Faculty & Staff

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Joe Aguilar’s teaching and research interests include creative writing, Chicano literature, folklore, science fiction, and the contemporary American novel. He has received support from MacDowell, Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, and Clarion Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers’ Workshop. He is co-editor of hex literary alongside Kate McIntyre and Danny Miller.

Gizem Arslan’s research and teaching interests include post-war literatures in German, French and Turkish, translation studies, migration studies, theories of language, literary-mathematical experiments, and writing systems of the world. She enjoys teaching German at all levels and learning new languages. Particularly important to her teaching are exploring connections between German and other languages, integrating culture and intercultural learning into her courses, and continually educating herself on diversity, equity and inclusion issues in language programs. ...

I compose, perform, record, mix and produce electroacoustic music; I am interested in how we can use the tools and techniques of audio production to explore new musical territory. I build mechatronic and robotic musical instruments; I am interested in how we can free electronic music from the world of speakers through computer-controlled automatic mechanical instruments. I conduct research and experiments that explore how our cognitive and perceptual processes affect our musical experience; I am interested in how we can use such research to guide our compositional and analytic activities. ...

Professor Frederick Bianchi works in the area of music technology. As the director of music technology research, Bianchi works with students from all disciplines. His particular focus is Virtual Orchestra technology, multichannel sound design, and neuroscience research. In addition to overseeing the Media Arts Group Innovation Center (MAGIC), Professor Bianchi is also the director of the Bar Harbor, Maine Project Center and the Glacier National Park Project Center.

Roshanak Bigonah has studied Education and Technology, and Media with concentration in Video Production and Advertising. For the past 13 years, she has taught a wide range of courses in Digital Arts including  Graphic Arts, Web Design,  Photography, Videography and 3D Design. Roshanak Bigonah has worked as a freelance graphic and web designer.  In addition to her teaching interests Roshanak Bigonah, is a poet and has published four poetry books in her native language, Farsi. A collection of her works has been translated and published in Dutch and German. ...

Dr. Boucher-Yip has taught in many parts of the world including Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, China, Laos, the United Kingdom, and the United States. She has taught communication skills and writing courses at university level for over a decade. Her teaching approach is informed by her own experience in language learning and with theories of second language acquisition and their pedagogical applications. Both her studies and her experience have taught her that there is no one method or idea that guarantees successful language learning. ...

My research interests include literature and culture, humanities and STEM integration, and engineering education. These areas are unified by broad concerns for justice, inclusion, and social progress. My literary scholarship considers the ways literature helps to advance social progress and justice. My educational scholarship is aimed at advancing more inclusive, fair, and effective education for all people.  ...

Born in Michigan in 1956, I graduated from the University of Michigan in 1978, earning my PhD at Stanford University in 1985. I have enjoyed teaching British literature at WPI since 1990. I like the intelligence and good work ethic of WPI students; I especially enjoy the opportunity to meet and interact with students in small groups and on an individual basis. The bulk of my scholarly work falls into three principal areas. ...

Steven C. Bullock is professor of history at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, where he was a recipient of the Trustees’ Award for Outstanding Research and Creative Scholarship. He has also served as a Fulbright Lecturer in Okinawa, Japan. ...

Lucy Caplan is an interdisciplinary historian of music, race, and culture in the United States. Her research and teaching interests include African American music, opera and musical theater, and cultural criticism. At present, she is writing a book about how early-twentieth-century African Americans redefined the genre of opera as a wellspring of antiracist activism, collective sociality, and aesthetic innovation. In conjunction with her academic work, Prof. ...

In addition to teaching the history of science and technology, I have at various times in the past raised baby birds at the Bronx Zoo and the Baltimore Aquarium, curated and inventoried mammal skeletons in attics at the Smithsonian Natural History Museum, designed biology teaching labs at the University of Colorado, and collected dinosaurs and other fossils while camping in the Wyoming badlands with paleontology field crews. ...

