Visiting Assistant Professor of English
Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow
B.A. Smith College
M.A. New York University
Ph.D. New York University

Office:  Preyer 114  Ext:  2504
email:  Shanté Smalls

Shanté Paradigm Smalls, received her doctorate in Performance Studies at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts in May 2011. Smalls's current book project, Hip Hop Heresies: Queer Interraciality in New York City, 1975-2005, a revision and expansion her dissertation, traverses New York City’s sonic, visual, and material topography to demonstrate how particular artists and artistic scenes in New York City hip hop offer “queer articulations” of race, gender, and sexuality. In fall 2013, Smalls will begin her tenure-track position as Assistant Professor of American Studies at the University of New Mexico. Her interests include performance studies, hip hop studies, critical race theory, queer theory, popular culture, psychoanalysis, feminism, graphic novels, martial arts films, and speculative fiction and sci-fi.

Smalls was a founding member of the hip hop duo, B.Q.E., and they released two albums: a self-titled EP, and The Digm and The Dutch. Shanté Paradigm Smalls has performed at CB's Gallery, The Nuyorican Poets Cafe, HERE Theater, Yale University, Wesleyan University, UMASS-Amherst, and New York University, as well as Toronto and New York City LGBT Pride Festivals. She was featured in the 2005 film, Pick Up the Mic, which explored the music and lives of queer hip hop artists in the US, and also in the EMMY award-wining documentary, Baring It All (2011). She's currently working on a solo album and a book of prose and poetry. She blogs intermittenlty.

Courses for Fall 2012:

• ENG 393: Hip Hop, Gender, and Sexuality
• WRI 101: Queer Theory/Queer Popular Culture

Publications

Book Chapters

"Queer Hip Hop: A Brief History," Oxford Handbook of Music and Queerness, Oxford University Press,  (under contract), Forthcoming

Peer-Reviewed Articles

"'The Rain Comes Down': Jean Grae and Hip Hop Heteronormativity,"  American Behavioral Scientist, January 2011, 55 (1): 86-95. 

"Blasians: Berry Gordy's The Last Dragon and Afro-Asian Culture in Early NYC Hip Hop Culture" (under review)

Reference Entries
"W.H. Auden." Encyclopedia of Modern Drama, Eds. Gabrielle H. Cody and Every Sprinchorn, Columbia University Press, 2007.

"J.M. Barrie." Encyclopedia of Modern Drama, Eds. Gabrielle H. Cody and Every Sprinchorn, Columbia University Press, 2007.

"John Galsworthy." Encyclopedia of Modern Drama, Eds. Gabrielle H. Cody and Every Sprinchorn, Columbia University Press, 2007.

"Harley Granville-Barker." Encyclopedia of Modern Drama, Eds. Gabrielle H. Cody and Every Sprinchorn, Columbia University Press, 2007.

"Christopher Isherwood." Encyclopedia of Modern Drama, Eds. Gabrielle H. Cody and Every Sprinchorn, Columbia University Press, 2007.

"Lynn Nottage." Encyclopedia of Modern Drama, Eds. Gabrielle H. Cody and Every Sprinchorn, Columbia University Press, 2007.

Poems/Creative Writing
"Starfucker." Suspect Thoughts: A Journal of Subversive Writing, Issue 19, 2007. Suspect Thoughts Press.

Albums
The Digm and The Dutch. B.Q.E. Phat Family Records, 2007.

B.Q.E. B.Q.E. Phat Family Records, 2004.