Alumni
PCS is a relatively new program, however, its graduates are already beginning to make mark on their respective fields of endeavor. This page is intended to be an on-going list of PCS graduates, a forum for highlighting their current location and accomplishments, and a means of connecting them to the students and faculty who presently make up the PCS program at College Park.
Amber Wiest (M.A. 2013)
Dissertation title:
Committee:
Date of Graduation: Fall 2013
Jennifer Sterling (Ph.D. 2013)
Dissertation title: Visualizing Active Bodies: Knowledge-Making in Visual Physical Culture
Committee: Drs. David L. Andrews (Chair), Damion Thomas, Shannon Jette, Michael Friedman, and Robin Sawyer (Dean's Representative)
Date of Graduation: Spring 2013
Ryan Basen (M.A. 2013)
Masters Project Title:
Committee:
Date of Graduation: Spring 2013
Joy Bauer Olimpo (M.A., 2012)
Masters Project Title: Contemplating Survival: Sport History, Kinesiology, and the Academy
Committee: Dr. David L. Andrews (chair), Dr. Damion Thomas, Dr. Shannon Jette
Date of Graduation: Fall 2012
In addition to the masters program in Physical Cultural Studies, I am a certificate candidate in the department of Women’s Studies here at Maryland. I am exploring the opportunities presented by further developing and utilizing a feminist physical cultural studies approach. The areas I focus on in my research include corporeality, pain, and injury in elite athletes, the negotiation with puberty in female athletes, femininity as it relates to bodily practices of sport and dance, and gender performances in sport. My research focus is still being shaped by my desire to learn as much as possible—I’ve relished the opportunity to complete coursework in Dance, American Studies, and Women’s Studies, in addition to the Kinesiology base of the PCS program.
My academic background is in movement science (B.S. in Kinesiology from Penn State University) and sports administration (M.Ed. from Temple University). My professional background is in college athletics, where I spent 8 years as a coach, academic advisor, and administrator before returning to the role of a student. Aside from my own academic ventures through coursework and research, I have been thrilled with the opportunity to teach at Maryland. I take great pride in my teaching and the learning experience shared by everyone in the college classroom. As a very proud native of Pennsylvania, I live for being outdoors and spend as much time in the fresh air as possible.
Callie Maddox (Ph.D., 2012)
Dissertation title: Postcolonial Play: Encounters with Sport and Physical Culture in Contemporary India
Committee: Dr. David L. Andrews (chair), Dr. Damion Thomas, Dr. Shannon Jette, Dr. Elisabeth Maring, and Dr. Jeff Lucas (Dean's Representative)
Date of Graduation: Fall 2012
My work focuses on various elements of sport and physical culture in contemporary India in an effort to understand the political, economic, and cultural complexities that underly India's postcolonial condition. In questioning the collision between lingering colonial practices and postcolonial globalization, I will be looking at numerous empirical sites including the 2010 Commonwealth Games, gym and fitness clubs, sport for development and peace projects, and yoga retreat centers. I have previously completed research on the US Paralympic Military Program and its strategic mobilization of the disabled soldier/athlete, the commercialization of American yoga, and the public memory of Andy Flower and Henry Olonga's political protest during the 2003 Cricket World Cup. While on-campus at Maryland, I served as a teaching assistant and lecturer in the Department of Kinesiology for a number of classes including Sport in American Society, Sport and Globalization, and History of Sport in America.
Prior to coming to Maryland, I worked as a volunteer for Right to Play, an international humanitarian organization that uses sport and play to catalyze community development in marginalized areas of the world. Stationed in a refugee camp in northern Uganda, I helped to create and implement sport projects that ranged from a women's soccer league to Ultimate Frisbee lessons for high school students. I then enrolled at the Chelsea School at the University of Brighton and completed a MA in International Sport Policy. From there I dabbled in the professional world for several years, including stints with the US Olympic Committee, US Paralympics, and BaseballSoftballUK.
I am a very proud native of New Mexico, so I miss green chile burritos, hiking in the mountains, and wide open blue skies. When I'm not researching, writing, or navigating the crazy streets of Delhi, I enjoy practicing yoga, watching baseball, and playing squash with my husband.
Jenny Collins (M.A., 2011)
Thesis Title: Beyond the beauty salon: Sport, women of color, and their hair
Committee: Dr. Jaime Schultz (Chair), Dr. David L. Andrews, and Dr. Damion Thomas
Date of Graduation: Spring 2011
Since graduating in 2011, I have been finding my way in the “real world” to figure out a meaningful way to stay involved and apply my research in a real and meaningful way. First off, I will be the first to tell you that black women and their hair is a topic people LOVE to talk about!! I have had many meaningful conversations with family members, fellow athletes and even colleagues at work about the unpacking of black female athletes and their hair. It is a topic that I think is just beginning to attract the research and scholarly attention it deserves, and I have seen so many different articles surface across academic disciplines and media outlets. Although I loved discussing this specific topic, my greater goal is to positively impact the lives of athletes, and specifically to help grow and diversify the game of lacrosse- which is near and dear to my heart since I played at Maryland for 5 years and I identify as a black female athlete myself.