In research and in teaching, Jim Cocola focuses on intersections between geography and the humanities, primarily in the field of modern and contemporary American literature and culture. His most recent study examines place making in American poetry and poetics through a comparative, multiethnic, and transnational lens. His newest project reflects on cultural production by Americans and others of Mediterranean descent, looking mainly at literary and visual artifacts. He is also interested in experiential and experimental forms of writing. ...

One of Professor Cullon’s students recently called him "strangely fascinating." He knew that he was strange but he was happy to learn that a student found his approach to teaching fascinating. He likes to encourage students to see history not as a mass of dead facts but as a vital mode of inquiry and a moral project that has the potential to inform the present as much as illuminate the past. ...

Althea started teaching English as a second language in 2000, when she moved to West Africa. Over the next seven years she lived and taught in Senegal, Niger and Benin. In 2007 she moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota, where she taught ESL to immigrants and refugees at the Hubbs Center and developmental reading at St. Paul College. Her teaching passions include integrating culture and social justice issues in the classroom, building critical thinking skills in her students, and teaching with technology. ...

I am a broadly trained interdisciplinary scholar of 19th and 20th American history and critical feminist studies. Along with Dr. Rebecca Moody, I serve as the co-founder and co-director of the Gender, Sexuality & Women’s Studies (GSWS) program. My scholarly and pedagogical interests vary widely, ranging from reproductive justice to sexual harassment law to the intersection of feminist theory and STEM.  ...

I am an associate professor of German and co-director of WPI’s Berlin Project Center.   ...

I am an historian of 19th- and 20th-century U.S. history, with a special focus on imperialism, capitalism, and the Pacific Ocean. In my first book, Coconut Colonialism: Workers and the Globalization of Samoa (Harvard University Press, 2022), I argue that the globalization of Samoa at the turn of the twentieth century was driven by a diverse group of working people on and off the islands. Currently, I am doing research for my next book, "War Workers," which tells the global story of non-citizen civilians working for the U.S. military from the Civil War to Iraq. ...

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Laura J. Eckelman is a theatrical lighting designer, production manager, and educator. ...

Mohammed El Hamzaoui teaches academic writing to native and non-native speakers of English, Arabic as a foreign language to non-native speakers and ISE (Integrated Skills of English) courses to international students. Mohammed adopts an eclectic approach to teaching languages; he uses a communicative and interactive methodology to help students overcome persistent fears related to learning, speaking and writing in foreign languages. ...

Michelle Ephraim is a Shakespeare scholar and a Professor of English. Her book GREEN WORLD: A Tragicomic Memoir of Love and Shakespeare was awarded the 2023 Juniper Prize in Creative Nonfiction by the University of Massachusetts Press and was published by them in 2024. ...

In my lab we study medical writing and the human factors that influence medical diagnosis, treatment, and patient care. I am a practicing paramedic who volunteers with a rural ambulance squad and at a free urban clinic. My current research is focused on three areas: 1) Improving healthcare for uninsured and underinsured at-risk patients; 2) Alternative systems for healthcare delivery; and 3) Clinical reports in pre-hospital care. ...

John Galante’s interests are primarily in Atlantic History, Latin America, and Global Studies. At WPI, he teaches courses in History, International and Global Studies, and Latin American and Caribbean Studies. In addition to introductory level courses, he has designed and taught specialized courses and capstone Humanities seminars on Migration, Ethnicity and Race in the Americas, and Global Energy.  ...

Emily Gioielli is a historian of modern European history, with a special focus on Central and Eastern European history, the history of gender and sexuality, and the history of violence. I am currently finishing a social history that traces women’s involvement and the role of gender in the social and political revolutions that took place in Hungary during the long World War One period. ...

Roger S. Gottlieb is a William B. Smith Professor at WPI, and the author or editor of over twenty books and more than 150 articles. He is internationally known for his work on religious environmentalism, spirituality in an age of environmental crisis, environmental ethics, and the role of religion in a democratic society. ...

