American Studies Graduate Student Committee

The committee's aim is to foster a greater sense of community within the department, through adoption of the following mission and responsibilities.
Please visit the ASGSC website for current activities.

Mission

The committee is the representative and executive arm of the collective graduate student population of the American Studies Department of the University of Texas at Austin.

Responsibilities

The responsibilities of the committee include but are not limited to:

• acting as a liason between graduate students and faculty

• planning social events

• participating in new student orientation and the mentoring of existing students

• increasing campus-wide awareness of the American Studies Department

• providing information regarding UT employee unions, employment opportunities for graduate students on campus, and professional development

• administering an outreach program to solicit greater undergraduate enrollments in American Studies courses

• communicating with other American Studies departments

Membership

The American Studies Graduate Student Committee shall be made up of no more than five persons. All members will serve one year terms starting on November 1.

Committee Contacts

Gavin Benke
Katie Feo
Andi Gustavson
Susan Quesal

List of Current Graduate Students:

Bendele, Marvin

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: 19th century religion; psychology and the law; South Texas history; foodways

Benke, Gavin

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Business History, Neoliberalism and Transnationalism,Cultural Geography, Technology and Culture, Popular Culture, and Literature
Publications: Forthcoming: “Authenticity: The Search for the Real Thing,” in Republic of Barbecue. U of Texas P.
2008: “Where Is Enron? Changing Perceptions of Geographic Relationships in the Deregulation of California’s Energy Market,” in Business and Economic History On-Line: Papers Presented at the BHC Annual Meeting. Vol. 6, 2008.
2006: “The Corporate American Dream: Class and Ethnic Struggle in Non-fiction Representations of Wall Street Culture,” in Storytelling: A Critical Journal of Popular Narrative special issue on non-fiction narrative. Winter 2006.

Beza, Brenda

M.A. American Studies,  California State University at Fullerton
B.A. American Studies,  California State University at Fullerton
Degree Sought: PhD, Graduate Studies Portfolio in Mexican American Studies
Research Interests: Immigration, specifically the migration of Central Americans to the United States; cultural memory; oral history; Latin@s in Orange County, CA; Comparative Race and Ethnicity in the United States; Border Studies; Latin@ cultural production and visual studies.
Publications: El mundo de lotería: Transnational Identity in Play, M.A. Thesis, CSUF

Covey, Eric

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Western Colorado, the railroad, foodways, whiteness studies, U.S. imperialism

Cunningham-Kruppa, Ellen

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Cultural Policy Studies
Prior Degree(s): BS Secondary Education, The University of Texas at Austin; MLIS, The University of Texas at Austin; Certificate of Advanced Study in Preservation Administration, Columbia University

D'Orsogna, Rebecca

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
B.A. Smith College, 2002
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: popular culture, gender studies, modernity, Asian American Studies
Dissertation title: Cultural History of Yoga in the United States, 1893 to the present

Feo, Katherine

M.A. History of Design, The Royal College of Art, London, UK
B.A. Art Practice/B.A. Social Welfare, University of California at Berkeley
Degree Sought: Ph.D. American Studies
Research Interests: Design History, visual rhetoric, Fashion History, exhibition design, Design Studies, early-20th century cultural history, contemporary problem solving.
Publications: "Invisibility: Men, Masks, and Memory in the First World War" in The Journal of Design History, Volume 20, Issue 1

Friedenthal, Andrew

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Comic Books, Tourism, Amusement Parks/Theming/Immersive Environments, Theatre,Performance Studies, American Cold War Social & Popular Culture
Publications: Upcoming publication of Wonder Woman paper in as-yet-untitled collection of essays on comic books

Garcia, Christina

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Mexican American Studies, Ethnic American Literature, and Transnational Studies

Gerling, Danny

M.A. Philosophy and Cultural Analysis, University of Amsterdam
Language program at the University of Veracruz
M.A. English, Eastern Illinois University
B.A. Philosophy, Eastern Illinois University
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Scatology, Foreign Relations, Cultural Imperialism, 20th Century Pop Culture, Iconography of Dissidents and Revolutionaries, Documentary Film
Dissertation title: Civilizing the Wasteland: Excrement in American Life, 1861-1914

Gessler, Anne

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: women and early radio
Prior Degree(s): College of William and Mary, BA in American Studies

Gustavson, Andi

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: 20th century fiction and photography, documentary expression, oral history

Hill, Vicky

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: class stratification and identity; consumer culture; psychology; popular culture; media.
Prior Degree(s): M.A., Journalism, University of Texas at Austin, B.S., Communications, University of Texas at Austin
Thesis title: A Qualitative Investigation of Mass Media Influence on Female Consumption Patterns and Attitudes
Dissertation title: Defining “Normal” in Their Own Image: Psychological Professionals, Middle-Class Normativity, and the Postwar Popularization of Psychology
Publications: “Conspicuous Consumption,” “Contradictory Class Location,” and “Lowell Millworkers” in Robert E. Weir, ed., Class in America: An Encyclopedia (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2007).

Holland, Josh

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Intellectual History, American Education, History of Social Movements, History of Alternative Education, Subjectivity

Jones, Andrew

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Photography, American Landscape, Road Culture, Postmodernity, the American Avant-Garde

Jenny Kelly

M.A. Interdisciplinary Humanities and Social Thought. New York University
B.A. Feminist Studies and Literature, University of California, Santa Cruz
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: U.S. imperialism; U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East; U.S. Christian Zionism; U.S. domestic and foreign prisons; feminist studies; postcolonial studies; comparative colonial histories; interdisciplinary and transnational literary studies.
Publications: “One of the Guys: A Feminist Analysis?” Review of One of the Guys: Women as Aggressors and Torturers, edited by Tara McKelvey. Anamesa: An Interdisciplinary Journal 6 (1) (Spring 2008), 114-130.

