Regular Faculty
Ross Lerner, Chair
Associate Professor, English
B.A., Haverford College; M.A., Princeton University; Ph.D., Princeton University
Ross Lerner specializes in medieval and Renaissance British literature, especially poetry.
James Ford III
Mary Jane Hewitt Department Chair in Black Studies; Associate Professor, English and Black Studies
B.A., Morehouse College; M.A., Ph.D, University of Notre Dame
James Edward Ford III’s teaching and scholarship focus on three fields: The Aesthetics of Black Radicalism; Black Popular Culture; and Western Political Thought.
Warren Montag
Louis M. Brown Family Professor in Literature in English
B.A., UC Berkeley; M.A., Ph.D., Claremont Graduate School
Warren Montag teaches 18th-century British and European literature with particular reference to political philosophy; he also teaches 20th-century European critical theory.
Leila Neti
Professor, English
B.A., UCLA; M.A., Ph.D., UC Irvine
Leila Neti teaches in the fields of postcolonial Anglophone literature and theory, 19th and 20th century British literature, and literary and cultural criticism.
Non-Tenure Track Faculty
Chekwube O. Danladi
Writer in Residence; Visiting Assistant Professor, English
B.A., Oberlin College; M.F.A., University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Promise Li
Visiting Instructor, Critical Theory & Social Justice
A.B., Occidental College; M., A., Princeton University; Ph.D., Princeton University (in progress)
Zachary M. Mann
Visiting Assistant Professor, English
B.A., University of California, Berkeley; M.F.A., California State University, Long Beach; Ph.D., University of Southern California
Affiliated Faculty
Yumi Pak
Associate Professor, Black Studies
B.A., University of California, Santa Cruz; M.A., P.h.D, University of California, San Diego
Yumi Pak is a student, scholar and instructor of Black literary and cultural studies, particularly within the overlaps and interstices between the United States, Scotland and Jamaica.
Emeriti/ae Faculty
Professor, English Emeritus (1976-2020)
English
Daniel Fineman’s primary fields of interest are American literature and literary theory.
Professor, English, American Studies, Emeritus (1975-2019)
English
Eric Newhall taught courses in modern and contemporary American literature and culture.
Irma and Jay Price Professor of English Literature, English, Emerita
English
A 2007 recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts grant, she has published a number of poetry and fiction books and chapbooks, including Vertigo (2008), which was a National Poetry Series selection, and In a Landscape of Having to Repeat (2004), which received the PEN USA 2005 poetry award.
H...
Professor, English, Emeritus (1981-2019)
English
Gender, Women, & Sexuality Studies
Interdisciplinary Writing
Swift's main field of teaching and research was late 19th- and early 20th-century British and American literature. He also taught for many years an interdisciplinary course on Los Angeles in Occidental's cultural studies program.
Professor, English; Emerita
English
Gender, Women, & Sexuality Studies
Research Fields
Jean Wyatt’s main research field is contemporary women writers of color, with a special focus on African American and Black British women writers.