Gender Studies

Dr. Laura Barbas Rhoden

Professor of Spanish

Dr. Laura Barbas Rhoden’s teaching interests include environmental humanities; Latin American literary and cultural studies; collaborative projects-based learning and research; and community-engaged learning in Spanish. Her research focuses on environmental humanities, ecocriticism and public humanities (multilingual, multiethnic engagement and research). She earned her B.A. degree from the University of Georgia, and her M.A. degree and Ph.D. from Tulane University. She enjoys teaching and learning with students on a leafy urban campus. She appreciates the chance to engage students in thinking and learning, and the opportunity to further community efforts for positive change through undergraduate research and co-created endeavors that Wofford provides.

Dr. Karen Goodchild

Chapman Family Professor of Humanities (Art History) and Chair

B.A., University of Georgia
M.A., Ph.D., University of Virginia

Karen Hope Goodchild is Chapman Professor and Chair of Art and Art History at Wofford College in Spartanburg, South Carolina. She has recently published articles on landscape theory, Giorgio Vasari, Piero di Cosimo, and Agnolo Bronzino, and her research has appeared in scholarly journals including Artibus et Historiae and Source, as well as in the Ashgate Research Companion to Giorgio Vasari (2016). She co-edited the volume Green Worlds in Early Modern Italy: Art and the Verdant Earth (Amsterdam University Press, 2019), which includes her essay “Naturalism and Antiquity, Redefined, in Vasari’s Verzure.” Her current work intersects with landscape and art theory, artist biography, literature, and gender. Goodchild teaches courses in Ancient and Classical art, Renaissance art, Gender in the Early Modern Period, surveys of African Art and pre-modern western art, and practice-based courses involving community engagement in the arts.

Dr. Natalie Grinnell

Reeves Family Professor in Humanities

Natalie Grinnell’s areas of interest include medieval studies (especially medieval romance), the writings of Geoffrey Chaucer and John Gower, gender studies, detective fiction, fantasy and science fiction. She holds B.A. degrees in French and English from Tulane University, and earned an M.A. degree and Ph.D. in English from SUNY at Buffalo. Grinnell says the personal relationships that develop between students and faculty and the freedom to pursue and develop her scholarly passions are two of her favorite things about Wofford. In her spare time, Grinnell enjoys ceramics, cooking and her two “strict felines.”

Dr. Li Qing Kinnison

Professor of Chinese

Ph.D., Michigan State University

Dr. Li Qing Kinnison’s teaching interests include Chinese language, Chinese culture/history and cross-cultural communication between East and West. Her research interests include politeness, comparative studies of Chinese and the West cultures, and cross-cultural communication. Away from Wofford she enjoys traveling and reading.

Dr. John C. Lefebvre

Professor of Psychology

B.A., McGill University
M.A., Ph.D., Duke University

John Lefebvre is a professor of psychology at Wofford College in Spartanburg, South Carolina. Trained as a clinical psychologist, his teaching and research focus on topics related to physical and mental health. Lefebvre teaches courses in abnormal psychology, personality, health psychology and clinical psychology. In 2010, he was awarded Wofford’s Roger Milliken Award for Excellence in Teaching Science. Lefebvre’s research has concentrated on the experience of pain, especially the influence of personality, worry, catastrophizing and memory. Recently, his research has focused on improving student well-being through a variety of approaches. Lefebvre also has served as a leader on campus, directing the college’s implementation of its strategic plan. He’s also a past chair of the Wofford Department of Psychology. Lefebvre has been published numerous times and has presented his research in the United States and Europe.

Dr. Amanda L. Matousek

Associate Professor of Spanish

B.A., B.S. and M.A., University of Akron
Ph.D., The Ohio State University

Dr. Amanda Matousek’s teaching interests include Mexican, Latin American and Latinx novels and short stories; female Latin American and Latina rebels, divas, performers, artists, and writers; Latinx pop culture and popular music; Argentine Dirty War and Spanish Civil War literature; and intermediate language course design and instruction. Her research interests include Mexican, Latin American and Latinx literatures and cultures; Chicanx studies; U.S.-Mexico border studies; popular music and popular culture studies; women and violence in Latin American and Iberian literatures and cultures; women’s studies; and modern language pedagogy. Away from Wofford, she enjoys sharing musicals and pop music with her children. She says she is a TV and true crime junkie and a Selena Quintanilla-Pérez superfan.

Dr. Patricia G. Nuriel

Associate Professor of Spanish

Dr. Patricia G. Nuriel teaches intermediate and advanced Spanish, as well as courses on 20th and 21st century literature and cultures of Latin America. In all her courses, she emphasizes task-based language acquisition, minority voices and underrepresented topics to create an inclusive environment for collaborative learning. Her research focuses on Latin American literature and film, particularly on the area of Latin American Jewish studies. She co-edited the special issue Jewish Identities in Latin American Cinema for Post Script: Essays in Film and the Humanities with Luca Barattoni. She has published articles in scholarly journals such as Hispamérica and Revista Iberoamericana, as well as in the volume Evolving Images: Studies on Latin American Jewish Cinema. Her current work relates to the cultural production of Yiddish-speaking immigration to Latin American in the first half of the 20th century. She holds B.A. and M.A. degrees from Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a Ph.D. from Arizona State University.

Dr. Catherine Schmitz

Professor of French

Dr. Catherine Schmitz’s favorite courses to teach are French culture, especially her courses on French food and food culture in France; her course on travel literature; contemporary Francophone women writers; and her theater course on the social history of the family in French theater. Her research interests include French women's studies, primarily in women’s theater, and travel literature from the end of the 19th century to the present. She has published in the field of French women playwrights and journalists. Her forthcoming essay deals with the coverage of the first Pavilion of the Colonies at the Universal Exhibition of Paris in 1889 by journalist and editor Marie de Rute. She earned a B.A. degree in Anglo-American studies and an M.A. in American literature from the University of Paris-Nanterre, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in French literature from Indiana University. She enjoys the freedom and support she receives at Wofford to build courses on a variety of topics. She also appreciates the small class sizes that allow her to get to know her students well over their Wofford careers. Away from Wofford, she enjoys outdoor activities such as hiking, skiing and sailing. Her regular activities involve walking in town, in her neighborhood and practicing yoga. She also enjoys traveling with her husband and daughter, and discovering new places. And, as a teacher of literature and theater, she enjoys reading a good book and seeing a play.

Dr. Carey Voeller

Associate Professor of English

Dr. Carey Voeller teaches courses on Early American and 19th century American literature, gender studies and American protest literature. Voeller’s research interests include 19th century sensation novels; literature concerning race, slavery, and abolitionism; gender studies and disability studies. He enjoys working with students of all levels during their four years at Wofford, finding value in the intellectual conversations that he is able to have with them on a daily basis in class discussions. Away from Wofford, Voeller is an outdoorsman at heart, spending his free time fishing, hiking and listening to underground music.

Dr. Nancy M. Williams

Associate Professor and Chair of Philosophy

B.A., University of North Carolina at Charlotte
B.S., Winthrop University
M.A., University of South Florida
Ph.D., University of Georgia

Dr. Nancy Williams’ teaching interests include the philosophy of love and sex, philosophy of food, our relationship with animals, feminist philosophy, environmental ethics and ethical theory. Her research interests include feminist philosophy, animal ethics and the philosophy of food. Away from Wofford, she enjoys traveling across the country in an RV with her dogs. Her hobbies include mountain biking, road biking, hiking, jogging and yoga. She also advocates for greater compassion for animals and ethical veganism.