Since 2008 I have co-owned Step Up Lacrosse (www.stepuplacrosse.com), a company dedicated to growing the game through camps and clinics all over the county, however in 2011 my business partner and I decided it was time to expand our brand into the non-profit 501(3)c realm. Fast forward and in 2012 Step Up Lacrosse Charity (www.stepuplacrossecharity.org) was born with the mission to grow and diversify the sport of lacrosse. Although we are growing slowly, we have held a National Girls & Women in Sports Day free clinic with over 300 participants, we have hosted our first inner city youth after school program, and have been able to provide scholarships and equipment to give girls access to the sport. While I am very passionate about my work with both Step Up organizations, I am equally as passionate about my full-time job at Nike Lacrosse. While I may spend nights and evenings working on Step Up I get to spend my days growing and improving the women’s game through product, apparel and footwear at Nike. I couldn’t be more excited about the balance that Nike and Step Up bring to my life, and hope that this marriage of two very different ways of contributing to the growth of the sport can continue to co-exist and allow me to positively impact women in sport.
Jaime DeLuca (Ph.D., 2010)
Dissertation Title: Exercising social class privilege: Examining the practices and processes defining upper-middle class swimming club culture
Committee: Dr. David L. Andrews (chair), Dr. Jaime Schultz, Dr. Damion Thomas, Dr. Kevin Roy, Dr. Elisabeth Maring
Date of Graduation: Fall 2010
Jaime DeLuca is currently an assistant professor at Towson University in the Sport Management department. She holds a Ph.D. from the University of Maryland in Physical Cultural Studies, an M.A. from the University of Connecticut in Sport Management, and a B.S. from Penn State in Business Administration. Dr. DeLuca’s area of specialization and research interests focus on the relationships between sport participation, family structure, and social class status. Dr. DeLuca teaches a variety of courses at Towson including Sport and Society, Sport and the Media, Sport Marketing, and Sport Management.
Dr. DeLuca currently resides in Maryland with her husband, Nick, an economic consultant in Washington, D.C., and baby daughter, Ryan Ava. She enjoys swimming, jogging, and golf, and is an avid Penn State football fan.
Caitlin Brauer (M.A., 2010)
Date of Graduation: Fall 2010
Caitlin is currently working with St. John’s College High School and Hoop Education, LLC in Hyattsville, MD and the greater DC metro area as the Assistant Varsity Girls Coach, Camp and Clinic Coach, and as an instructor and trainer.
Tan Zhang (Ph.D., 2010)
Dissertation Title:
Committee: Dr. David L. Andrews (chair),
Date of Graduation: Fall 2010
Ashley Gollmann (M.A., 2010)
Date of Graduation: Fall 2010
Ryan King-White (Ph.D., 2009)
Dissertation Title: Baseball, Citizenship, and National Identity in George W. Bush’s America (completed Fall 2009)
Committee: David L. Andrews (Chair), Michael Giardina, Sheri Parks, Damion Thomas, Jaime Schultz, Michael Silk (proposal), Elizabeth Marshall (proposal)
Date of Graduation: Spring 2009
Ryan King-White is currently an assistant professor at Towson University in the Sport Management department. Dr. King-White teaches courses at Towson on Sport and, Cultural Economy of Sport, Sport and Society, and Sport History. He has published (some forthcoming) research on South Korean-American relations around the 2002 World Cup and Olympics, the Little League World Series and American Nationalism, Danny Almonte and national identity, the Red Sox-Yankees rivalry, Obesity and pedagogy, and the politics of qualitative research in journals such as the International Journal of Media and Cultural Politics, Sociology of Sport Journal, International Review for Qualitative Inquiry, and in various edited books. Ryan's current research and writing agenda consists of completing manuscripts from his PhD on Red Sox Nation, contemplating the value of internships for Sport Management undergraduates, and considering the intersection between globalization, (post)neoliberal capitalism, and obesity.
This spring Dr. King-White will be presenting the keynote lecture at the University of Maryland's 3rd Annual Physical Cultural Studies Student Symposium with a paper entitled "Obesity! (Post)Neoliberalism Still Needs You: Food, Personal Responsibility, and the Failure of Free Market Economics". The paper will discuss his recent ethnographic research at a local meal production company, and how its goals are often undercut by the workings of the "free market". Later this spring he will be presenting at the 6th Annual Congress of Qualitative Inquiry with Amber Wiest. The paper entitled '"If I were a Boy it would be All Right": Power, Privilege, and Apprehension in Student-Teacher Research" will discuss their recent research project and the experience of working together in and through a student-teacher power relationship.
