Priscilla Wald (born 1958) is Professor of English and Women's Studies at

Duke University Duke University is a Private university, private research university in Durham, North Carolina, United States. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity, North Carolina, Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1 ...

and the author of ''Constituting Americans: Cultural Anxiety and Narrative Form'' (1995) and ''Contagious: Cultures, Carriers, and the Outbreak Narrative'' (2008). She has published widely on the intersections of science, medicine, law, and literature. She is currently at work on a book-length study entitled ''Human Being After Genocide'', which chronicles the challenge to conceptions of human being that emerged from scientific and technological innovation in the wake of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, as well as a series of essays that explore the impact of genomics on current thinking about categories of social, biological and political belonging and on the narrative of human history. Wald is the current editor of

American Literature American literature is literature written or produced in the United States of America and in the British colonies that preceded it. The American literary tradition is part of the broader tradition of English-language literature, but also ...

. She served as the president of th
American Studies Association (ASA)
from 2011-2012. Wald received her B.A. in English from

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...

(class of 1980) and her M.A. and Ph.D. in English from

Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...

(1981, 1987). She is married to the poet and literary critic Joseph Donahue.

Works

''Constituting Americans: Cultural Anxiety and Narrative Form'' (Duke University Press, 1995).
''Contagious: Cultures, Carriers, and the Outbreak Narrative'' (Duke University Press, 2008).

External links

Duke University faculty American literary critics American women literary critics Living people Yale College alumni 1958 births {{US-English-academic-bio-stub