Faculty

Bob Niemi
Coordinator of American Studies Program
Associate Professor of English
B.A. University of Massachusetts at Amherst; M.S. Columbia University; M.A., Ph.D. University of Massachusetts at Amherst

Courses Taught: Genres: Film; American literature surveys; Critical Theory; advanced film courses

Areas of Expertise: American Studies; American literature and cultural history; film studies; critical theory; popular culture studies

Recent Scholarly Achievements: Dr. Niemi has just completed a book on Russell Banks and has published a bibliography of Weldon Kees. He is beginning work on another study, Class Representation in Film.

On Teaching and Research: Most of Dr. Niemi's research and publishing is in American Studies areas (i.e., contemporary literature, film, cultural studies and critical theory), which makes for a close and lively reciprocity between his research and teaching.

Outside Saint Michael's: Dr. Niemi and his wife keep a "hobby farm," complete with numerous chickens, roosters, goats, dogs, cats, and a 3-year-old pet Vietnamese potbellied pig named Leonard.

Campus Office
Saint Edmund's 345
Phone: 802.654.2569
Box 394
E-mail: rniemi@smcvt.edu

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Nathaniel Lewis
Professor of English
B.A. Yale University; M.A. University of North Carolina; Ph.D. Harvard University

Dr. Lewis has written on western American literature, literary aesthetics, and nature writing. He is the co-editor of True West: Authenticity and the American West and the author of Unsettling the Literary West, which won the Western Literature Association’s 2004 Thomas J. Lyon award for Best Critical Book in the field. He serves on the editorial board of the Postwestern Horizons series for the University of Nebraska Press and is a past member of the Western Literature Association’s Executive Council. He is currently at work on a collaborative book, tentatively titled Morta Las Vegas: CSI and the Problem of the West. Dr. Lewis teaches courses on literary theory, environmental writing, and multiethnic literatures. 

Campus Office
Saint Edmund's 335
Phone: 802.654.2308
Box 245
E-mail: nlewis@smcvt.edu

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Lorrie SmithLorrie Smith
Professor of English and American Studies
B.A. University of Massachusetts-Boston; M.A., Ph.D. Brown University

View Dr. Smith's Curriculum Vitae

Courses Taught: American Literature I and II; African American Literature; The Middle Passage (Transatlantic Slave Trade in History, Memory, and Imagination); Genres: Poetry; Senior Seminar on various topics (latest: Literature and the Blues); First-Year Seminar on Race and Culture

Areas of Expertise: African American literature, especially poetry 

Recent Scholarly Achievements: Dr. Smith is currently working on a book entitled Reports from Vernacular Valleys: Post-Sixties Black Poetry and the Public Sphere. She published a book chapter, "Hungry Ghosts and Restless Spirits: Lyric Voices of the Middle Passage" in Africa and Its Diaporas: History, Memory, and Literary Manifestations (Eritrea: African World Press, 2008).  

On Teaching and Research: Dr. Smith's classes offer the opportunity to engage students in discussions of race, racism, African American literature and history. She has worked hard to develop strategies for safely approaching what can often be loaded material that challenges students' comfort zones. She often incorporates experiences that combine classroom study with activities in the community. This includes overnight field trips to Charlestown, Massachusetts with her First-Year Seminar course and a three-week service-learning program in Ghana with students from her Middle Passage class. Through these cross-cultural encounters, students have a chance to examine and enlarge their own perspectives. Dr. Smith is also a faculty member in Saint Michael's American Studies program.

Outside Saint Michael's: Dr. Smith enjoys yoga, meditation, dance, gardening and cross-country skiing. She participates in anti-racism efforts and anti-war activism.

Learn more about Dr. Smith in her faculty spotlight. 

Campus Office
Saint Edmund's Hall 337
Phone: 802.654.2392
Box 167
E-mail: lsmith@smcvt.edu