Jeslyn Pool

PhD Student American Literary and Cultural Studies   Research Areas 19th-century American Literature, Disability Theory/Critical Disability Studies, Intersectional Feminisms, Feminist Theory, US Women’s Literature, Transnational/Hemispheric American Literatures, Post-Colonial/Decolonial Theory   Contact Information Email: pooljm23@unm.edu Office Location: Parish Library

Biography

Jeslyn Pool is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of New Mexico, where she studies ethnic women’s literature with a focus on disability in the long 19th-century. Her dissertation investigates the specific rhetorical and literary strategies of women writers from diverse ethnic and racialized positionalities who experienced disability in their own lived experiences and/or defined and produced disability in their writing for particular social, political, or ideological reasons. She is also examining disability and Critical Disability theories and their applicability for the long 19th-century, in which ‘disability’ (both in term and concept) was very different than we conceive of today and was evolving dramatically as the century progressed. In addition to her studies, Jeslyn teaches Composition courses as Instructor of Record for the Core Writing Program. She has also taught ‘Introduction to the Analysis of Literature’ for the English Department. Jeslyn has been awarded the 2024 ‘Graduate Award of Excellence’ from the Department of Women, Gender & Sexuality Studies, in addition to the ‘Outstanding New Core Writing Instructor’ of 2024, and ‘Best 1000-Level Sequence’ of 2026 from the English Department. Originating from rural Oregon, she completed a Latin American Studies Program semester abroad in Costa Rica (2018), received her B.A in English: Communications (2020) from Corban University, and her M.A. in English Literature (2023) from James Madison University.