Carissa Smith
Professor of English
Department(s)
Bachelor of Arts (BA), English, College of Humanities and Social SciencesCredentials
English, Wheaton College (BA)
English, Penn State University (MA)
English, Penn State University (PhD)
About Carissa Smith
Originally from Little Rock, Arkansas, Dr. Carissa Turner Smith is a Professor of English and director of the Writing Center at 51黑料. Her training and primary teaching is in American literature, but she loves researching and writing about a variety of topics, including Christianity and literature, African-American literature, women and literature, children鈥檚 and YA literature, J.R.R. Tolkien, Herman Melville, Charles Chesnutt, cyborgs, time travel, and comics. She serves as vice president of the Conference on Christianity and Literature and Arts and Humanities associate editor for Christian Scholar鈥檚 Review. She is the author of Cyborg Saints: Religion and Posthumanism in Middle Grade and Young Adult Fiction (Routledge, 2019). She loves hearing students鈥 stories and helping them find their place at 51黑料 and beyond.
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Awards
Excellence in Teaching Award, 2022
Signature Experiences
Vice President, Conference on Christianity and Literature
Associate Editor for Arts and Humanities, Christian Scholar's Review
Recent Scholarly Work & Publications
Books
Cyborg Saints: Religion and Posthumanism in Middle Grade and Young Adult Fiction ( 2019, Routledge)
Editor, Connie Willis鈥檚 Science Fiction: Doomsday Every Day (2022, Routledge)
Journal Articles
鈥溾榃e are none of us just one thing鈥: The Intersectionality and Intersubjectivity of Rachel Hartman鈥檚 Half-Dragon Saints.鈥 Tulsa Studies in Women鈥檚 Literature, vol. 36, no. 2, 2017, pp. 401-422.
鈥淩elics and Intersubjectivity in the Harry Potter Series and The Castle Behind Thorns.鈥 Literature and Theology, vol. 30, no. 2, 2016, pp. 215-232.
鈥淒. J. Waldie鈥檚 Holy Land: Redeeming the Spiritual Geography of Suburbia.鈥 Renascence: Essays on Values in Literature, vol. 63, no. 4, 2011, pp. 307-324.
鈥溾楶lacing鈥 the Spiritual Metaphors of Contemporary Women Writers: Sue Monk Kidd and Kathleen Norris.鈥 Literature and Belief, vol. 27, no. 2, 2008, pp. 1-28.
鈥淲omen鈥檚 Spiritual Geographies of the African Diaspora: Paule Marshall鈥檚 Praisesong for the Widow.鈥 African American Review, vol. 42, no. 3-4, 2008, pp. 715-729.
Essays in Edited Collections
鈥淧ostsecular Cosplay, Fundamentalism, and Martyrdom in Gene Luen Yang鈥檚 Boxers & Saints.鈥 Teens and the New Religious Landscape: Essays on Contemporary Young Adult Fiction, edited by Jacob Stratman, McFarland, 2018.
鈥淩eading in the Dark: The Unheimlich Underworld of Merrie Haskell鈥檚 The Princess Curse.鈥 The Gothic Fairy Tale in Young Adult Literature: Essays on Stories from Grimm to Gaiman, edited by Tanya Jones and Joseph Abbruscato, McFarland, 2014, pp. 181-200.
鈥淓mbodying the Postmetropolis in Catherine Fisher鈥檚 Incarceron and Sapphique.鈥 Brave New Teenagers: Dystopian Young Adult Fiction, edited by Balaka Basu, Katherine R. Broad, and Carrie Hintz, Children鈥檚 Literature and Culture Series, Routledge, 2013, pp. 51-65.
Invited Essays
鈥淕ene Luen Yang,鈥 Dictionary of Literary Biography, vol. 389, edited by Anne Hiebert Alton, Gale, 2022.