Detailed Event Description by Location
Programs at EIU	Programs Co-sponsored with Area Libraries
Related Programming - EIU Campus	Related Programming - East Central Illinois

BIOGRAPHIES

Paul Johnston

Paul Johnston is serving as project scholar for the America’s Music series and also will play piano with the Doudna Theatre Ensemble. Johnston joined Eastern’s faculty in 2004. He directs the Jazz Lab Band, coordinates the combo program, and teaches courses in jazz piano, improvisation and arranging. He has degrees from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Indiana University. He is at home in a wide variety of musical styles and has performed with artists including Clark Terry, Benny Golson, Nancy Wilson, Monica Mancini and Bernadette Peters. Johnston’s compositions and arrangements have been performed by soloists, chamber groups and jazz ensembles across the country.

Allen Lanham

Allen Lanham is the dean of Library Services at Eastern Illinois University. He holds degrees from the University of Rochester, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Arkansas State University and Murray State University. He is a past president of the Consortium of Academic and Research Libraries in Illinois and the Illinois Library Association, and previously wrote a column for the ILA Reporter. He is a trustee for the Charleston Carnegie Public Library and is a former officer of the Lincoln Trail Libraries System. He was named the 2008 Illinois Academic Librarian of the Year and has been a consultant for libraries in Costa Rica, Peru, Ghana and the United States.

 

Presenters

David Gracon completed his Ph.D. in communication and society at the University of Oregon in the fall of 2010 and is currently seeking a publisher for his dissertation, Exiled Records and Over-the-Counter-Culture — A Cultural Political Economic Analysis of the Independent Record Store. He recently completed his first feature-length documentary video, Walls of Sound: A Look Inside the House of Records (63 minutes, 2012). His research and teaching interests include political economy of communication (in particular, the music industry), critical cultural studies, alternative media, media/music based subcultures, DIY cultural production, tactical media, video, documentary and experimental media production. He is a native of Buffalo and has been invested in post-punk, indie, experimental music scenes, zine communities and college radio.

Newton Key, professor of history at Eastern, has published on the political, religious, local and cultural history of early modern British Isles. He is now revising his co-authored, best-selling text, Early Modern England, and co-edited Sources and Debates in English History for the third editions. He has just written on the early modern blogosphere and blogs himself at http://earlymodernengland.blogspot.com. His musical avocation extends from his swing/jazz band school days through British reggae, a subject on which he has directed graduate study.

Michael Loudon, professor of English, has taught at Eastern for the past 28 years. He completed an A.B. at Wabash College in Crawfordsville, Ind., and a M.A. and Ph.D at the State University of New York at Buffalo. He studied Ghandian nonviolent resistance in India as an undergraduate, was Fulbright Professor of African American Literature in 1990-91 at the University of the West Indies-St. Augustine in Trinidad, taught at the University of Guam in 2001, participated in Study Abroad-Cape Town, South Africa, in 2007 and led student groups to South Africa in 2009 and 2011. Dr. Loudon served as acting coordinator of the African American Studies Program from 2006 to 2008. He has been an African American Studies Advisory Board member for 28 years and has served as faculty adviser for the African Student Association for the past five years. He enjoys hiking, gardening, writing
poetry and listening to the blues.

Robin L. Murray is professor of English at Eastern Illinois University, where she coordinates the film studies minor and teaches film, literature and pedagogy courses. She and Joe Heumann published Ecology and Popular Film: Cinema on the Edge in 2009 (SUNY Press), “That’s All Folks”?: Ecocritical Readings of American Animated Features in 2011 (University of Nebraska Press) and Gunfight at the Eco-Corral: Western Cinema and the Environment in 2012 (University of Oklahoma Press). Their manuscript, Film and Every Day Eco-Disasters, is contracted with the University of Nebraska Press.

Patricia S. Poulter is the associate dean of the College of Arts and Humanities and professor of music at Eastern. Raised on bluegrass and country music, and trained in classical voice and piano,  Poulter is equally at home singing harmony on the back porch or conducting a chamber orchestra. Poulter has a doctorate of education in music from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, a master of arts in choral conducting and a bachelor of music with teacher certification, both from Eastern. As a member of the International Council of Fine Arts Deans Advocacy Task Force, Poulter is engaged in arts advocacy initiatives at the state and national levels. Recent national presentations have focused on interdisciplinary teaching and learning, community arts outreach and issues in higher education.

Debra A. Reid holds a B.S. in historic preservation (Southeast Missouri State University), an M.A. in history museum studies (Cooperstown Graduate Program) and worked in open air museums before shifting careers. She completed an M.A. in history (Baylor University) and a Ph.D. (Texas A&M University) before joining the history department at Eastern Illinois University.

Chris Robison received a B.A. in English from Eastern in 2011. He is now a second-year graduate student pursuing a M.A. in English with a creative-writing emphasis. He will begin working on his creative-writing thesis this semester under the direction of Dr. Markelis. His accomplishments include winning the James Johnson award for his creative essay “Valve.” Besides reading and writing, Robison enjoys music, especially the blues.

Mark Rubel has played rock music since 1970, for the last 32 years as bassist of Captain Rat and the Blind Rivets. He teaches the history of rock to about 275 students a semester at Eastern, where he also teaches music technology and is the audio director for the Doudna Fine Arts Center. Since 1980, Rubel has produced and/or engineered about a thousand recordings at his Pogo Studio in downtown Champaign for various artists including Hum, Alison Krauss, Rascal Flatts, Fallout Boy, Ludacris, Adrian Belew, Luther Allison, Jay Bennett, Ian Hobson and Henry Butler; and for all of the major recording labels, video game companies, the BBC, etc. He is on the national board of the Society of Professional Recording Services and belongs to many other professional organizations. He occasionally writes for recording magazines, including his interviews with Les Paul.

Percussionist Jamie V. Ryan thrives on playing and teaching many types of music, including chamber and orchestral music, popular American genres and music from the African diaspora. An active solo and chamber musician, he is a member of the Galaxy Percussion Group. In 1999, he co-founded the Africa->West Percussion Trio, which plays its own music influenced by the African Diaspora and the Western tradition, as well as standard repertoire for chamber percussion. He has toured Europe and the United States with the Leo Sidran band, El Clan Destino and many other artists. He has recorded for the GoJazz and Stellar Records labels. Ryan is an assistant professor of percussion at Eastern and has taught at Mansfield University, the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater and Lawrence University. He received degrees from Lawrence University (magna cum laude) and the University of Wisconsin.