Coordinator, Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies Program & Professor
thompsmx@jmu.edu
Contact Info
Spring 2026 Office Hours
TBA
Office: Keezell 413
Specialization
Contemporary American Literature, Women's Literature, Feminist Theory, Body Studies, Motherhood Studies, and Reproductive Justice
Education
Ph.D., American Culture Studies, Bowling Green State University
M.A., English, University of Vermont
B.A., French and English, University of Vermont
Publications
Edited Volume
The Politics of Reproduction: Adoption, Abortion, and Surrogacy in the Age of Neoliberalism. Co-edited with Modhumita Roy. Formations: Adoption, Kinship, and Culture Series. Ohio State University Press. Forthcoming October 2019.
Refereed Articles
“Impossible Motherhood: Irene Vilar’s Misconceived Metaphors.” Frontiers: A Journal of Women’s Studies 35.1 (2014): 132-59.
“Learn Something From This! The Problem of Optional Ethnicity in America’s Next Top Model.” Feminist Media Studies 10:3 (Sept. 2010): 335-52.
“Third Wave Feminism and The Politics of Motherhood.” Genders 43 (Spring 2006). Reprinted with new introduction as “Third Wave Feminism and The Politics of Motherhood” Genders 1:2 (2016). https://www.colorado.edu/genders/2017/03/17/third-wave-feminism-and-politics-motherhood. Web.
Refereed Book Chapters
“Bad Mothers and Staunch Feminists: Selective Abortion in Mommy-Memoirs by Ayelet Waldman and Martha Beck.” Mothering and Abortion. Eds. H. Jackson and K. Kosior. Toronto, ON: Demeter Press. (forthcoming 2019)
“Precarity and Disasters in Jesmyn Ward’s Salvage the Bones: A Reproductive Justice Reading” in The Politics of Reproduction: Adoption, Abortion, and Surrogacy in the Age of Neoliberalism. 37-61. (forthcoming 2019)
“Introduction” (co-authored with Modhumita Roy). The Politics of Reproduction: Adoption, Abortion, and Surrogacy in the Age of Neoliberalism. 1-36. (forthcoming 2019)
“Believing is Seeing is Believing: Elective Abortion and Visual Closure.” Interrogating Reproductive Loss: Feminist Writings on Abortion, Miscarriage, and Stillbirth. Eds. Emily R.M. Lind & Angie Deveau. Toronto, ON: Demeter Press, 2017. 61-74.
“When Chickens Come Home to Signify in Our Mothers’ Gardens: The Walkers, Mommy-Memoirs, and the New Maternalism.” New Maternalisms: Tales of Motherwork (Dislodging the Unthinkable). Eds. Roksana Badruddoja and Maki Motapanyane. Toronto, ON: Demeter Press, 2016. 180-195.
“Juno or Just Another Girl? Young Breeders and a New Century of Racial Politics of Motherhood.” In Motherhood at the 21st Century: Policy, Experience, Identity, Agency. Ed. Andrea O’Reilly. NY: Columbia University Press, 2010. 171-84.
“The Construction of Public Health in the FDA Hearings on Silicone Breast Implants.” In Body Talk: Rhetoric, Technology, and Reproduction. Eds. Clare Gavon, L. Gurak, M. Lay, and C. Mynti. Chicago: University of Wisconsin Press, 2000. 262-76.
Shorter Works
“The Mommy Memoir.” The Microgenre: A Quick Look at Small Culture. Eds. Molly O’Donnell and Anne Stevens. New York: Bloomsbury. (forthcoming 2019)
“The Round House” and “Grandma.” Entries in Women’s Rights: Reflections in Popular Culture. Ed. Ann M. Savage. Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood Publishing, 2017.
Commissioned Review of Mothers Who Deliver: Feminist Interventions in Public and Personal Discourse. Edited by Jocelyn Fenton Stitt and Pegeen Reichert Powell. Teachers College Record, Date Published: June 15, 2011. http://www.tcrecord.org ID Number: 16449.
“Mothers in Media.” Encyclopedia of Motherhood. Ed. Andrea O’Reilly. Sage Press, 2010. 2:746-50.
“What is a Feminist (Blog)?” Feminist Collections: A Quarterly of Women’s Studies Resources. 27(2) Winter 2006.
“Janice Radway” and “Joanna Russ.” Entries in Encyclopedia of Feminist Literary Theory. Ed. Beth Kowaleski-Wallace. New York: Garland, 1997. 335 and 357.
