Prelims

Half Title

American Life Writing and the Medical Humanities

Title Page

American Life Writing and the Medical Humanities: Writing Contagion

Samantha Allen Wright

William Penn University, USA

United Kingdom – North America – Japan – India – Malaysia – China

Copyright Page

Emerald Publishing Limited

Howard House, Wagon Lane, Bingley BD16 1WA, UK

First edition 2020

Copyright © 2020 Samantha Allen Wright.

Published under exclusive license by Emerald Publishing Limited.

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN: 978-1-83909-673-0 (Print)

ISBN: 978-1-83909-672-3 (Online)

ISBN: 978-1-83909-674-7 (Epub)

Contents

About the Author

Samantha Allen Wright is an Assistant Professor of English at William Penn University. She earned her Ph.D. in English from Texas Christian University in 2018. Her dissertation, titled Reading and Writing Epidemics: Illness Narratives as Literature, won Addran College of Liberal Art’s (at Texas Christian University) Outstanding Dissertation Award of 2019. Her research revolves around the medical humanities, disability studies, and American literature. Her research has been published in the Lamar Journal of Humanities in a special medical humanities edition. This is her first monograph.

Acknowledgements

I decided to write a book about epidemic disease about 10 years ago, while reading for my master’s thesis. Although I didn’t know the exact topic, I knew I wanted to study life writing and epidemic illness. After a decade worth of research, schooling, and writing, I’m humbled to present my work to a wider audience. Of course, this book would not exist without the help and encouragement of my colleagues, former professors, family, and friends for imparting both their wisdom and confidence in me over the years. Although there are far too many people to name, I’m grateful to all of you for your help over the years.

Firstly, I’d like to thank all of those at Emerald Publishing who made this book possible, particularly Amber Stone-Galilee and Katy Mathers. I’d also like to thank Ben Doyle and Anna Scaife for this help as well. Thank you all for recognizing the value of the medical humanities and giving me the chance to share my work. I’d also like to broadly thank the English Department at Texas Christian University, particularly Drs David Colón and Sarah Robbins for their unwavering support. Not only did they read many drafts of my writing, but both of them went above and beyond in working with me. I’d also like to thank Drs Stacy Alaimo, Desiree Henderson, and Sarah Rose for sharing their knowledge about disability studies, life writing, and cultural studies and for not batting an eye when I said that polio was the only topic I wanted to write about for my thesis. Without your support early in my career, I never would have written this book.

I’d also like to thank my colleagues and students at William Penn University for giving me a space to write, teach, and think about my work. Finally, I am thankful for my friends, and family, especially my mother Dorothy McDowell, and my grandmother, the original Dorothy McDowell, as well as Clifford and Elizabeth McDowell. I would also like to thank Dr Ariel Weygandt Peterson, Taylor Wesley, and the Jumby and Wright families. A special thanks goes to my academic partner, Dr Heidi Hakimi-Hood for helping me make tough decisions by asking me “is this your first choice?” Finally, I would like to thank Dr Wilton S. Wright for reading everything I write, organizing my books and my office, and for sharing life with me.