Elizabeth Russ

Dr. Russ has published scholarly articles on Dominican and Dominican American writers, transnationalism, and trans-American literary themes and tropes, among other topics. Her book, The Plantation in the Postslavery Imagination (Oxford University Press, 2009), examines the plantation, that physical place most vividly associated with slavery in the Americas, as a vexing rhetorical, ideological, and psychological trope through which intersecting histories of the New World have been told. Dr. Russ is currently working on a second book, which analyzes representations of gender, race, and national identity in 20th-century literature written by women from the Dominican Republic. Dr. Russ teaches classes in her areas of expertise, as well as on all aspects of Hispanic language and cultures. She also teaches two Ways of Knowing courses, one on the city of Dallas and one examining the long history between Mexico and the United States, with a focus on Texas and, especially, Dallas.

Areas of Interest

• Caribbean and Caribbean Diaspora cultures and literatures, with a special emphasis on the Dominican Republic
• Comparative literature of the Americas
• Latin American women writers
• Race, gender and sexuality in colonial and postcolonial societies

Publications and Presentations

• “‘The tam-tam of drums from the West’: Shifting representations of Haiti in the Later Work of Aída Cartagena Portalatín.” Transnational Hispaniola: Converging Paths of the Haitian-Dominican Insular Experience. Eds. April Mayes and Kiran Jayaram. Forthcoming from U of Florida P.
• "Negotiating Globalization in the Work of Junot Díaz and Rita Indiana." Paper presented at the 2017 Conference of the American Comparative Literature Association.
• “Hispaniola, on the Border of Sisterhood: Julia Alvarez’s A Wedding in Haiti and Alanna Lockward’s Marassa y la nada.” Caribbean Studies Association Conference, Port-au-Prince, June 2016.
• “Haitian-Dominican Relations in Contemporary Dominican Literature: Rey Andújar’s Candela and Rita Indiana’s Nombres y animales.” LASA Conference, New York, May 2016.
• “Between the Unthinkable and the Unsayable: The Legacy of Brigadas Dominicanas (December 1961-March 1963).” Hispanic Review 84.4 (Autumn 2016): 381-402.