About Us
Welcome, word nerds and film buffs. Want to know more about the brains behind our podcast? Well, you're in luck! This page is all about our hosts - their bios, areas of research, quirks, hobbies, and all the juicy details you've been dying to know. Get ready to discover what makes our hosts tick and maybe even find out where to find the best cookie in the U.S. and who the best three-point shooter in all of basketball is. So, sit back, relax, and let get to know our hosts a little better!
McKenzie
Ever since "playing school" in a makeshift classroom in the forest behind her house at eight years old, McKenzie has had a nonstop passion and drive for teaching. As the years went on, nothing seemed to touch the imagination and adventure that literature incites. McKenzie is one of those "odd people" who loves school. She also enjoys refurbishing furniture, thrifting, and serving the community, and she is very passionate about trying every chocolate chip cookie possible (the current number one ranking is the chocolate chip cookie from Kilwins in NC).
McKenzie's scholarship focuses on determining the most effective pedagogical practices that promote students' critical thinking processes. Much of this research involves the role of multimedia communication within literature, such as podcasts, music, images, cinema, etc. She is working on a theoretical publication on effective multimodal teaching practices in a post-COVID-19 environment.
In her spare time, McKenzie also loves practicing writing in diverse literary genres, including research and creative writing, rewatching and reanalyzing episodes of The Twilight Zone, baking every flavor of cookie possible, and going on adventures with her husband to find every amazing hole-in-the-wall eatery in Alabama.
Stephen
Somehow or another affiliated with academia and teaching for over two decades, Stephen is no stranger to droning on and on over subjects that spark his passion. Two of those just happen to be literature and film. There's also the perfect way to make a cocktail, the sheer poetry that is Sabrina Ionescu's three pointer, and how pineapple doesn't belong on pizza, but those can be saved for a different pod.
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His scholarly pursuits have led him to publish and present on films such as Jaws, Cujo, Firestarter, and Marvel's Avengers as well as television series such as Dollhouse. His current area of study is animal-attack fiction, both literature and film, specifically from the window of 1974-1983 because academic studies can often be oddly specific. He is currently working on a monograph delving into analysis of this genre and era, a book that absolutely no one is clamoring for.
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Most of his spare time is spent cuddling with his loyal canine bestie Penny and his two feline overlords Ares and Athena as well as curating his collection of Aliyah memorabilia (the former wrestler, not the singer) that he began amassing by accident--again, a tale for another pod.
