Don James McLaughlin

Don James McLaughlin, ‘09, was awarded the Diane Hunter Prize for best dissertation in English from the University of Pennsylvania. The award, which Don James received in September 2018, goes to the best dissertation in English submitted during the previous academic year. His dissertation is entitled Infectious Affect: The Phobic Imagination in American Literature.

Don James was awarded his PhD from the University of Pennsylvania in July 2017. He held a Visiting Assistant Professorship in English at Swarthmore College in 2017-2018. Following this appointment, he has accepted a tenure-track Assistant Professorship in 19th-Century American Literature at the University of Tulsa, beginning in the fall of 2018.

Don James has also been awarded the Hench Post-Dissertation Fellowship at the American Antiquarian Society, 2018-2019, for the purpose of conducting research in their collection of early American newspapers, rare books, and manuscripts, as he turns his dissertation into a book.

UPDATE: Don James also recently published an essay in Public Books entitled "The Gay Conversion Therapy Memoir." You can read the essay here.

Congratulations, Don James!