Stephen Whitworth

Stephen Whitworth is an Associate Professor in the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Writing at Bloomsburg University. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Michigan and a post-doctoral certificate in psycho-analytic theory and writing from the Washington D.C. Center for Psychoanalysis. His research focuses on early modern non-dramatic literature, psychoanalysis, and semiotics, with publications in journals such as Exemplaria, Rhetoric Society Quarterly, and The Journal of Lacanian Studies.

Whitworth has delivered keynote lectures internationally, including at Tel Aviv University’s symposium on literature and psychoanalysis (2014) and Fordham University’s seminar on laughter and psychoanalysis (2013). He actively engages with interdisciplinary scholarship, organizing conferences like the 2009 'Psychosexual Haunting in Henry James and William Shakespeare.' His work bridges literary analysis with psychoanalytic theory, particularly exploring themes of madness, metaphor, and baroque aesthetics.

Whitworth advises the university’s Dead Letter Society, an affiliate of the Ecole de Psychanalyse des Forums du Champ Lacanien. His recent scholarship includes contributions to volumes on Crashaw’s baroque poetry and Traherne’s semiotic metaphors. He regularly presents at international psychoanalytic workshops and conferences, emphasizing the intersection of literary texts with Lacanian concepts.