Graduate Student Directory

Lena Minh Thai
  • Title
    • PhD Student
  • Division Humanities Division
  • Department
    • Literature Department
  • Affiliations Graduate Studies Division
  • Email
  • Office Location
    • Humanities Building 1, Zoom
  • Office Hours Appointment
  • Mail Stop Literature Department

Summary of Expertise

Shakespeare

Literature of the Early Modern Period

Medieval Literature

The Romantic Period

Poetry

American 19th Century Poetry

 

 

Research Interests

Chivalric Fairy Tales

Monstrosity and Otherness

Shakespeare and Servitude

Biography, Education and Training

Born in Garden Grove and raised in Riverside, Lena, whose first language was Vietnamese, was determined to fluently read and understand Shakespeare after years of shying away from it in high school. In university, she studied Shakespeare with Dr. Heidi Brayman and Dr. John Briggs while discovering a love for American literature and poetry with Dr. Steven Axelrod. After earning a B.A. a year early in 2021, she completed a M.Ed and taught a class of 12th graders in 2022 (she misses them so much). Today, Lena aims to become a community college professor, a profession and position she feels will help her increase accessibility to Shakespeare and other initially intimidating texts.

 

B.A. English, summa cum laude, UCR, 2021

M.Ed. Single Subject English, UCR, 2022

Teaching Interests

Paradise Lost

Poetry

Shakespeare