My primary academic specializations are American literature, rhetoric, and film. At Luther I have taught both American literature surveys, the American novel, and January term courses on American humor, American war literature, American autobiography, Abraham Lincoln, and the Western. I have offered seminars on “Mark Twain and Garrison Keillor,” “Reading the American Civil War,”and "film Adaptions of Literature."

My book, Garrison Keillor. Twayne Publishers: New York. 1993; paper ed. Univ. of Iowa P, 1994, grew out of my interest in American humor, and I have also published on humorous writers such as James Thurber, Jean Shepherd, and Kurt Vonnegut. I am also interested in history and theory of rhetoric, and taught the Luther English Department's rhetoric course regularly until 2007. I have been teaching an introduction to film since 2001.

After teaching about China in Luther’s Paideia I course for many years and a trip to that country in 1993, I became even more interested in Chinese language and literature and Chinese-American literature. In fall 1998 I directed the Hangzhou Study Abroad Program for the Lutheran Colleges China Consortium and I have taught “Chinese Journeys and Encounters”—a January term course in China—in 2003 and 2004.  I have taught English in China in summer in 2004, 2005, and in 2006 when I was a Dean for Global Language Villages in China.

Since fall 2004 I have been the editor of Agora: Luther College in Conversation, which typically publishes two issues each year and primarily focuses on articles by faculty and guests of the college. I am the sponsor of the Alpha Beta Xi Chapter of Sigma Tau Delta, the International English Honor Society and have served on the board of the International chapter since 1996, serving in various offices, including as President (2006-08).