Edward R. Gutierrez comes to WPI from a long career in the animated feature film industry; having worked on films such as The Little Mermaid (1989), Beauty and the Beast (1991), The Lion King (1994), The Emperor’s New Groove (2000) and many others. Professionally he is now a prolific independent filmmaker who concentrates on conservation of the environment and social issues. ...

Peter H. Hansen is Professor of History and Director of International and Global Studies at WPI. International and Global Studies brings together faculty from arts and sciences, business, engineering, and the global school to enrich students’ global learning on campus and around the world. He enjoys teaching courses in history or international and global studies, seminars on sports or global studies, and working with students in WPI’s project programs. ...

Alexander Herbert is an expert in the history of the Soviet Union and Global Environmental History. His research examines the interrelations of science, technology, and environmental change in the late USSR. Alexander is additionally interested in the intersection of popular culture and education and has published two books: the first on the history of punk rock in the Soviet Union and Russia, and another that uses horror films in the late USSR to examine the anxieties and fears of late Soviet society. ...

Hsin-han Hung is a Fulbright FLTA Scholar (2020-2022) who taught Chinese language skills and promoted intercultural communication at the University of Miami. She also served as the military language instructor (2019-2024) for the United States Department of Defense’s summer overseas Chinese program (Project Go). ...

Professor David Ibbett is a composer, educator, and musical advocate for science. He directs the Multiverse Concert Series, a project that combines music and science in live performance - and thus he has found the perfect home in WPI’s unique STEAM culture. Together, David and his students develop the music, techniques, technologies and performance practices to unite the arts and sciences as an immersive experience for audiences of all ages. ...

WPI provides opportunities to investigate worlds beyond your major, and one of those worlds might be art. It might seem an alien world, but many art skills can be useful beyond making art. Drawing enhances spatial perception. Solving design problems hones communication skills. Dreaming up impossible ideas can illuminate what is possible. While you learn to engineer certain outcomes in many disciplines, artmaking also encourages play and if you play you may discover new ways of thinking and doing.  ...

Shana Lessing’s teaching and research interests include rhetorics of health and illness, intersections of biomedicine and popular culture, health and moral panic, global health, bioethics, and gender and sexuality.

My primary focus is technical and professional writing, though I also teach other writing courses less technical in nature. Having spent over 20 years in industry as a professional writer, I tend to think about how I can help students become stronger writers in the workplace. My background as a practitioner has instilled in me the simple concept of learning by doing, so my courses are mostly based on the practice of writing. I also believe that, in becoming stronger writers, students should enjoy the process. ...

Sarah Lucie earned her PhD in Theater and Performance from The Graduate Center, City University of New York, and MA in Performance Studies from New York University. Her research approaches contemporary performance and digital art through new materialism, ecocritical theory, and posthumanism. Her current book project, Acting Objects: Staging New Materialism, Posthumanism and the Ecocritical Crisis in Contemporary Performance, explores the critical eco-conscious potential of the human–non-human relationships on the contemporary stage. ...

Mitchell Lutch was appointed Assistant Teaching Professor of Music and Director of Wind Band Activities at WPI in 2020. He directs the Concert Band, coaches chamber ensembles, and teaches conducting, music theory and aural skills, and performance practice. The WPI Concert Band performs on and off campus, including Mechanics Hall, the metro region’s top concert venue. In 2022, upon the invitation of Colonel Jason Fetting, Professor Lutch served as a guest conductor with "The President’s Own" United States Marine Band at Mechanics Hall. ...

Aarti Smith Madan is an Associate Professor of Spanish & International Studies in WPI’s Department of Humanities & Arts. ...

