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Jennifer S. Tuttle

Jennifer S. Tuttle, Ph.D.

she/her

Dorothy M. Healy Professor of Literature and Health

Professor of English

Director, Maine Women Writers Collection

Affiliated Faculty, Gender, Women, & Sexuality Studies

Ludcke Chair of Liberal Arts and Sciences, 2021-22

Location

Marcil Hall 105
Biddeford Campus
Eligible for Student Opportunities

Jennifer Tuttle teaches courses on literature and health studies, US literature and culture, women's writing, and the US West. Holding an endowed chair in literature and health, she designs courses, pursues scholarship, and develops curricular and programming initiatives that integrate the health sciences and the humanities at 成人直播. As the Dorothy M. Healy Professor, she is also director of the . She is also a co-founder of the Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies Program. Beyond 成人直播, she was a longtime editor of .

Central to Dr. Tuttle's research is scholarship drawing on archival sources as well as the study of archives themselves. Much of her work engages in the recovery of texts, writers, and perspectives that are absent from or obscured by the historical record. She is editor of the first recovered edition of Charlotte Perkins Gilman鈥檚 1911 western The Crux (2002) and co-editor of two additional books on Gilman, a collection of her letters (2009) and a volume of critical essays (2011). Dr. Tuttle has been at the forefront of recent scholarly efforts to illuminate the western orientation of New England-born Gilman. Her published essays on Gilman as well as on authors Dora L. Mitchell, Edith Maude Eaton, Mar铆a Amparo Ruiz de Burton, Owen Wister, and S. Weir Mitchell, M.D. explore intersections among race, gender, medical discourse, and western literary studies, and her article on Elizabeth Stuart Phelps's letters to Weir Mitchell illuminates issues of gender and professionalization in the late-19th-century doctor-patient dyad as well as the problem of women's invisibility in archives. Her current book project, Dora Mitchell/Dolores Michel: A Literary Biography, illuminates how one woman navigated early 20th-century California鈥檚 shifting and racialized terrain; enlarges what is considered to be Black literary women鈥檚 historical archive; and reconsiders where and how to look for Black women鈥檚 texts. 

Professor Tuttle is the recipient of myriad awards for her work as a scholar and teacher. These include her designation as the 2021-22 Ludcke Chair of Liberal Arts and Sciences for outstanding achievement as a scholar-teacher; Distinguished Alumna of the University of California, San Diego Department of Literature; the Kenneally Cup Award for Distinguished Academic Service to 成人直播; and the Schachterle Prize, awarded by the Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts for the best new essay on literature and science (for 鈥淩ewriting the West Cure鈥), among others. She also has several award nominations, including for the Modern Language Association's  Morton N. Cohen Award for a Distinguished Edition of Letters (for The Selected Letters of Charlotte Perkins Gilman), for both the Debra J. Summers Memorial Award for Teaching Excellence (成人直播/Biddeford Campus) and the Mary Rines Thompson Award for Teaching Excellence (成人直播/Portland Campus), and for the ULead Excellence in Academic Advising Award.

As the faculty mentor for the 成人直播 Generation Action Club (Planned Parenthood campus chapter), Professor Tuttle loves working with students both in and outside of class.

Courses

Writing, Revolution, and Resistance in US Literature (ENG 200)

Who and What is an American? Reimagining US Literature (ENG 201)

The Captivity Narrative (ENG 235)

Women of the West (ENG 237)

American Dystopias (ENG 237)

The Slave Narrative (ENG 300)

Writing and Women's Health (ENG 310)

Madness in Literature (ENG 326)

Patient Narratives (ENG 326)

Women鈥檚 Detective Fiction (ENG 335)

Humanities Seminar: Slavery in the Land of the Free (ENG 412)

Introduction to Women鈥檚 and Gender Studies (WGST 200)

Directed studies according to student interest

Credentials

Education

Ph.D. in Literature
University of California, San Diego
1996
M.A. in English and American Literature
University of California, San Diego
1994
B.A. in English, with Honors
University of California, Irvine
1989

Research

Current research

鈥淯nsettled Empire: American Nervousness in California Women鈥檚 Writing鈥 (book manuscript in process)

Selected publications

鈥,鈥 Legacy: A Journal of American Women Writers 39.2, 2023, pp. 93-120.

Editor, 鈥溾 by Dora L. Mitchell, Legacy: A Journal of American Women Writers 39.2, 2023, pp. 121-31.

鈥淩eading Archival Absences鈥 (newsletter article), , Seaver Center for Western History Research, Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, January 2023.

鈥淲riting the Rails in Edith Eaton鈥檚 West,鈥 The Routledge Companion to Gender and the American West, ed. Susan Bernardin, Routledge, 2022, pp. 271-83.

鈥淥ther People鈥檚 Labor,鈥 Legacy: A Journal of American Women Writers, , 2022 (invited). 

