PAUL A. CEFALU
Easton, PA 18042
cefalup@lafayette.edu
EMPLOYMENT
LAFAYETTE COLLEGE, EASTON, PENNSYLVANIA 18042
Frank Lee and Edna M. Smith Professor, 2015-
Professor, 2013 –15
Assistant- Associate Professor, 1999-2012
LOUISIANA STATE UNIVERSITY, BATON ROUGE, LA
Associate Professor of English, 2008-09
EDUCATION
THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS
M.A. English Literature, June 1992
Ph.D. English Literature, March 1999
THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY, BALTIMORE, MD
B.A English Literature, June 1988
BOOKS
The Johannine Renaissance in Early Modern English Literature and Theology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017)
Tragic Cognition in Shakespeare’s Othello: Beyond the Neural Sublime (Shakespeare Now! Series, Bloomsbury, 2015)
English Renaissance Literature and Contemporary Theory: Sublime Objects of Theology (Palgrave Macmillan Press, 2007)
Moral Identity in Early Modern English Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, November, 2005)
Revisionist Shakespeare: Transitional Ideologies in Texts and Contexts
(New York: Palgrave Macmillan Press, November, 2004)
Edited Collections
The Return of Theory in Early Modern English Studies, Volume II, co-edited with Gary Kuchar and Bryan Reynolds (Palgrave Macmillan Press, 2014)
Thinking with God: Cognitive Theory, Religion, and Literature (co-edited with Julia Reinhard Lupton, special issue, Literature and Theology, September 2014)
The Return of Theory in Early Modern English Studies: Tarrying with the Subjunctive co-edited with Bryan Reynolds (Palgrave Macmillan Press, 2011)
Book in Progress
The Mind and Body of God: Divine Accommodation and Anthropomorphism in Early Modern English Culture (in progress; supported by a long-term fellowship at the Folger Shakespeare Library, Washington, D.C., 2013-2104)
Essays
“Johannine Poetics in George Herbert’s Devotional Lyrics” (forthcoming, ELH, 2015)
“Incarnational Apophatic: Rethinking Divine Accommodation in John Milton’s Paradise Lost” (forthcoming, Studies in Philology, 2015)
“The Burdens of Mindreading in Shakespeare’s Othello, or How Iago Gives the Lie to Cognitive Theory.” Shakespeare Quarterly, 64:3, 2013.
“Acquiring Things: Strange Cases of Compulsive Hoarding” (forthcoming, Journal of the Medical Humanities)
“Introduction to Special Issue of Literature and Theology on Cognitive Religious Theory and Literature, co-edited with Julia Lupton. Literature and Theology, September, 2014)
“The Doubting Disease: Religious Scrupulosity in Historical Context.” Journal of Medical Humanities, February 2010.
“What’s so Funny about OCD?” PMLA, January 2009.
“The Ethics of Pardoning in Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure,” Early Modern Drama and the Politics of Biblical Reading, ed. Adrian Streete (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011)
“Richard Hooker,” Encyclopedia of English Renaissance Literature, eds. Alan Stewart and Garrett Sullivan (Wiley-Blackwell, 2012)
“Godly Fear, Sanctification, and Calvinist Theology in the Holy Sonnets and Sermons of John Donne.” Studies in Philology, 100.1 (2003): 71-86.
“Thomistic Metaphysics and Ethics in the Poetry and Prose of Thomas Traherne.” Literature and Theology, 16.3 (2002): 248-269.
“Moral Pragmatism in the Theology of Milton and his Contemporaries, or
Habitus Historicized.” Milton Studies, 39 (2000): 129-166.
“‘Damned Custom…Habits Devil’: Antidualism, Hamlet and the
Early Modern Philosophy of Mind.” ELH, 62.2 (2000): 399-431.
“Rethinking the Discourse of Colonialism in Economic Terms: The Tempest, Captain John Smith’s Virginia Narratives and the English Response to Vagrancy.” Shakespeare Studies, 28 (2000): 85-219.
“The End of Absolutism: Coriolanus and the Consensual Nature of the Early Modern State.” ., 4.2, 2000.
