April Trepagnier – President
April is a 2nd-year PhD and Teaching Associate at the University of Tennessee where she studies 20th- and 21st-century American literature, the influence of canonical traditions on contemporary literature, narrative ethics and moral philosophy, theological aesthetics and poetics, cultural memory and sacred narrative, and Cormac McCarthy. She is facinated by the way stories shape belief and the search for the good, the true, and the beautiful. Her academic interests range from the sacred to the subversive, often at once. She teaches writing and literature with a core belief that it is not opposable thumbs that make humans special, but our ability to tell, share, and feel stories.
When not reading, writing, or grading, she is probably making coffee.
Kira Compton – Vice President
Maegan Bishop – Secretary
Maegan currently serves as a Visiting Instructor of English at Georgia Southern University, where she earned her BA and MA in English (we call that a Double Eagle). Her research interests include Literature and the Environment, Comic Studies, the American Short Story, and Contemporary Literature. Through her experience at ALA, an executive member of a participating society invited Maegan to take part in a 4-week learning and research program in Mainz, Germany, during the summer of 2024. Additionally, Maegan continues to serve as an ALA Executive Assistant. Her experience in this area has been an invaluable resource to the ALA and the GSO. Ridiculously organized and unfailingly helpful, her new kitten Cricket is one lucky (and adorable!) rescue.
Mary Moore – Communication Director
Aidan Vick – Professional Chair
Aidan Vick (he/him) is a PhD student at Boston College studying modern and contemporary literature. His research considers how developments in media and technology affect narrative form and depictions of interiority in 20th- and 21st-century novels. He is increasingly interested in how the transformation of public space since deindustrialization impacts our relationship with digital media.
Charlene Caruthers – Social Chair
Daniel Wartham – Society Chair
Maria Lusakowska – International Chair
Erik Eklund – Post-Doc Liaison
Erik teaches in the Department of English and the College of Ministry at Northwest University and is a Research Scholar with the Northwestern University Research Initiative in Russian Philosophy, Literature, and Religious Thought. His research focuses on 20th- and 21st-century histories of religion in literature, Vladimir Nabokov studies, and the intersections of self-conscious literature, critical theory, and religion more generally. His scholarship has received three major awards from the International Vladimir Nabokov Society, including best article, best Ph.D. dissertation, and best graduate work, and comprises ten refereed articles, a Festschrift issue of Nabokov Studies in honor of Zoran Kuzmanovich, and a book titled And Then Nothing: Remapping Literature and Theology in Nabokov’s Pale Fire.