About the Faculty
Çiğdem Üsekes
Department Chair, Professor
Office: White Hall 325C
Phone: (203) 837-3294
Email: usekesc@wcsu.edu
I have published essays on drama, theatre and race studies in the following journals, books and encyclopedias: African American Review, Obsidian: Literature in the African Diaspora, American Drama, Bloom’s Modern Critical Views: August Wilson, New England Theatre Journal, Philological Review, Dictionary of Literary Biography, The Literary Encyclopedia and Contemporary Literary Criticism. Although I started out my career as an English professor, I have also taught film courses for well over a decade. While I spent some time as an administrator, teaching has always been my passion; I look forward to engaging students in conversations on contemporary and relevant topics. The interdisciplinary studies programs in the Kathwari Honors Program and the Department of Philosophy and Humanistic Studies have allowed me to draw from my varied academic interests. In addition to teaching courses for the Kathwari Honors Program (as my schedule permits), I regularly teach the following courses (most of which I have developed) in the Department of Philosophy and Humanistic Studies:
HUM 190 Social Issues in Film
HUM 224 Thinking about Race
HUM 290 Science and Technology in Film
HUM 291 Utopia and Dystopia
HUM 292 Science and Society
HUM 390 Interdisciplinary Approaches to the Moving Image
HUM 391 Big Data and Society
HUM 451 Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies
I am firmly committed to interdisciplinarity which best helps us understand the interconnected nature of our world and its complex problems.
Heather Levy, Ph.D.
Professor of English
Office: White Hall 325A
Phone: 203-837-3272
Email: levyh@wcsu.edu
My research interests include LGBTQIA+ fiction, feminist literature and narratives of the sea. Current research projects include a study of abjection and maritime lyricism in the shorter fiction of Langston Hughes and resistance and abjection in Brandon Taylor’s first three novels. Greyhound welfare and animal rights are so important to me. Hobbies include freshwater kayaking, swimming, landscape watercolors and chess with AI.
Donald P. Gagnon, Ph.D.
Professor of English
Office: VPAC 247
Phone: 203-837-9062
Email: gagnond@wcsu.edu
Teaching and Research Interests: American literature and theatre; African American literature and theatre; lgbtq+ literature and theatre.
Dr. Don Gagnon earned his Ph.D. in English/Literature at the University of South Florida, where he taught prior to joining the WestConn English faculty. His fields of research include American literature, modern drama, and African American literature, with additional background and interest in LGBTQ literature and theatre. Holding a dual appointment in both the English and Theatre Arts departments, he was the inaugural recipient of the university’s Outstanding Teacher award. He also teaches for the Kathwari Honors program and has co-created courses that have taken WCSU students to Paris and London. He has published and presented fiction and criticism on a wide variety of topics in a wide variety of venues and is the editor of an anthology on Oscar Hammerstein II. In addition, he has served as board representative to the Northeast Modern Language Association and the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival, for which he leads a criticism workshop, and he is active as advisor to the Gender and Sexuality Alliance.
| Adjunct Faculty
|
Office: White Hall 125
Email: buchanand@wcsu.edu
David Buchanan earned his Ph.D. in English from the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied modern drama and the histories of domesticity, empire, and racial capitalism. His recent research project reassesses plays by Caryl Churchill, Henrik Ibsen, Arthur Miller, August Wilson, and others, and argues that their works reveal how transatlantic imperialism, global capitalism, and settler colonialism have shaped domestic conventions and kinship structures. He has published a journal article on Caribbean literature and its representations of economic austerity programs that have impacted the environment and feelings of belonging to the islands. As a freelance journalist, David has interviewed three finalists and one winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
| Provey |
Office: White Hall 125
Email: proveyr@wcsu.edu
Robin DeMerell Provey has taught in the English and Writing departments at WCSU since 2013. An award-winning journalist, Robin studied journalism at Pace University, where she received the university’s Print Journalism Award. Robin spent more than a decade in the newsroom and has written for The News-Times, The Connecticut Law Tribune, and The Rivertowns Enterprise. Since 2013, she has also been the Public Relations consultant for Danbury Public Schools. Robin has an MA in English literature from WCSU, where she is currently pursuing an MFA in Professional and Creative Writing. Her most recent work, “Seeds of #MeToo Planted under the Orange Trees in Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath,” was published in the spring 2020 issue of The Steinbeck Review.
Office: White Hall 125
Email: elkhalfih@wcsu.edu
Dr. Hamid El Khalfi holds a Ph.D. in Literature (English and French Drama), Master of Arts (M.A.) in Drama in addition to a Postgraduate Certificate in Literature from the University of Essex, England. His doctorate has enabled him to teach across disciplines and he has taught English, English Literature, IDS (Interdisciplinary Studies), and various Language courses such as French and Arabic. His credentials in Literature and Linguistics, his multicultural background, and research interests over the past 20 years reflect his passion for communication, world languages, and different cultures. Alongside his teaching duties, he continues to develop courses and to give presentations on topics within all his fields of expertise.
John Klyczek
Email: klyczekj@wcsu.edu
John Klyczek holds a master’s degree in English. For more than 10 years, he has taught a range of university and community college courses, including composition, rhetoric, research methods, interdisciplinary studies, literary studies, creative writing, and business writing. He has also taught an array of adult education courses, including developmental writing, fundamental reading, and GED prep classes. Klyczek also has over a decade of experience as a literacy tutor and writing center consultant.
Robinson
Mark Robinson
Email: robinsonma@wcsu.edu
Mark Dennis Robinson is an ISP Resident Fellow at Yale Law School. Dr. Robinson joins Yale from Harvard Law School, where he was a student fellow at the Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics, as well as Creighton University, where he is an assistant professor of bioethics.
Robinson’s research offers insights relevant to bioethics, global technology policy, and the implications of emerging advances in science, technology, and medicine. His recent book, The Market in Mind: How Financialization Is Shaping Neuroscience, Translational Medicine, and Innovation in Biotechnology (MIT Press) was the first to trace the unforeseen impacts of economic shifts upon the work of translational neuroscientists and its ethical implications for global innovation and the world’s patients.
Robinson’s latest project synthesizes significant data about human moral failure and makes a brand new argument about the nature of human morality. Using this data, Robinson proposes a new way to design solutions for global moral problems.
Dr. Robinson holds a degree in Bioethics from Harvard Medical School, graduate degrees from the University of Chicago, and a Ph.D. and M.A. from Princeton University, under a Presidential Fellowship.
Danielle Troetti
Office: White Hall 125
Email: troettid@wcsu.edu
Danielle Troetti, MA, believes deeply in education as activism for social justice. She has been teaching “Secondary English Methods” and “Teaching Literature in Schools” through WCSU’s English and Education departments since 20212, but the majority of her professional time is spent at Bethel High School where she has worked as an English Teacher, interventionist, literacy specialist, and instructional coach since the last millennium. Her service on district-wide teams as well as adjuncting at WCSU has provided her with experience ranging from preschool through graduate school levels; she is grateful for the perspective that has bestowed up her a teacher, mother, and advocate for learners of all ages. She presented on summer reading at the CT Reading Association Conference, but relishes in and discusses reading year-round with all who will indulge her (especially reluctant students).