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Laura Nicosia

Professor, English, College of Humanities and Social Sciences

Office:: Dickson Hall 464
Email:: nicosiala@montclair.edu
Phone:: 973-655-7326
Degrees:: BA, Saint Peter's College; MA, Montclair State University; PhD, New York University
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Profile

I am a Professor of English and have disciplinary expertise in American literature, Young Adult/Children’s Literatures, popular culture, and literary theory. I serve as the NJ State Ambassador for the Assembly on Literature of Adolescents (ALAN) and am a two-term, Past-President of the NJ Council of Teachers of English (NJCTE). I am also a New Jersey Council for the Humanities Public Scholar and I travel all over the tri-state area offering workshops, presentations, and professional development seminars.

My most recent publications (all co-edited with Dr. James Nicosia) are: Critical Insights: Frankenstein; or, the Modern Prometheus, Critical Insights: Cormac McCarthy’s All the Pretty Horses (Salem/Grey House P. Summer 2023, The Encyclopedia of African American Writing. (Grey House P. Spring 2023), Digital Literacy: Skills & Strategies. (Gale P. Winter 2022) Starred Review: Library Journal, Critical Insights: Virginia Woolf (Salem/Grey House P. Fall 2022), Notable Writers of the American West & the Native American Experience (Salem/Grey House P. Fall 2021), Critical Insights: Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 (Salem/Grey House P. Fall 2021), the two-volume Notable American Women Writers, which was named a CHOICE Top 75 Community College Resource for September 2021 (Salem/Grey House P. Fall 2021), Examining Images of Urban Life: A Resource for Teachers of Young Adult Literature (Myers Education Press, Fall 2020).

In the past few years, I have published peer-reviewed articles and book chapters on Beatrix Potter, Cynthia Voigt, A.A. Milne, Gloria Naylor, Sarah Orne Jewett, Cynthia Voigt, Suzanne Collins, Neil Gaiman, Louis Sachar, Paolo Bacigalupi, Philip Roth, and Marianne Moore.

Several of the book collections I have edited with my husband, James, have earned prestigious awards by CHOICE (including being named the Outstanding Academic Choice for 2023 for our collection: Notable Writers of the American West & the Native American Experience). You will find our collections in Sprague Library and in most university libraries across the country.

Ultimately, one of my most important pedagogical missions is to bring various voices (both in the characters we encounter and by the authors we read) into my reading lists and syllabi. These include thematic focuses on issues around mental health, suicide, trauma, memory, economic disparity, race, and censorship. I want to encourage people to (re)discover the community-building and curiosity-fostering power of reading (in all its modes).

If you're interested, here are links to some of my books and collections:
https://www.salempress.com/ci-frankenstein
https://www.salempress.com/ci_all_the_pretty_horses
https://greyhouse.com/digital_literacy
https://salempress.com/ci_woolf
https://salempress.com/notable-native-american-writers-american-west
https://salempress.com/critical-insights-catch-22
https://salempress.com/book/notable-american-women-writers
https://myersedpress.presswarehouse.com/browse/book/9781975502447/Examining-Images-of-Urban-Life
https://salempress.com/critical-insights-the-pearl-by-john-steinbeck
https://www.amazon.com/Through-Distorted-Lens-Curricula-Pedagogy/dp/9463510168
https://www.amazon.com/educators-online-Preparing-Literacies-Epistemologies/dp/1433109301

Specialization

My areas of scholarly interest rest in Modern/Contemporary American fiction and poetry, young adult and children's literatures, diverse voices, science fiction, speculative fiction, and educational applications for social networking media. Some of my more recent publications examine the narrative constructs of Neil Gaiman, Louis Sachar, Philip Roth, John Dufresne, Willa Cather, and Gloria Naylor.

With my expertise in Modern and Contemporary American literature, I also serve as Volume Advisor/Curator for Gale Publishing's Short Story Criticism, Children's Literary Review, and Contemporary Literary Review. I have curated entries on numerous authors such as: A. A. Milne, Beatrix Potter, Frank Baum, Gloria Naylor, John Green, Laurie Halse Anderson, Louis Sachar, Suzanne Collins, Roald Dahl, Theodore Geisel, Roald Dahl, and Walter Dean Myers, among others.

Resume/CV

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Office Hours

Fall

Monday: 1:30 pm - 3:00 pm; Appointments are generally held via Zoom but may be face-to-face. Appointments made in advance via email: nicosiala@montclair.edu
Wednesday: 4:00 pm - 5:00 pm; Graduate Advising hours, generally. Made via email. Face-to-face or Zoom
Thursday: 2:00 pm - 3:30 pm; Appointments are generally held via Zoom but may be face-to-face. Appointments made in advance via email: nicosiala@montclair.edu

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