Na Rim Kim

I study contemporary multi-ethnic American women’s literature. Specifically, I am interested in this literature’s pedagogical exploration of how to encourage ethical living. My dissertation examines how the magical realist novels of four contemporary African American and Asian American women promote wondering, an act/experience that these writers view as a gateway to becoming more respectful and open to the other. I have presented or published research on the work of diverse women writers, such as Harriet Jacobs’s autobiography/slave narrative, the plays of Julia Cho and Wendy Wasserstein, and the novels of Jesmyn Ward, Leslie Marmon Silko, and Kamila Shamsie. I received my Ph.D. in English from Purdue University, where I taught first-year composition and served as editorial assistant for the peer-reviewed academic journal Modern Fiction Studies (MFS).  

Courses Taught

Introduction to Literary Analysis (ENG 120) and Traditions of Ethnic American Literature (ENG 232)

Publications

“The Ethics of Desire in Gertrude Stein’s ‘Melanctha’: A Lacanian Reading.”  Journal of Arts and Humanities, vol. 5, no. 8, 2016, pp. 29-38.
 
“The ‘Whiter Foster Sister’ Fails: Interracial Sisterhood Is a Myth in Harriet Jacobs’s Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl.” Journal of American Studies, vol. 47, no. 1, 2015, pp. 191-211. (Coauthor: Ji-Eun Kim)                                                                                     
 
“Women Judge Women: Disagreement amongst Women about Women in Wendy Wasserstein’s The Heidi Chronicles.” Studies in British and American Language and Literature, vol. 117, 2015, pp. 179-98. (Coauthor: Jung-Gyung Song)