Karen E. Waldron

Karen Elizabeth Waldron sees herself first and foremost as teacher and mentor. She received her B.A. in Literature and Philosophy from Hampshire College in 1974, an M.A. in English Literature from the University of Massachusetts/Boston in 1988, a second M.A. in Womens Studies from Brandeis University in 1993, and the Ph.D. in English and American Literature from Brandeis in 1994. Her research on 19th and 20th century American womens and minority literature Brandeis is highly interdisciplinary and she has a wide diversity of literary, historical, and scientific passions particularly the exploration of otherness and consciousness in narrative form and the power of language to represent and transform. Prior to her graduate work, Karen taught secondary English and worked as a technical writer and trainer. She earned several teaching fellowships while a graduate student at Brandeis and from 1993 1995 she was an adjunct and then visiting faculty member at both Boston College and Brandeis University. Karen became a member of the faculty of COA in the fall of 1995 and teaches literature and writing courses ranging from Literature, Science, Spirituality to Nineteenth Century American Women, Native American Literature, From Atmosphere to Argument, and Contemporary Womens Novels. Other classes such as City/Country: American Literary Landscapes 1860-1920 and African American literature take an interdisciplinary approach to literary periods and histories. COA students working with Karen have done projects ranging from nature writing, an exploration of literature and mathematics, and histories of communities to writing a book of poems, novel, or advanced theoretical piece in literary studies.

Besides reading, writing, and being the academic dean, Karen spends time thinking about psychology, education, politics, and ecology. She is the mother of two avid soccer-playing sons.

Karen's website: http://www.coa.edu/kwaldron/