鈥淩ecollecting Charlotte Perkins Gilman: Archival Labor and Women鈥檚 Literary Recovery,鈥 Tulsa Studies in Women鈥檚 Literature, Special Issue: "Women and Archives,鈥 Part 2, ed. Laura Engel and Emily Ruth Rutter, vol. 40, no. 2, Fall 2021, pp. 215-39. DOI: 10.1353/tsw.2021.0021.

鈥溾楾o turn over and over鈥: the Loss of the Verso in the Virtual Archive,鈥 Women鈥檚 Studies special issue on 鈥淓arly American Women Authors, Unbound,鈥 ed. Betsy Klimasmith, Ren茅e Bergland, and Len von Morz茅, vol. 50, no. 6, 2021, pp. 549-51. DOI: 10.1080/00497878.2021.1947281.

鈥淯nruly Voices: Artist's Books and Humanities Archives in Health Professions Education鈥 (with Cathleen Miller), Journal of Medical Humanities, vol. 41, no. 1, Mar. 2020, pp. 53-64. DOI 10.1007/s10912-019-09599-1.

鈥溾業 make books so I won鈥檛 die鈥: Artist's Books in the Archives and Classroom鈥 (with Cathleen Miller), Prescriptions:  Artists' Books on Wellbeing and Medicine, Natrix Natrix Press, UK, 2017, pp. 11-17. Catalog for Beaney House of Art & Knowledge Exhibition, Canterbury, UK.

鈥淩ecovering the Work of Charlotte Perkins Gilman: or, Reading Gilman in Rome,鈥 Charlotte Perkins Gilman and a Woman's Place in America, ed. Jill Bergman. University of Alabama Press, 2017, pp. 186-218.

鈥淐harlotte Perkins Gilman and the U.S. West,鈥 Charlotte Perkins Gilman and a Woman's Place in America, ed. Jill Bergman. With Gary Scharnhorst; University of Alabama Press, 2017, pp. 13-46.

鈥溾楴ew England innocent鈥 in the Land of Sunshine: Charlotte Perkins Gilman and California,鈥 Western American Literature, vol. 48, no. 3, Fall 2013, pp. 284-311.

New Texts and New Contexts in Charlotte Perkins Gilman Studies, with Carol Farley Kessler, Ohio State University Press, 2011.

The Selected Letters of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, with Denise D. Knight, University of Alabama Press, 2009.

"The Symptoms of Conquest: Race, Class, and the Nervous Body in The Squatter and the Don," Maria Amparo Ruiz de Burton: Critical and Pedagogical Perspectives, ed. Amelia Maria de la Luz Montes and Anne E. Goldman. University of Nebraska Press, 2004, pp. 56-72.

"Indigenous Whiteness and Wister's Invisible Indians," Reading The Virginian in the New West, ed. Melody Graulich and Stephen Tatum. University of Nebraska Press, 2003, pp. 89-112.

Scholarly edition, The Crux by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, 1911. University of Delaware Press, 2002.

"Letters from Elizabeth Stuart Phelps (Ward) to S. Weir Mitchell, M.D., 1884-1897," Legacy: A Journal of American Women Writers, vol.17, no. 1, 2000, pp. 83-94.

"Rewriting the West Cure: Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Owen Wister, and the Sexual Politics of Neurasthenia," The Mixed Legacy of Charlotte Perkins Gilman, ed. Catherine J. Golden and Joanna S. Zangrando. University of Delaware Press, 2000, pp. 103-121.

"Liminality in Women鈥檚 'History-Mystery':  The Case of Anne Perry," Popular Culture Review, vol. 11, no. 1, Feb. 2000, pp. 85-97.

鈥淪. Weir Mitchell, Medicine Man: Race, Gender, and Medical Authority in Mitchell鈥檚 West Cure,鈥 Transactions and Studies of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia, vol. XX, 1998, pp. 31-36.

Other scholarly activity

Scholarly journal editions

Editor-in-Chief, Legacy: A Journal of American Women Writers, issues 30.1-34.1 (2012-2017)

Co-Editor, Legacy, issues 23.2-29.2, 35.1-37.2 (2006-2012, 2017-2020)   

Book reviews

A Black Woman鈥檚 West: The Life of Rose B. Gordon by Michael K. Johnson, in Western American Literature 58.3 (2023), forthcoming.

Westerns: A Women鈥檚 History by Victoria Lamont, in Tulsa Studies in Women鈥檚 Literature 36.1 (2017): 224-26.

鈥淥ut of the Archives: New Biographical Studies of Charlotte Perkins Gilman.鈥 Review essay on Helen Lefkowitz Horowitz, Wild Unrest: Charlotte Perkins Gilman and the Making of 鈥淭he Yellow Wall-Paper鈥 and Cynthia J. Davis, Charlotte Perkins Gilman. In Resources for American Literary Study 35 (2012): 359-67.

鈥淭he Yellow Wall-Paper鈥 by Charlotte Perkins Gilman: A Dual-Text Critical Edition ed. Shawn St. Jean, in Resources for American Literary Study 33 (2010): 327-29.

