Contact one of our Current Students
Below is information on some of our current students who are willing to speak with prospective students about the program. Feel free to contact them with your questions about life in MAPH, Chicago, or the University. This also offers a cross section of the variety of people who come to the University of Chicago as MAPH students.
Mike Bennett
A Tucson native, Mike received his undergraduate degree in Mathematics from Providence College in 2006 and his MS in Mathematical Sciences in 2008 from Loyola University Chicago. A longtime literature enthusiast, he came to MAPH to pursue graduate studies in English. A fabled north-side resident of Chicago for over two years, he marvels at how much of the city he has yet to explore. When he’s not teaching undergraduates part-time or sharpening his skills in Hyde Park, he goes to as many concerts and comedy shows as possible. He can be seen most often at Intelligentsia Coffee, the Empty Bottle, iO, and the L&L Tavern.
Kyle Bucy
Kyle graduated from the University of Oregon in 2006, with a BA in English. Thinking that he was spending too much time reading about lives more exciting than his own, he spent the next two years teaching English and doing volunteer work in Europe, Asia, and South America. His MAPH plan is to study American travel writing (specifically Mark Twain), though he has noticed his plans change frequently.
Kristin Cordova
Kristin Cordova graduated from the University of Notre Dame in 2004. After graduating from ND, Kristin volunteered in a post-grad service program in Puerto Rico, where she worked as an English teacher and helped run an after-school program for disadvantaged kids. Sadly, she said good-bye to the island life in July 2005 and moved home to Seattle. There she got a job in the wireless industry, where she worked in merchandising for 3 years until coming to MAPH. Currently, Kristin is considering a PhD in English and trying to answer the inevitable “so what are you going to do with that” question. In addition to her love of fiction, she can’t live without ice cream, hot fudge or Negra Modelo and wishes she had more time for salsa dancing and watching football!
Simon Fisher
Simon Fisher graduated from DePaul University with a double major in English and Women's Studies in 2001. He spent the next five years traveling around the U.S. and living at a rural queer arts community in Tennessee. He has been a national organizer around transgender issues and continues that work here in Chicago. He hopes to go on to PhD work in some conglomeration of history, literature, and sex and gender theory. His academic interests include the Victorian era and the British Raj, as well as deconstructive projects of all sorts. For fun, he plays ukulele and sings in a bluegrass duet.
Kimberly Hassen
Kimberly graduated from Northwestern University in 2007 with a B.A. in Political Science and a minor in French. She wants to be a veterinarian when she grows up and so will spend her time in MAPH studying animals in the humanities, and perhaps anthropology. Maybe ecology, too. She spends her spare time playing with her two King Charles Spaniels Libby and Nick, working at an animal hospital, and watching Girls Next Door reruns. She welcomes any questions about MAPH, or your pets.
Timothy Jones
After growing up in Toronto, Timothy Jones came to Chicago via two miniscule Canadian towns: Sackville NB, where he completed a BA in English focuses on youth creative writing and the theory of autobiography, and Dawson, Yukon, where he served as Artistic Director of the 30th annual Dawson City Music Festival. Switching gears in Chicago, Tim is one of the rare breed of MAPHers taking the Cultural Policy option through the Harris School of Public Policy. Informed by his work in the arts, his humanities background, and his inexplicable love for critical theory, Tim’s current research argues that amateur and grassroots art practice is radically underserved by North American cultural policymaking. In his spare time, he enjoys bacon (the gateway meat), chasing frisbees, and arguing about baseball with strangers at the Woodlawn Tap.
Alan Kellner
Alan came to the University of Chicago to study philosophy after getting a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. Though a native of Sheboygan, Wisconsin—the land of brats and beer— he enjoys being a vegetarian and cooking curry. His commute to school each day is a bit reminiscent of Planes, Trains, and Automobiles—he takes nearly every mode of transportation to get to campus (car, train, and bus). So, if you’re thinking of commuting, he can help navigate your trip. He also has a cat named Plato who is kind of fat.
Christine Lieb
Christine Lieb graduated from Texas Christian University in 2005 with a B.A. in English literature and a B.S. in news- editorial journalism. She tried the working world for a few years, copy editing at the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, editing and writing about home design and shopping for D Magazine, tutoring students for the SAT and GRE, and docenting at the Dallas Museum of Art, only to realize that she likes school better, besides the whole not-getting-paid part. Her academic interests are fragmented—that’s partly why MAPH is a solution—and include cultural geography, post-colonial literature, and all things French. A quest: How to combine these in a thesis? A second quest: How to find time for everything else? (mainly, the New Yorker magazine, yoga, my MBA-obtaining husband, city exploring, and The Colbert Report).
Meghan O’Neil
Meghan O’Neil graduated from Georgetown University with a BA in American Studies and English in 2006. After spending two intellectually stagnant years as a government paralegal in Washington DC, she came to MAPH to remember what it was like to learn and to work towards applying for a PhD in English Literarure. Though she never really wants to grow up and get another job, she hopes to be a professor in an American Studies department someday far, far in the future. She is interested in 19th century American literature and history, the search for and creation of an American “identity” and “culture,” the American frontier, and puppies. Please email her with any and all questions. She loves email.
Kristine Parker
Kristine graduated with a BA in English from the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, Washington, in 2001. After a year of a 9-to–5 ad sales job, she went back to UPS to get her MA in Teaching in 2003. Thereafter she spent the next four years teaching English to youngsters in grades 7 to 9. When her husband accepted a job in Chicago after law school, she took the opportunity to begin the MAPH program. She also expanded her family this February, so after fall quarter 2008 she has been a part-time student, planning to finish in Spring quarter 2009. Her academic interests within MAPH have centered in American literature and poetry. In what very little spare time she has between studying, caring for her 8-month-old son and a dog, and bonding with her husband, she enjoys reading, writing poetry, singing, and traveling.
Lisa Faye Petak
Lisa graduated from American University in DC in 2008 with dual degrees in Literature and Political Science, and hopefully MAPH will help her find a way to combine the two. After focusing her last years in undergrad on postcolonial South African literature, she shifted back to domestic and political interests and joined the Obama Campaign in her home state of Colorado. From there, it was onto Chicago, where she’s currently thinking about political rhetoric, gender equality, and the law. She spends far too much money on chai lattes from the cafes she’s discovered throughout Chicago, and when not reading, she’s feeding her addiction to 24–7 news commentary, ice skating, or sipping pinor noir.
Roxanne Samer
Roxanne Samer graduated from Tufts University in 2008, where she double majored in Art History and German Area Studies as well as minored in Women’s Studies. She wrote her senior thesis on two art films of the 1960s. In attending the MAPH at the University of Chicago she hopes to pursue her interest in contemporary art, film, and cultural studies. Outside of the classroom Roxanne enjoys walking other people’s dogs, playing with her own two cats (essentially doing anything animal-related except eating them), and indulging in her recent Alison Bechdel addiction. Roxanne also like writing in third person- it makes her giggle.
Naomi Slipp
Naomi Slipp graduated from Hampshire College in 2005 with a concentration in Studio Art and Art History. Upon graduation, she joined the Installations Department at the Philadelphia Museum of Art where she worked for 3 years. This work solidified her love of the museum and art history in general and provoked the return to school. At the University of Chicago, Naomi is pursuing an Art History concentration with a particular emphasis on Museum Studies, Collecting practices and Contemporary Art. She hopes to go on to her PhD and eventually teach in a liberal arts environment. Although her interests outside of UC include indie music, gallery nights and good food, reading seems to occupy all of her time as of late.
