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nf-woodward-spotlightMarshelle Woodward, PhD, joins Canisius College as an assistant professor of English. Woodward received her BA from Georgetown College in Kentucky, and her MA and PhD from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Woodward specializes in the study of early modern literature and culture, with a particular interest in the histories of science and religion. Her recent publications examine the role of Catholicism in Ben Jonson’s poetics and the use of allegory in early modern science writing. Woodward is currently researching “apocalyptic materialism” in the devotional lyrics of Hester Pulter, a recently discovered 17th-century poet.

This semester, Woodward is teaching FYS 101: Writing Fear, Fighting Fear and Shakespeare I, a course in which students explore how Shakespeare’s generic experiments affected his treatment of race, gender and sexuality. Woodward will offer a spring topics course on Shakespeare and emotion, and looks forward to teaching widely in medieval and Renaissance literature. Courses in development include Literature and World Building, which she hopes to teach in the core curriculum and an upper-level course on Ignatian meditation and metaphysical poetry.

When not reading aged texts, Woodward can be found watching high and lowbrow television, visiting her husband in Toronto and taking the occasional Pilates class.

Submitted by: Sara Morris, PhD, associate vice president, academic affairs