Ryan currently resides in Towson, MD with his wife, Meghan, who is a speech pathologist at Franklin Square Hospital. In the past he has played in local bowling and softball leagues, was once the Kinesiology Department graduate school intramural soccer team's goalkeeper, and flag football team's starting quarterback. He also enjoys ball and disc golf, as well as working out at the Towson University gym. He has been recently spotted courtside cheering his school's team on at Towson University men's and women's basketball games, the latter of whom defeated the University of Maryland earlier this season.
Mike Friedman (Ph.D., 2009)
Dissertation Title:
Committee: Dr. David L. Andrews (chair),
Date of Graduation: Spring 2009
Amie Chaudry (M.A. 2009)
Date of Graduation: Fall 2010
Andy Grainger (Ph.D., 2008)
Dissertation Title: The Browning of the All Blacks: Pacific Peoples, Rugby, and the Cultural Politics of Identity in New Zealand
Committee: David L. Andrews (Chair), Mary McDonald
George Ritzer, Jaime Schultz, Damion Thomas
Date of Graduation: May 2008
Andy Grainger is doctoral graduate of the Physical Cultural Studies program. Originally from New Zealand, he has been a visiting professor at The University of Memphis and, more recently, Miami University of Ohio where he taught classes in the socio-cultural and historical analysis of sport, leisure, and recreation. Broadly interested the relationship between globalization, immigration, and identity, Andy’s recent work examines the cultural politics of ‘race’ and ‘nation’ as played out through the sport of rugby. As well as problematizing the ‘postcolonial’ political mobilization of ‘multiculturalism’, the larger goals of this research are to popularize new ways of thinking about physical culture and identity that destabilize linear understandings of time and space and to advance concepts of subjectivity that emphasize plurality, mobility, hybridity and the margins. Despite the nature of this research, and in a classic case of Orwellian doublethink, Andy remains a fan of the New Zealand All Blacks rugby team.
Nik Dickerson (M.A., 2007)
I am currently a second year Ph.D. student, finishing my course work and preparing to narrow down a topic for my dissertation.My work focuses on the ways in which aspects of race, gender, and sexuality are intertwined with constructions of Canadian nationalism. More specifically, I have focused on how the production and consumption of hockey standout Sidney Crosby, has led to a reinforcement of the Canadian citizen as white, heterosexual and male. My other areas of interest include: globalization, hip-hop and sport, and neo-liberalism.
I started out in Sport Studies as an undergraduate at Ithaca College, following my graduation at Ithaca I went on to receive my Masters degree from the University of Maryland in Physical Cultural Studies. I am now in my second year in a Ph.D. program at the University of Iowa. I am presently a Teaching Assistant for Inequality in Sport, and I will be teaching this course in fall 2009.
Joshua I. Newman (Ph.D., 2005)
Dissertation Title: Dixie’s Last Stand: Ole Miss, the Body, and the Spectacle of Whiteness
Committee: David L. Andrews (Chair), Sheri Parks, Darcy Plymire, Michael Silk, Debbie Young
Date of Graduation: December 2005
Joshua I. Newman lectures in the areas of sport and physical culture, qualitative research, cultural studies, and critical pedagogy at the University of Otago’s (New Zealand) School of Physical Education. Dr Newman earned his PhD in the Physical Cultural Studies program at the University of Maryland in 2005. Broadly speaking, his research, teaching, and supervision are committed to interrogating the intersections of late capitalism, identity, and cultural [bio]politics of the in/active body. Through various forms of ethnographic inquiry, his work has focused on the politics of embodiment, performativity, and enfleshment within the US South. To this end, he is the author of Embodying Dixie: Studies in the Body Pedagogics of Southern Whiteness (Common Ground, 2010) and the forthcoming (with Michael Giardina) Consuming NASCAR Nation: Sport, Spectacle, and the Cultural Politics of Neoliberalism (Palgrave, 2011). He has been invited to publish his research in Kincheloe and Steinberg’s (2008) Christotainment and most recently in Denzin and Lincoln’s (2011) Sage Handbook of Qualitative Research (both with Giardina). He has also published numerous research articles in various sociology, sport studies, cultural studies, and critical pedagogy journals including Cultural Studies-Critical Methodologies, American Behavioral Scientist, Review of Education, Pedagogy, and Cultural Studies, Sociology of Sport Journal, and International Review for the Sociology of Sport.
Sarah Olson (M.A., 2008)
Lisa Swanson (Ph.D., )
Bryan Vitagliano (M.A., )
Jessica Chin (Ph.D., )
Where Are They Now?
