Current Student Bios

Dorothy Bayern is interested in the way people perceive and negotiate identities through clothing and costume, and the current and potential applications of historical and ethnic clothing as learning tools in museum exhibits, educational programming, and cultural events. She has a BA in Anthropology from the University of Oregon and is the Exhibitions Coordinator at the U of O Museum of Natural and Cultural History.

Bruce Dahlstrom has an MA from Sonoma State University in Cultural Resource Management and a BA in Anthropology from the University of California at Berkeley. He has worked in consulting archaeology primarily in California, Oregon, and British Columbia. He is interested in the construction, meaning and use of monsters in
contemporary society particularly as they are used in expressing concerns about human/environment and human/technology issues.

Robert Dobler is a PhD student with a Master's degree in Folklore from the University of Oregon, and a B.A. in English from Penn State. He has studied Spiritualism, Internet communication with the dead, Neo-Circus and Freak Show movements, bohemianism, antinomianism, graffiti, the religious comic tracts of Jack Chick, and roadside attractions.

Nathan Georgitis is a Librarian at the University of Oregon and also Archivist of the Folklore Program's Randall V. Mills Archives of Northwest Folklore. He earned a B.A. in Literature at Brown University and a M.L.S. from Simmons College. Nathan’s interests include archives management and audio preservation; folklore and public media; and canoeing and boat building traditions.

Abby Grewatz is a first year Master's student. She graduated from the University of Montana in 2009 with a B.A. in Russian and Anthropology. She spent the following year in Moscow, Russia teaching English. Her interests include cultural stereotypes, the Caucus region, Russian culture, relations between Russia and the U.S., and matryoshka dolls.

Chip Hanna is a first year Master's student. He graduated with a B.A. in English from the University of Miami. His research interests include folk and fairytales, particularly a comparison of similar tales from different parts of the world, and how differences and similarities in the tale assist in a comparitive study of those cultures.

Hannah Kolesar is a first-year graduate student who holds a B.A. in Anthropology and English Literature from Elmira College. Her research interests include religious and occult practices, rites, and rituals, and particularly what these beliefs say about gender perception and sexuality. She takes a special interest in the role that women played in the Spiritualist movement and the role of spirit possession in different religions.

Nathan J. Moore is a first year Master's student. He earned a B.A. in Sociology from the University of Oregon. His research interests include laborlore, working class and occupational folklore, protest songs, public folklore, and film.

Jesse LeRoy Mabus is a Master's student working with the Deptartments of Folklore, Anthropology and Religious Studies. He is currently on leave working with Clatsop Community College library in Astoria, OR and studying Spanish. His previous work has focused on calendrical events in Olympia, Washington, the WTO protests in Seattle, the current Anti-War protests, as well as the Neo-Pagan tradition of Reclaiming.

Robb Norton is a Eugene native whose primary research interests include new media and digital culture. He has studied documentary filmmaking and cultural studies in England, as well as Japanese language and culture in Japan. He was one of the filmmakers of the award-winning feature film Pizza Girl produced right here in Eugene.

Ahavah Oblak received a B.S. in Elementary Education from UW-Madison and a M. Ed and Certificate of Native American Studies from Southern Oregon University. She has been an educator for 19 years; working with students ages three through adult. She has spent the last four years spearheading an eclectic group that focuses on authentic and accurate Native American resources and curriculum for teachers in the southern Oregon/northern California region. She is interested in Native salmon stories and customs and bringing them to Oregon classroom teachers and students.

Whitney Phillips is a fourth-year PhD student with a structured emphasis in Folklore, and writing instructor in the English department. She studies online culture, specifically transgressive humor within trolling and gaming subcultures, and is particularly interested in the constitutive aspects of viral humor, the metacommunicative signaling necessary to subcultural formation and what she refers to as rhizomatic reception theory, an approach to online content that attempts to bypass traditional accounts of the individual artist/author. Recent projects include an explication of “post-irony,” a comedic aesthetic inherent to and, as she argues, necessitated by online discourse, a discussion of the Obama/Joker/socialism macro, and several ethnographic accounts of trolling behaviors, both on 4chan/b/ and Facebook memorial pages.

Rosalynn Rothstein is a second year Master's student with a B.A. from Grinnell College in Comparative Literature. She studies performance in the workplace, issues of authenticity in various contexts, and the "comments" section of online news articles. She has, and continues, to do fieldwork at her workplace, the Bureau of Emergency Communications in Portland, OR.

Sarah Sandri is in her third year of the Master's program working in the Folklore, Anthropology and English departments. She studies performativity, gender and ethnicity in African dance communities in the U.S. She received a B.A. in Comparative Literature in English & French from Smith College.

Zachary B. F. Schwartz is a third year Master’s student in Folklore. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin with a B.A. in History. Zachary’s areas of study include fan communities that are dedicated to such pursuits as comic books and politics, and the negotiation of identity in commodified culture.

Erin Swartz is in her third year of the Masters program, studying Folklore, English, and Arts and Administration. In the past she has done work on gender performance in MTV's "Jackass," internet communities, "lolcats," and apocalyptic beliefs. She is beginning to put together a film for her terminal project which analyzes gender performance, rites of passage, and tradition at the Pendleton Round-Up, which celebrated its 100th anniversary this year.

Kevin Taylor is a Master's student.  He received his B.A. from the University of Oregon in Philosophy and Religious Studies.  His areas of focus within Folklore are Religious Studies and Arts and Administration.  Current research interests include new religious movements, apocalyptic eschatology, and prophetic tradition.

Christy Vrtis is pursuing a PhD in English with a structured emphasis in Folklore. Her research interests include contemporary African diasporan women's literature and folklore, Pacific Island literature and culture, ritual theory, new media and storytelling. Christy received her MA in Folklore from the University of Oregon in June 2010 upon completion of a master's thesis entitled "'Death is the Only Reality': Notions of Death and Funerary Ritual in Contemporary Caribbean Women's Literature."

Jenée Wilde is in the English Ph.D. program with a structured emphasis in Folklore. Her research interests include contemporary American literature and popular culture, sexual identity and representation, sexual subcultures, fairy tales, and queer theory. Her essay titled "Queer Matters in The Dark Knight Returns, Or Why We Insist on a Sexual Identity for Batman" will be published in the forthcoming book, Batman Meets the Academy. She also has presented the essay at the 2009 Popular Culture Association national conference and at the University of Oregon's Understanding Superheroes conference. In Spring 2010, she received the Bruce Abrams LGBT Award for her essay "Torchwood and Bisexual Representation." She is currently doing fieldwork with polyamory and bisexual groups. She has an MFA in creative nonfiction writing from Goddard College and a BA in English and Journalism from Boise State University.

Rosemary Woodward received a B.A. in Music at the University of Oregon in 2008 and began pursuing her Master's in Folklore with focuses in Ethnomusicology and Anthropology in the fall of 2009. Her interests include herbal and other nature-based medicines, healing through music, food traditions throughout the world, and female archetypes such as the wise woman, the goddess, the green witch, and the crone. She spent a portion of the summer of 2010 apprenticing with herbalist, wise woman, and shaman Susun Weed at her home and goat farm in the state of New York where she learned more about the Green Goddess Path and living in connection with the earth.

Shelise Zumwalt is a third year Master’s student with a B.A. in Religious Studies, and an Undergraduate Certificate in Folklore from the University of Oregon. Her areas of focus include Folklore, Arts and Administration, and Anthropology. Her interests center around public folklore and issues of representation.

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