studies Events Committee
2016 Graduate Students-Faculty New Hire Liaison
MUSIC WRITING
2021 Dawn Richard’s Second Line: An Electro Revival celebrates New Orleans and Black musical culture,” Via Nola Vie.
2021 “Lana Del Rey retreats into subtlety on Chemtrails Over The Country Club,” Via Nola Vie.
2019 “Gimme a Beat: Janet Jackson’s Induction to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is Finally Here,” Bitch Media
2017 Review of Zola Jesus’s Okovi, Bitch Media, October 2017.
2017 “Austra Calls Out White Supremacy on Future Politics,” Bitch Media.
2017 “In Complete Control: SZA’s Album Follows Janet Jackson’s Blueprint,” Bitch Media.
2016 “Synthesized Sounds and Fusion Friendships in Grimes and Janelle Monáe’s ‘Venus Fly,'” In Media Res.
PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATION
American Studies Association
Cultural Studies Association
Pop Conference
Popular Music Books in Process
National Women’s Studies Association
GL/Q Caucus for the Modern Languages Association
CONSULTING
2016 Research support on Queer Genius, a documentary by Catherine Pancake.