Each summer, the English Department Summer Scholar Program invites a nationally recognized scholar to teach an intensive graduate course in his or her area of expertise. This year’s scholar is Rebecca Weaver-Hightower, an associate professor of English specializing in postcolonial studies at the University of North Dakota. Her book, “Empire Islands: Castaways, Cannibals, and Fantasies of Conquest” (Minnesota 2007), analyzes how island castaway tales presented fantasies that made the expansion of empire more palatable. She is currently co-editing a volume on postcolonial film and a journal special issue on Australian literature. 

Weaver-Hightower will offer a one-week intensive graduate seminar titled “Frontier Fictions” at NDSU June 13-18. Students will examine frontier fiction of the U.S. alongside similar tales from Australia, South Africa and Canada to investigate why such stories are important to national mythologies. Summer scholars from past years have included Melea Powell from Michigan State University and Anne Ruggles Gere from University of Michigan.