Dr. Shirley Lumpkin (1997-1998)

Dr. Shirley Lumpkin earned a B.A. in English from Ohio Wesleyan University in 1965, an M.A. in English from Johns Hopkins University in 1966, and a Ph.D. in English from McGill University in 1983. A Canada Council Doctoral Fellowship and Woodrow Wilson Scholarship recipient, Dr. Lumpkin served as a member of the Marshall faculty in the Department of English from 1983 until her retirement as Professor Emerita in 2013. She served as Director of the University’s Writing Across the Curriculum Program and worked to support the Marshall Writing Project and similar discipline-based activities in the College of Liberal Arts, the College of Education and Human Services, and the Department of English. Dr. Lumpkin served as co-director of the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Gender in Appalachia and was active in Marshall’s self-governance through her service on the Faculty Senate. She has published extensively on American literature and African American writers. She is especially interested in exploring the writing of contemporary women in Appalachia, which challenges every stereotype and many generalizations about women, writing, and the region. As a Distinguished Drinko Fellow, she directed a study entitled Re-Membering, Re-Weaving, Re-Visioning ‘Other’ Ways: Contemporary Women Writing in Appalachia. Among many accolades, Dr. Lumpkin was named the West Virginia Legislature’s Outstanding Professor in 1990. She received the Marshall and Shirley Reynolds Outstanding Teacher Award the same year and was the recipient of the Marshall University Distinguished Service Award in 2010.