Instructor Biographies

Fall 2022

Michele Bigley

Kathleen Bryan, M.A. in English and American Literature from UCSD, is still reading, studying and teaching about race and class in America through its literature, more relevant than ever since writing my thesis on those themes in the novels of William Faulkner.

Andrea Carter holds a PhD in Education with a focus on feminist pedagogy and student resistance and has taught at a variety of colleges and universities. She has participated in the National Writing Project, the NCTE, and the AERA. She recently published her first in a series of young adult murder mystery novels. Her most recent work was published in the San Diego Poetry Annual, 14 Hills and The Big Windows Review.

Jennifer Carter completed an MA in Liberal Arts & Sciences, focusing her research on gender, popular culture, sociology, ethnic, and LGBTQ studies. She also holds a BA in English Literature and Women's Studies and is a German-English translator. In addition, Jennifer has taught for several college campuses and her writing has appeared in various publications, which culminated in the founding of The California Journal of Women Writers. 

Melinda Guillen is a writer, curator, and Ph.D. in Art History, Theory, and Criticism in the UCSD Department of Visual Arts. Her dissertation, tentatively titled, "Don't Need You: Conceptual Art, Feminism, and Estrangement" focuses on the work of curator Lucy R. Lippard and artists Lee Lozano and Adrian Piper during the 1960's and 1970's. She specializes in Postwar American Contemporary Art and Feminist Theory. She has also published essays and presented on panels in other areas including socially engaged art criticism, art & technology, urban studies, social movements, DIY culture, and humor as a critical device.

Erik Homenick is a PhD candidate in Literature. His scholarly interests include representations of monstrosity in literature and films as well as the narrative/semiotic potential of music in films. Erik's doctoral dissertation will focus on the outstanding narrative importance of music, especially by the composer Akira Ifukube, in Godzilla films. Erik also holds an M.A. in French and has taught the language at various institutions of higher learning, including UC San Diego and San Diego State University.

Jarret Krone

Trung T. Le was a lecturer of British and American literature at the University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi. He is completing his doctoral studies at University of California, San Diego. His current research focuses on migrating subjects of irony in the literature and history of Vietnamese refugees.

Elizabeth Miller has a Ph.D. in Art History, Theory, and Criticism from UC San Diego and an M.A. in Art and Museum Studies from Georgetown University. She has worked for a number of arts initiatives, non-profit organizations, and museums over her graduate and professional career, and she has been teaching and tutoring writing since 2005, when she first gained employment as an undergraduate writing tutor at Arizona State University's Learning Resource Center. Her dissertation, “The U.S. Imagination of Maya Ruins—Critical Reflections on American Art and Architecture 1839-1972,” unpacks historical treatments of indigenous America by addressing various examples of Anglo-American cultural production that draw upon ancient Mesoamerican architecture. Elizabeth's research focuses on the intersections between geography, art, and politics, and her interests include 19th and 20th century art of the Americas, focusing on works of fine arts and architecture that have contributed to the mythologies of the broadly American landscape.

Michael Morshed writes crime novels around bringing opportunities to the disenfranchised. He also created and writes for a website (roykeaneismydaddy.com) that tells narrative and analytical stories about soccer.

Vincent Pham, Ph.D. Program, Visual Arts. Vince is an art historian whose work and research focus on the visual culture surrounding portraiture in the long eighteenth century in Britain. Recent ideas that have been of interest include the sociability of portraiture, social practices within art spaces, and the experience of viewing in the eighteenth century. 

Pamela Redela

David Quijada

Kelly Silva recently completed her PhD in History from the University of California San Diego. Her dissertation, "To Serve and To Heal: Native Peoples, Government Physicians, and the Rise of a Federal Indian Health Care System, 1832-1883," charts the origins, expansion, and bureaucratization of a federal Indian health care system throughout the nineteenth century. She is currently researching and writing about medical interactions between the Ho-Chunk and U.S. army surgeons during the Black Hawk War of 1832.

Haydee Smith is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Literature Department and specializes in LGBTQ+ memoirs and media, Disability Studies, and how personal narratives propel social justice communities and movements.  She has published about Pop Cultural icons like Xena: Warrior Princess and is currently negotiating a détente with her cat about to whom the couch belongs.  

Marina Vlahakis

Felicity Yin is a Ph.D. candidate in Art History, Theory, and Criticism in the Visual Arts Department. She has taught courses on non-Western art. She also has been researching and presenting on topics focusing on the intersections between art, media culture, and politics in 20th century China.