Welcome, Professor Sami Schalk!

Sami Schalk

Dr. Sami Schalk is thrilled to join the Department of Gender & Women’s Studies at UW-Madison. Professor Schalk earned her PhD in Gender Studies at Indiana University and worked at SUNY Albany and Rutgers prior to coming to Madison. Her research focuses on disability, race, and gender in contemporary American literature and culture, especially African American and women’s texts. Professor Schalk’s first book, Bodyminds Reimagined: (Dis)ability, Race, and Gender in Black Women’s Speculative Fiction, is forthcoming from Duke University Press in 2018. The book argues that black women writers use the non-realist genre of speculative fiction to reimagine the possibilities and meanings of bodyminds in ways that shift and change our understandings of (dis)ability, race, and gender. Professor Schalk has also done research on disability in the American Girl brand, so she is especially excited to be here in Madison near where the brand was started and is still headquartered. Her next research project will focus on disability politics in contemporary African American culture, including the work of the Black Panther Party. At UW-Madison, Professor Schalk will be teaching humanities approach courses in disability studies, black feminist theory, and literature, such as her current course “Gender, Disability, and Sexuality” and her spring 2018 course, “Gender and Social Justice Movements in Literature.” You can learn more about Professor Schalk and keep up with her talks and research on her website.