Book Reviews
Review of Russell Hillier, Milton’s Messiah: The Son of God in the Works of John Milton (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), Literature and Theology 27:1 (2013)
Review of Angus Fletcher,Time, Space, and Motion in the Age of Shakespeare (Harvard University Press, 2007), Modern Philology 108:3 (2011)
Review of Re-Reading Thomas Traherne, ed. David Blevin (ACMRS Press, 2007), Review of English Studies 60:245 (2009)
Review of Thinking with Shakespeare: Comparative and Interdisciplinary Essays, eds. William Poole and Richard Scholar (Legenda), Shakespeare Quarterly 59:3 (2008)
Review of Bryan Reynolds, ed. Transversal Enterprises in the Drama of Shakespeare and His Contemporaries: Fugitive Explorations (New York: Palgrave Macmillan Press, 2006),Shakespeare Quarterly 58.2 (2007)
Review of Hamlet: New Critical Essays, edited by Arthur F. Kinney (New York and London: Routledge, 2002), Shakespeare Quarterly 55.1 (2004)
HONORS AND AWARDS
FOLGER SHAKESPEARE LIBRARY LONG-TERM MELLON FELLOWSHIP, 2013-2014: The Mind and Body of God: Divine Accommodation and Anthropomorphism in Early Modern English Culture
SOLMSEN FELLOWSHIP, UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN, MADISON, 2013-2014 (declined)
JONES AWARD FOR SUPERIOR TEACHING AND RESEARCH
Lafayette College, 2011
JONES LECTURESHIP
“The Doubting Disease: Religious Scrupulosity in Historical Context”
Lafayette College, April 2006
WOODROW WILSON FOUNDATION
Charlotte Newcomb Dissertation Fellowship, 1997-98
FRANCIS X. KINAHAN MEMORIAL PRIZE IN TEACHING
Awarded for Writing Lectureship, Winter 1993
University of Chicago
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO FELLOWSHIP
1991-1995
THE JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
Phi Beta Kappa, 1988
SELECTED PRESENTATIONS
“Incarnational Apophatic: Rethinking Divine Accommodation in John Milton’s Paradise Lost (upcoming paper to be presented at the MLA Conference, 2014, Milton: An Open Session)
Shakespeare and the Limits of Cognitive Theory (upcoming SAA, 2014 panel, co-organized and chaired with James Kunzer, Brown University)
“The Burdens of Mindreading in Shakespeare’s Othello, Or How Iago Gives the Lie to Cognitive Theory (RSA conference, 2013)
Shakespeare and Consciousness (participant, SAA Seminar, 2013)
“Shakespeare’s Moral Philosophy” (Shakespeare Association of America panel, “Staging Philosophy,” 2009)
“Ethics and the Instrumental Use of the Passions in Francis Bacon’s The Advancement of Learning” (RSA conference, Los Angeles, CA, 2009; organizer and panelist)
“The Doubting Disease: Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and Religious Scrupulosity,” Jones Lectureship, Lafayette College, April, 2006 (invited lecture)
Organizer of and Respondent to MLA panel, December 2005: “Slavoj Zizek and Early Modern English Literature.”
University of Memphis, 2001: “Revisionist Shakespeare: Transitional Ideologies in Texts and Contexts.” (invited lecture).
Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies Conference,
February 17-19, 2000:
“Godly Fear, Sanctification, and Calvinist Theology in the Holy Sonnets of
John Donne.”
MLA Conference, December 27, 1999:
“A Method for Teaching Literature and Ethics.”
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
SEPTEMBER 1998-PRESENT
English 7100: Renaissance Non-Dramatic Poetry (Graduate Seminar; LSU, Spring 2009)
English 4148: Shakespeare and Philosophy. Upper-level seminar on the philosophical questions raised by Shakespeare’s plays; LSU, Fall 2008)
English 303: British Writers: Milton. Upper-level seminar focusing on the politics and theology of Paradise Lost.
English 336: Studies in Seventeenth-Century Literature: Metaphysical Poetry. Upper-level seminar on seventeenth-century poetry.
English 336: Studies in Seventeenth-Century Literature: Sex and Gender in Early Modern Literature and Culture. Upper-level seminar focusing on the sex-gender distinction in Early Modern conduct manuals, treatises on biology, witchcraft tracts, drama and poetry.
English 210: Introduction to English Literature I: Beowulf to Milton. Survey of British Literature from the Old English period up to Restoration literature. Emphasis on the transformation of genre and the rise of individualism as represented in Early Modern texts.
English 206: Literary History. Assess the various meanings of the term and concept literary history.
English 205: Literary Questions. Introduces students to literary theory, including psychoanalytic, feminist, Marxist, and new historicist literary methodologies.
English 120: Narratives of Mental Illness. Introduces students to memoirs and medical literature on obsessive-compulsive disorder, depressive illness, and eating disorders.
English 110: College Writing. Introduces students to all aspects of composition, focusing particularly on critical reading and argumentation.
PROFESSIONAL SERVICE
North American Associate Editor, Literature and Theology (Oxford University Press)
Reader for Cambridge University Press
Reader for PMLA
Reader for Modern Philology
Reader for Literature and Theology
Reader for Fairleigh Dickinson Press
Diversity Committee, Lafayette College, 2011-
Grand Challenges Interdisciplinary Program in Engineering and the Humanities (Liberal Arts Representative, Lafayette College), 2009-
Life Sciences Steering Committee (Lafayette College), 2010-
Marquis Scholars Program Advisor (Lafayette College), 2010-11
Roethke Humanities Festival Steering Committee), 2010- 11
Graduate Studies Committee (LSU), 2008-2009
Academic Research Committee (Lafayette College), 2007-2008
Academic Progress Committee (Lafayette College), 1999-2001
Athletics Committee, (Lafayette College), 2002-03
Faculty Academic Policy Committee (Budget Subcommittee, Lafayette College), 2003-04
Phi Beta Kappa Selection Committee (Lafayette College chapter), 2002-03
Graduate Student Advisor (English Department, Lafayette College), 1999-present
Honors Committee (English Department, Lafayette College), 2002-present
Literary History Subcommittee (English Department, Lafayette College), 2003-04
TEACHING AND RESEARCH INTERESTS
Primary: Sixteenth- and Seventeenth-Century English Literature
Reformation Theology
Classical and Renaissance Ethics
Disability Studies and Medical Humanities
Marxist Theory
Psychoanalysis and Culture
Secondary: Literature and Medicine
Medieval Philosophy
Contemporary Theory
LANGUAGES
Reading Latin, Spanish
REFERENCES
Julia Lupton (University of California, Irvine)
Gary Kuchar (University of Victoria)
Bryan Reynolds (University of California, Irvine)
Reid Barbour (University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill)
Eric Ziolkowski (Lafayette College)
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