When new acquaintances find out I teach writing, it’s not unusual for them to lament a broad decline in the nation’s writing skills. How does it make me feel, they ask, that students, say, don’t know the difference between adjectives and adverbs? Or, can I believe it that people hardly even know what apostrophes do, let alone where to put them? As someone who treasures good, careful prose, I’m sympathetic to these worries. But as an educator, I think it’s important to steer the conversation in a different direction. ...

V.J. Manzo, Ph.D. is Professor of Music at WPI. He is a composer and guitarist with research interests in theory and composition, artificial intelligence, interactive music systems, and music cognition. V.J. is author of several books published by Oxford University Press including Max/MSP/Jitter for Music, Foundations of Music Technology, and co-author of Interactive Composition and Environmental Sound Artists. ...

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Dr. McIntyre’s research interests include writing fiction and creative nonfiction, collaborative writing, narrative theory, literary magazine publishing, the contemporary novel, the intersection of literary and genre fiction, and the gothic. Her short story collection, Mad Prairie, was selected by Roxane Gay as the winner of the Flannery O’Connor Award and is out now from University of Georgia Press. ...

My research centers around religion in North Africa and the Middle East with a focus on Islam; I approach the study of Islam through its representation in visual culture. My first book project, an outgrowth of my dissertation, focuses on recent fiction film by Moroccan women filmmakers as oblique forms of resistance to dominant narratives about Muslim women. My research tends to be very interdisciplinary: I draw on religion, cultural studies, feminist theory, film theory and affect theory. ...

Lina Muñoz Márquez has been teaching Spanish as a second language since 2012. Her teaching and research focus on Latin American cultures, literatures, and films exploring the links among culture, gender, race, mobility, and politics. Her research also concentrates on films and audiovisual production of Latin American indigenous people, with an emphasis on the Andean region. Her teaching passions and interests include fostering interaction and cultural immersion by using authentic resources like literature, music, films, and multimedia content to make lessons more effective and engaging. ...

My scholarly and professional interests lie in three areas: new forms of narrative emerging in our multi-media age; comparative and environmental literature; and interdisciplinary pedagogy. Over the years, I have taught teaches a variety of writing and literature courses from The Elements of Writing and Introduction to Literature, to Moral Issues in the Modern Novel and The American Literature and the Environment.  ...

Douglas Olsen has been a free-lance trumpeter for over 25 years performing jazz and world music. He has played solo and/or lead trumpet with many national acts including Scary Pockets, Aretha Franklin, Tommy Dorsey Orchestra, USAF Band of Liberty, the Smithsonian Masterworks Jazz Orchestra, Berklee College of Music Faculty Bigband, the Ayn Inserto Jazz Orchestra, the Brian Thomas/Alex Lee-Clark Bigband, the John Almark Jazz Orchestra, the Big Apple Circus, and Little Anthony and the Imperials. ...

My areas of expertise in philosophy and social theory are in social and political philosophy, Marxism, global justice, development ethics, and also Critical Pedagogies that help center Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in my teaching and research. I teach philosophy courses, global studies courses, and for the Great Problems Seminars program (currently I co-teach the Seeking Sustainability and the Climate Change courses for this program). ...

Sarah Riddick researches and teaches about digital rhetoric, writing, and media; popular culture; and rhetorical theory and research methods. Her work appears in Rhetoric Review, Media & Communication, and Computers and Composition, among other journals and edited collections.

Professor Rivera has been conducting research on 19th- and 20th-century Spanish Caribbean literature and theories related to the exploration of limits or borders (i.e., the edges or places where multiple cultures touch or come into contact). He has been exploring how Caribbean traditional modes of representation have been restructured to significant changes in cultural, literary, and historical contexts. ...

Dr. Joshua W. Rohde is the Director of Choral Activities at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, where he conducts all four of the university’s choral ensembles – Men’s Glee Club, Women’s Alden Voices, Festival Chorus, and the Chamber Choir. He is also the Music Director of both the Rhode Island Civic Chorale & Orchestra and the Quincy Choral Society, and performs as an active professional cellist throughout the Boston area. ...

