Department of English

Karen Kilcup

Email: klkilcup@uncg.edu
Office: MHRA 3314

Education

Ph.D. Brandeis University
M.A. Brandeis University
M.A. University of New Hampshire
B.A. Wellesley College

Research Interests

The Elizabeth Rosenthal Excellence Professor of English, Environmental & Sustainability Studies, and Women’s & Gender Studies, Professor Kilcup has broad research and teaching interests in nineteenth- and twentieth-century American literature.  Her current research focuses on environmental literature, children’s literature, nineteenth-century American poetry, Native American literature, and women’s writing. Since 2016, she has been the editor of ESQ: A Journal of Nineteenth-Century American Literature and Culture.

Selected Publications

• Stronger, Truer, Bolder: American Children’s Writing, Nature, and the Environment. Athens: U of Georgia P, 2021.
• Who Killed American Poetry?: From National Obsession to Elite Possession. Ann Arbor: U of Michigan P, 2019.
• “Looking Again: Reflections among the Trees.” Yale ISM Review 5.1 (2019).
• Fallen Forests: Emotion, Embodiment, and Ethics in American Women’s Environmental Writing, 1781-1924. Athens: U of Georgia P, 2013.
• Over the River and Through the Wood: An Anthology of Nineteenth-Century American Children’s Poetry, coedited with Angela Sorby. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2013.
• “Feeling American in the Poetic Republic.” Nineteenth-Century Literature 70.3 (2015): 299-335.

Awards and Honors

• Linda Arnold Carlisle Distinguished Excellence Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies, 2014-2015
• UNCG Senior Research Excellence Award, 2011-2012.
• National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) Fellowship, 2010-2011. Special recognition for advancing the goals of the We the People Project.
• President, Society for the Study of American Women Writers, 2004-2010 (elected).
• Edna and Jordan Davidson Eminent Scholar Chair in the Humanities, Florida International University, 2000. 
• Andrew W. Mellon Research Fellowship, Massachusetts Historical Society, 1996-97
• Dorothy M. Healy Distinguished Visiting Professor of American Studies, Westbrook College, 1996.
• Distinguished Teacher, The White House Commission on Presidential Scholars and The National Education Association, 1987.  

Links

Karen Kilcup’s Website 

ESQ: A Journal of Nineteenth-Century American Literature and Culture

Society for the Study of American Women Writers 

The Envious Lobster: A Collection of American Children’s Nature Writing, 1824-1923

Bookshelf

Over the River and Through the Wood: An Anthology of Nineteenth-Century American Children’s Poetry

Anthology by Karen Kilcup

Fallen Forests: Emotion, Embodiment, and Ethics in American Women’s Environmental Writing

Monograph by Karen Kilcup

Who Killed American Poetry?: From National Obsession to Elite Possession

Book by Karen Kilcup

Stronger, Truer, Bolder: American Children’s Writing, Nature, and the Environment

Book by Karen Kilcup