Kimberly DeFazio

Kimberly DeFazio is an Associate Professor in the English department at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. She specializes in Romanticism, 19th Century British Literature, Materialism, Posthumanism, and Urban Studies. Her research bridges literary criticism, cultural theory, and philosophical inquiry, particularly focusing on new materialism and its implications for humanities pedagogy and contemporary social structures.

DeFazio holds a Ph.D. in English from Stony Brook University, an M.A. from SUNY Binghamton, and a B.A. from Syracuse University. Her academic career includes teaching courses such as ENG 110: College Writing, ENG 204: British Literature after 1800, and advanced seminars on posthumanism and literary theory.

Her publications include The City of the Senses: Urban Culture and Urban Space (2011, translated into Chinese in 2022) and Human, All Too (Post)Human (2016, co-edited). She has received a UW System Fellowship (2019–2020) to advance her work on materialism and the humanities.

DeFazio’s research explores intersections of materialism, posthumanism, and cultural critique. Recent work addresses Spinoza’s influence on new materialism, the role of affect in literary analysis, and critiques of managerial academia. Her invited talks and conference presentations span institutions like the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, the Modern Language Association, and the North American Victorian Studies Association.

Her awards and recognitions include translations of her work into German and Chinese, as well as collaborative op-eds critiquing metrics-driven pedagogy in the humanities. She actively engages in interdisciplinary dialogues, co-editing special journal issues on materialism and speech in 19th-century prose.