Born to an artist mother and a musician father, Josh was destined from a young age for a life in the arts. An early interest in black and white darkroom photography and art-house cinema led him to study film and video art at Brown University. Fortuitously stumbling on a new course in multimedia art in his last term as an undergraduate, his zeal for digital media was unleashed. The next formative episode in Josh’s career found him designing interactive exhibits, such as the claymation studio at Zeum, a hands-on, multimedia arts and technology museum for kids in San Francisco. ...

By training, I am a political historian of China and Japan. Coming to WPI has expanded how I view my own research and teaching and what can be done with them. I’ve led WPI’s efforts to build China-related programs for STEM students on campus and off. With like-minded colleagues I helped establish and now direct WPI’s East Asia Hub (formally China Hub), established and co-direct WPI’s Hangzhou and Taiwan Project Centers, and advise the Chinese Studies minor. ...

Professor Samson teaches art history, and his scholarship is in the history of architecture, especially the modern period. He studies and explains the moments of transition when styles change, and the spread of avant-garde creations into general currency. He is also interested in the history of industrial design, and enjoys introducing his students to it, revealing the complex background of forms and ideas behind common household objects. His architectural history courses explore both the left- and right-brain aspects of built form. ...

John Sanbonmatsu received his BA from Hampshire College and his PhD in the History of Consciousness from the University of California at Santa Cruz.  His scholarly interests, which include critical theory, Marxism, Critical Animal Studies, existential phenomenology, Gramscian studies, and the sociology of intellectuals, reflect his personal commitment to social justice and to a politics of universal liberation.

Lance Schachterle enjoys the excitement of the classroom--meeting new students each term, sharing ideas about works of literature that matter, and learning to communicate more effectively. He teaches courses at the 1000 and 2000 levels, mostly in modern literature, but also really likes interdisciplinary courses that involve science. WPI students work harder than most, and students pursuing their minor in literature often really get intellectually and emotionally involved in what they are studying. ...

Matthew Scinto is an emerging conductor based in Cape Cod, where he currently serves as Founder and Music Director of the Cape Cod Chamber Orchestra and Visiting Director of Orchestra at Worcester Polytechnic Institute. He has twice studied conducting at the Tanglewood Music Center, was recently finalist for the Assistant Conductor of the San Antonio Symphony, and also currently serves as a cover conductor for the Portland (ME) Symphony. ...

The history of science is a well recognized branch of inquiry about the past that concerns itself with interesting and significant questions about humans and their knowledge and beliefs about nature over the past few thousand years. As such, the history of science is neither a branch of science nor a simplified form of “history for scientists.” Instead, historians of science use the tools and methods of historical questioning and analysis to examine details about past scientific ideas and practices that their colleagues and predecessors have worked long and hard to uncover and document. ...

Professor Stoloff’s research focuses on Chinese religious beliefs and practices from the late Warring States Period (ca. 475-221 BCE) to the Western Han dynasty (202 BCE-9 CE). Specifically, he studies the classical Daoist idea of wuwei (effortless action)

I am an Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Rhetoric. Before joining WPI, I was a postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, Berkeley. My work is animated by an intellectual curiosity with how ideas travel across time and space, and generate diverse practices of acting, seeing, and being in the world. I am especially intrigued by situations in which people come to ask new questions about themselves and others, in ways that require reconsideration of past experiences and imagining of future possibilities. ...

Huili Zheng is a scholar on late imperial Chinese literature and culture (1500-1895). Her research interests focus on late imperial Chinese literary culture and development of social, cultural and intellectual history, with a particular interest in issues of gender, ethnic/cultural identity, cultural politics of representation, and the relations of late imperial China to the formation of modern China. She is finishing a book manuscript on late imperial Chinese intellectuals’ changing conceptualizations of the world and China’s place in it. ...

Pam joined the WPI family in 2011. ...