Rebecca Wanzo

Rebecca Wanzo is the Chair and Professor of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Washington University in St. Louis. She holds courtesy affiliations in African and African-American Studies, American Culture Studies, English, and Film and Media Studies. Her research focuses on African American literature and culture, critical race theory, feminist theory, and affect studies. Wanzo's work explores how storytelling conventions shape political and social legibility, particularly through her books The Suffering Will Not Be Televised (2009) and The Content of Our Caricature (2020), which examine Black cultural production and citizenship. She has been recognized with major awards in cinema studies, comics scholarship, and media industries.

Wanzo earned a PhD from Duke University and a BA from Miami University. Her writing appears in American Literature, Camera Obscura, and media outlets like CNN and LA Review of Books. Her recent research engages topics such as gun violence in film, trauma narratives, and the ethics of cultural criticism. She maintains an active public-facing scholarship through essays on contemporary media and social movements.

Key contributions include analyzing Black comic art's critique of citizenship norms and exploring affective dimensions of public culture. Her interdisciplinary approach bridges literary analysis, visual studies, and fan cultures, with a focus on marginalized voices in media representation.