Kocurek, Carly

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Media Studies, Digital Culture, Popular Culture, Queer Theory
Publications: Gaming for the Gal on the Go: Advertising the Nintendo DS

Kolberg, Stephanie

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Landscapes of consumption and play, suburban history, aesthetics and taste, popular culture
Prior Degree(s): M.A. American Studies, Cal State Fullerton; B.A. Psychology, U.C. Davis
Publications: "Crafting a Better Tomorrow," in City Dreams and Country Schemes: Utopian Visions of the Twentieth Century American West, Kathleen Brosnan and Amy Scott, eds., University of New Mexico Press, 2010

Laux, Lily

M.A.T. The University of Memphis
B.A. Columbia University
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: American Urban History, Education

Lee, Kwangjin

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: American Corporate Culture, the Gilded Age and the Progressive Era, American Realism and Naturalism. Business History.

Lisle, Ben

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: 20C popular culture, cultural geography, sports culture, design

Jake Maguire

B.A., Amherst College 2007
Degree Sought: MA
Research Interests: Black politics, professionalization of politics, "postracialism", hate crimes

Charity Murrell

B.S. Florida A&M University
Research Interests: African American Literature and History, Louisiana Creoles of Color, Race and Ethnicity, Community Formation, Black Solidarity, Methods of Resistance, 19th Century Women's Literature

O'Sulllivan, Robin

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: environmental history, regionalism, popular culture

Onion, Rebecca

M.A. American Studies, University of Texas at Austin
B.A. American Studies, Yale University
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: childhood studies, environment and technology, modernity, popular culture
Thesis title: "Sled Dog Stories: Domestication, Masculinity, and Nationhood in Alaska, 1898-1925"
Publications: Forthcoming: "Environmental Health, Biological Risk, and Medical Display: The Individualist Etiologies of BODY WORLDS." Chapter in edited collection on BODYWORLDS exhibits, ed. Thora Jespersen, to be published by MacFarland
"Sled Dogs of the American North: On Masculinity, Whiteness, and Human Freedom." Chapter in edited collection Animals and Agency, ed. Sarah MacFarland and Ryan Hediger, to be published by Brill
"Reclaiming the Machine: Steampunk Practice and the Humanization of the Technological Object," article in the Journal of Neo-Victorian Studies

Quesal, Susan

B.A. English/Spanish, University of Iowa
Degree Sought: MA
Research Interests: urban studies, place studies, immigration, oral history, memory, early 20th century literature and culture

Powell, Lisa

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
M.S. Vanderbilt
B.A. Harvard
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: cultural geography, food, agriculture, environmental history, sustainability, national parks, the American South, Appalachia, pumpkins
Thesis title: Beauty and the Brochure: Nature and Tourism Promotion at the Tennessee Gateway Communities to Great Smoky Mountains National Park

Romig, Nadine

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
B.A. Humanities, Pepperdine University
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Religious History, Place and Landscape Studies, Feminist Analysis, Women’s History, Gender Studies, Emerging Church, Documentary Photography, Asian American Christians. Dissertation centers on Christian Praxis and Place in an Asian American Missional Community
Thesis title: “Revealing Landscape : Esther Bubley's Documentary Photographs of Tomball, Texas for Standard Oil (New Jersey), 1945”

Russek, Audrey

M.A. American Studies, The University of Texas at Austin
B.A., Pomona College
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Late-19th and 20th century cultural history; food studies; women's studies; design and technology
Dissertation Title: "I'll Have What He's Having": Consumer Desires and Cultural Conflict in American Restaurants, 1900-1965
Publications: " 'So Many Useful Women': The Pseudonymous Poetry of Marjorie Allen Seiffert, 1916- 1938" in Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature

Smith, Jacqueline

Degree Sought: PhD

Thompson-Hajdik, Anna

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Rural America, Popular Culture, Tourism, Animal Studies

Elissa Underwood

J.D. Boston College Law School, 2004
B.A. The Growth & Structure of Cities, Bryn Mawr College, 2001
Research Interests: urban studies, community development, cultural memory, criminal justice/juvenile justice, prison studies

Vaught, Jeanette

Degree Sought: PhD

Vliet, Sasha M.

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: American Youth Culture, Youth Voice Youth Expression, Education, Hip Hop Culture, American Ethnography, West Indian Culture, Latin American Studies
Publications: Essay published in: Youth Subcultures: Exploring Underground America, Arielle Greenberg
Consultant: Teens in the U.S.A. by Shea, Kitty

Wright, Allison

Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Cheerleading, Girls' Studies, Youth Cultures, Sports Cultures, Crime and Punishment, Popular Culture

Wuster, Tracy

B.A. Evergreen State College
Degree Sought: PhD
Research Interests: Mark Twain, Humor Studies, Literature, Race and Fiction, the Gilded Age, Baseball
Thesis title: Pitching the National Game: The Spalding World Baseball Tour of 1888-1889
Dissertation title: "The Funniest Man in the World": Mark Twain and the Transformation of American Culture
Publications: " 'Interrupting a Funeral with a Circus': Mark Twain, Imperial Ambivalence, and Baseball in the Sandwich Islands" in Mark Twain's Geographical Imagination.
Book Review of Jim Zwick, Confronting Imperialism for Mark Twain Forum online, February 2008. Reprinted in The Mark Twain Annual 2009, forthcoming.
"Comedy Jokes!: Steve Martin and the Limits of Stand-Up Comedy." Studies in American Humor