Rehabilitating Bodies: Health, History, and the American Civil War by Lisa A. Long (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004), in American Literary Realism 39.2 (2007): 174-75.

Films

The Maine Women Writers Collection: The First Fifty Years, co-written with Shoshana Hoose; co-created with Cally Gurley, Shoshanna Hoose, Rhonda Wanser, and Jen Widor. The Maine Women Writers Collection, 2009.  Aired on MPBN (television) 26 and 31 July 2010. 

I Make Books, a film about book artist Martha A. Hall, producer, interviewer, researcher with Cally Gurley, Hollis Haywood, and Kari Wagner. 成人直播 Media Services Department, 2005. 

Invited plenary presentation

鈥,鈥 2021 Ludcke Lecture, 成人直播, Feb. 8, 2023

鈥淩ecovering Lost Voices: The Case of Charlotte Perkins Gilman,鈥 Sargent House Museum, Gloucester, MA, 2021

Seminar leader (with Jean Pfaelzer), 鈥淔eminist Critical Regionalism and the Climate of Western Literary Studies,鈥 C19 Conference, Albuquerque, NM, 2018

鈥淢aking Sense of Charlottesville,鈥 成人直播 Constitution Day event, 2017

鈥溾業 make books so I won鈥檛 die鈥: Artists鈥 Books in the Archives and Classroom鈥 (with Cathleen Miller), Artist鈥檚 Books and the Medical Humanities Symposium, University of Kent, Canterbury, UK, 2016

Keynote address: 鈥淎ctivism and the Archive: Rethinking Recovery in Gilman Studies,鈥 Sixth International Charlotte Perkins Gilman Conference, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University, 2015

鈥淏eyond Vacationland: 鈥楢 Gateless Garden鈥 and Maine Women鈥檚 Writing,鈥 成人直播 Art Gallery,  2015

鈥淐alls and Responses: Speech Acts and the Unfinished Business of Civil Rights,鈥 Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration, 鈥50 Years of Progress and the Challenges That Remain,鈥 成人直播, 2014

Distinguished Alumni Lecture: 鈥淐harlotte Perkins Gilman and the U.S. West,鈥 Department of Literature, University of California, San Diego, 2013

鈥淩econceiving Writing: Collecting Artists鈥 Books for the Classroom and Archive,鈥 with Cathleen Miller, 成人直播 Art Gallery,  2012

鈥溾業 can feel the poetry coming鈥: Charlotte Perkins Gilman and California,鈥 Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe Institute, Harvard University, 2011

Plenary address: 鈥淚s Gilman a California Writer?,鈥 Fifth International Conference on Charlotte Perkins Gilman: 鈥淕ilman Goes West,鈥 University of Montana, Missoula, 2011

Keynote address: 鈥溾榮crappy, imperfect, desperately earnest鈥: Recovering the Work of Charlotte Perkins Gilman,鈥 conference entitled 鈥淒onne e Polis: Charlotte Perkins Gilman Oggi鈥 (鈥淲oman and Polis: Charlotte Perkins Gilman Today鈥), University of Rome III, Rome, Italy, 2010

鈥淥ut of the Archives: Editing Charlotte Perkins Gilman鈥檚 Letters,鈥 Dyer Library/Saco Museum, Saco, ME, 2010

鈥淩ecovering the Text,鈥 Colloquium on 鈥淚llness in Society,鈥 成人直播, 2006

鈥溾業 Make Books So I Won鈥檛 Die鈥 鈥 Artist鈥檚 Books and Illness,鈥 成人直播 Core Connections Event, 2005

鈥淕o West, Young Woman!  Health and the Frontier in the Work of Charlotte Perkins Gilman,鈥 The Baxter Society, Portland, ME, 2004

鈥淥wen Wister鈥檚 The Virginian,鈥 Parsons Memorial Library, Alfred, ME, 2003

鈥淭he West and Women鈥檚 Health in Charlotte Perkins Gilman鈥檚 The Crux,鈥 San Diego Mesa College Occasional Lecture Series, 2003

鈥淐onducting Archival Research on Women and Health in the Maine Women Writers Collection,鈥 Association of College and Research Libraries/New England Colleges Women鈥檚 Studies Interest Group meeting, Portland, ME, 2002

鈥溾楥ome with me into the freedom of the wild鈥: Women Health-Seekers in the Wilderness,鈥 Maine Women Writers Collection Spring Lecture Series, Portland, ME, 2002

鈥淪. Weir Mitchell, Medicine Man: A Cultural Analysis of the 鈥極pen-Air Treatment,鈥欌 College of Physicians of Philadelphia History of Medicine Seminar, 1998

Research interests

Literary recovery, California literature, literature and health studies, women's cultural production, ethnic studies

Research topics

Archival Studies
Ethnic Studies
Literature and Health Studies
Medicalization of Mothering
Pacific Studies
Race and Racism
Tourism, Travel and Leisure
United States Literature
Western American Literature
Women's and Gender Studies
Women's Literature