Faculty & Staff in Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies

Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies Office Information

Program Director: Dr.Tammy Birk
Phone: 614-823-1759
Email: tbirk@otterbein.edu

Women’s Gender & Sexuality Resource Center 24-hour Helpline

Call at 614-823-1028 and a peer advocate will either answer or return your call immediately.

Michele Acker

Michele Acker

Professor & Director of the Honors Program


Michele Acker is a professor of psychology, with emphases in social psychology, industrial organizational psychology, and personality. She received her doctorate in social psychology from the University of Michigan. Dr. Acker’s areas of expertise are in close personal relationships, social stereotyping, the scholarship of teaching, and social influences involving the internet. Some of her research examines perceptions of intimacy between relationship partners and the role that suspicion and trust play in relationships. She teaches courses in general psychology, social psychology, industrial and organizational psychology, psychology of women, personality, and research methods. In 2000, she won the junior faculty teaching award.

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Suzanne Ashworth

Suzanne Ashworth

Professor


Suzanne Ashworth is a professor in the Department of English and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Otterbein University in Westerville, Ohio. She has taught early American literature, women’s literature, GLBTQ literatures, gender & sexuality studies, film studies, and the emotional, political, and interpersonal implications of social media. Her research interests include the history of reading, pop culture and media studies. Her published work examines the interplay among literature; histories of the body, desire, sexuality, and gender; and critical theory.…

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Tammy Birk

Tammy Birk

Associate Professor of English & Director of the Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program


Tammy Birk is an Associate Professor of English and has been director of the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies program since 2009. She regularly teaches in the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies foundational core as well as courses in experimental women’s writing, contemporary graphic narrative, gender and madness, and seminars in topics as varied as Disability Cultures and Human/Animal: Seminar in Critical Animal Studies. Her research interests are centered on critical cosmopolitanism and its radicalizing impact on global learning pedagogy.…

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Sarah Bouchard Profile Photo

Sarah Bouchard

Professor


Dr. Bouchard is a physiological ecologist who specializes in reptile and amphibian nutrition. She has a very active research lab, with undergraduates conducting projects both in Ohio and Panama. Her most recent students have examined developmental plasticity in amphibians pre- and post-metamorphosis. Dr. Bouchard teaches Ecology and Vertebrate Biology, as well as Gender and Biology for the Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies Program. She is also an active part of Zoo and Conservation Science program.

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Jim Bowling

James Bowling

Professor


Jim Bowling is a Professor in Art at Otterbein University’s Department of Art and Art History teaching in the areas of ceramics and sculpture. As a contemporary artist working in clay, he is rooted in the material and craftsmanship of ceramics but focuses on conceptual approaches to explore the connection between surface and form in figure-based narrative works. His work has shown locally, regionally and nationally; he is currently represented by the Sharon Weiss Gallery in Columbus. Jim is an…

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Carla Corroto

Carla Corroto

Professor


Associate Professor Carla Corroto earned a Ph.D. in Sociology from The Ohio State University and a Master’s degree in Architecture from the University of Illinois, Chicago. She teaches community and human service focused courses including Introduction(s) to Social Justice Studies and Sociology, the Sociology of Gender, and Sociology of Family Diversity. Taking advantage of her cross-disciplinary background, Dr. Corroto researches the intersection of gender, race, social class, and disability in architecture and urban design. She employs critical ethnographic research methods in her qualitative work with attention to narrative structure and social justice outcomes. Dr. Corroto is an avid sports fan and is kind to animals.

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Anthony Destefanis

Anthony DeStefanis

Associate Professor of History


Anthony DeStefanis specializes in modern U.S. history with an emphasis on labor and the working class and immigration, race, and ethnicity. His current research uses the Colorado National Guard and the 1913-14 southern Colorado coal strike to examine military strikebreaking. He charts the development of both Colorado’s mining industry and the Colorado National Guard to understand how the confluence of capital’s growing power, cultural politics, and the imperatives of state building created a state with a formidable National Guard that…

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Glenna Jackson

Glenna Jackson

Professor


When I came to Otterbein University in 1992, my mentor at Marquette University told me that although I was going to a college renowned for teaching, I should always remember that good teaching cannot be done without good research and good research cannot be done without the outlet of good teaching. He was right. My passion for both teaching and research centers on issues of social justice from the first century through today’s world and on a global basis. Otterbein…

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Johnson  Amy

Amy Johnson

Associate Professor


Johnson's areas of study include modern European and American art and architecture, women’s and gender studies, visual culture studies, and historic preservation. Dr. Johnson’s research focuses on the links between the artist and society, and the larger role art plays in our community. Her recent projects explore the intersections of photography and historic preservation within the creation of the modern city. Previously, Dr. Johnson taught at the University of Wisconsin – LaCrosse, the University of Delaware, and Harford Community College in…

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Noam Shpancer

Noam Shpancer

Professor


Noam Shpancer is a professor of psychology. He received his Ph.D. at Purdue University, with specialty areas in clinical and developmental psychology. Dr. Shpancer’s research interests center on various dimensions of the home-daycare link, including parent-caregiver relations, people’s childcare attitudes and perceptions, and children’s adaptation across contexts. He is a licensed, practicing clinical psychologist, with a clinical specialty in the assessment and treatment of anxiety disorders. He teaches introductory psychology, child development, personality, abnormal psychology, human sexuality, assessment, advanced research, and health psychology. In 2001, he won the junior faculty teaching award.

Follow Dr. Noam Shpancer’s blogon PsychologyToday.com

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Karen Steigman

Professor, Department Chair


Karen Steigman is a Professor of English, specializing in 20th- and 21st-century American literatures, postcolonial literature and theory, literary theory, and film.  She completed her PhD at the University of Minnesota. Her current research focuses on the post-war fiction and journalism of Joan Didion, Renata Adler, Jamaica Kincaid, and Elizabeth Hardwick. She has published articles on Graham Greene, Joan Didion, and critical university studies in College Literature, a/b: auto/biography studies, and the Journal of the Midwest Modern Language Association. She…

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Comm Headshot Kerry Strayer

Kerry Strayer

Professor


Dr. Kerry Strayer teaches courses in Communication Studies including Communication Theories, Teamwork, Organizational Communication, and Gender and Communication.  Additionally, she team teaches a Gen Ed course in Censorship, as well as a Senior Year Experience course titled, Community, Change, and Leadership.  Her research is currently focused on creating a collaborative, multi-generational workplace. Her newest project will involve creating a Cultural Awareness Training course for medical professionals.  Dr. Strayer leads workshops using personality inventories (MBTI, StrengthsFinder, Enneagram) to maximize teamwork and…

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