As Head Tutor, I collaborate with Folklore and Mythology students to design their curriculums and senior thesis projects. I teach the Folklore and Mythology sophomore tutorial, FOLKMYTH 97: Fieldwork and Ethnography (spring), FOLKMYTH 120: Folklore and Appalachia (spring), and GENED 1196: The Artfulness of Everyday Life (fall), which double counts as the introductory course for Folklore & Mythology concentrators and secondaries. Harvard students are welcome to schedule a meeting with me through Calendly. 

My work explores rurality and the role of young people in cultural transmission in contemporary Bulgaria and Appalachia, through a folkloristic lens. My book in progress, The Village Project: Reimagining, Rebuilding, and Reconnecting in Contemporary Bulgaria, investigates the role of young Bulgarians in village revitalization. I look to their engagements in personal life projects, civic projects, and arts projects to better understand intergenerational meanings attached to the Bulgarian village. (Manuscript under contract with University of Wisconsin Press). My broader interests include space, place, and commemoration; critical heritage studies; and generations. I am committed to community engaged, public facing scholarship.

I received my PhD in Comparative Cultural Studies and Folklore from Ohio State University. Prior to joining Harvard’s Folklore & Mythology program, I was Visiting Assistant Professor of Folklore at Indiana University. A first-generation college graduate, I grew up in southwestern Ohio, at the border of the Midwest and the Appalachian foothills. Outside of class and advising, I am an avid embroider and ultimate frisbee player, and a novice of Bulgarian horo (folk dance). I serve on the International Connections Committee of the Appalachian Studies Association and the Steering Committee of the Midwest Folklorists and Cultural Workers Alliance. I also co-organize the Folklorists of Appalachia working group alongside Dr. Jordan Lovejoy of UNC Chapel Hill.

Publications

“An Urban Project in Rural Crisis: Responding to Coronavirus in Bulgarian Villages.” FOLKLORICA—Journal of the Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Folklore Association. 24 (July 2021):1-26.

“Young in the Village: ‘The Project’ in Rural Revitalization Work.” Bulgarian Ethnology. 1 (2022): 123-140.

“Playing with the Past: ‘Momata Barbie’ and Georgi Gospodinov’s Time Shelter as Two Folkloric Futures'.” The Collective