Education
Ph.D English, Literature, Arizona State University, 2015
M.A. American Literature, San Diego State University, 2009
B.A. English, California State University, Chico, 2007
Biography
Dr. Kyndra Turner Katz joined the English Department at California State University, Channel Islands in Spring 2016. Her research draws on transnational American studies methodologies and ecocriticism in order to provide models for what she calls “readings in the Anthropocene” or re-readings of classic and contemporary texts that intervene and question dominant ideologies of power and progress. She illustrates how writers, filmmakers, and academics have been calling attention to dramatic climate events that challenge the public to rethink the relationships between human beings and other species, and reconsider responses to ecological systems of low predictability, high variability, and frequent extremes. As a whole, her work shows how ecocritical readings of texts offer insights into changing human behavior and suggest alternative practices, which provide new ways to imagine livable futures.
Recently, her book chapter titled, “Writing in the Anthropocene from the Global North to the Global South: Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and Richard Power’s The Echo Maker,” was published in Critical Norths: Space, Nature, Theory edited by Kevin Maier and Sarah Jaquette Ray (University of Alaska Press, 2017).
From 2013-2014 she served as Key Researcher for the North American Observatory's Western Cluster. In this position, she organized and facilitated several conferences and workshops that brought together literary critics, historians, political ecologists, indigenous studies scholars, and philosophers to work on collaborative projects that can be adapted and re-scaled for different institutions and communities interested in exploring how social values and human behaviors can be transformed together as a key step in developing alternative solutions to the complex environmental challenges we face now and for the future.
Prior to working at California State University, Channel Islands, Dr. Katz taught at Arizona State University and at the Hong Kong Institute of Education as a Fulbright Fellow. In addition to her work in Hong Kong, she had the opportunity to teach English and work closely with students and faculty at the Yangzhou Polytechnic College in Jiangsu Province, China, and the Longdong University in Qingyang, Gansu, China.
Representative Courses Taught
- ENGL 492: Internship
- ENGL 483: Technical Communication
- ENGL 482: Technical and Business Writing
- ENGL 337: Literature of the Environment
- ENGL 327: Major American Authors
- ENGL 326: Major British and European Authors
- ENGL 330: Interdisciplinary Writing
- ENGL 240: Literary Genres in Translation
- ENGL 220: American Literature II
- ENGL 210: Themes and Theories in World Literature
- ENGL 120: American Literature I
- ENGL 110: Multicultural Lit for Nonmajors
- ENGL 250: British and European Literature
- ENGL 338 Science and Conscience
Scholarship
Keywords
environmental humanities, ecocriticism, environmental justice, border studies, postcolonial studies, transnational American studies, cultural studies, film studies