Charity Fox

I am a fourth-year doctoral candidate at GW. My research and teaching interests include issues of race, class, and gender in popular culture, social and cultural reactions to war, capitalism and consumerism, and America in the world. In 2007, I completed comprehensive exams in 20th Century Cultural History, 20th Century American Literature, and Media: Radio, Film, and Television.

My dissertation examines representations of American mercenary figures in fictional and non-fictional literature, television, and film, ranging from the early Cold War to private military contractors in current military conflicts. I argue that these cultural products rework myths of paternalistic white masculinity and benevolent warrior figures, connecting the figure of the American mercenary/warrior in post/Cold War popular culture to principles of paternalism, gender, and race inherent in past expressions of American expansion and conquest.

As a Graduate Writing Preceptor, I have had the opportunity to design, teach, and revise a writing and research seminar for first-year students over multiple semesters. My UW20 courses have explored the history of 20th Century American "Cool," including: All That Jazz; Defining 20th Century Cool; Race, Gender, and the History of Cool; and Teenage Terror in the 1950s. I use Universal Design for Learning methods in designing and teaching, and have incorporated a number of online and hybrid components in these courses. In the Spring of 2009, I'll teach an American Studies WID seminar titled "The Veteran Returns."

I graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with BA in History and Political Science and an MLA in History and Literature, where my master's thesis was titled: Heroic But Flawed: Hardboiled Detective Fictions and the Rehabilitation of American Masculinity in the Interwar Period. Between Penn and GW, I worked in Undergraduate Admissions at Penn and taught at The Benchmark School, a school for students with reading and learning differences.

Feel free to contact me at cyfox@gwmail.gwu.edu