Craig Owens

Professor of English
Office Location: 322 Howard Hall
515-271-3876
craig.owens@drake.edu
Owens CV

I came to Drake in 2003, after completing my doctorate in English at Indiana University—Bloomington and my undergraduate degrees in Latin and English at DePauw University. Since that time, I have designed and taught courses on a broad range of topics, including British and Irish literature, modern drama, play writing, the history of the English language, popular music and culture, and literary and writing studies, in addition to numerous first-year seminars. In 2014, I was awarded the Madelyn Levitt Outstanding Teacher award, an honor I share with several of my English department colleagues. My primary scholarly interests include theatre and drama studies; contemporary film, television, and popular music; literary and critical theory; and cocktail culture. Recently, I have begun writing about the ethics of teaching writing and on the relationship between university athletics and pedagogy. I have edited two volumes of scholarly essays: Pinter Et Cetera (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2009) and, with Stephen Schneider, The Shaken and the Stirred: This Year’s Work in Cocktail Culture (Indiana University Press, forthcoming 2020). My full-length play Open House won Tallgrass Theatre’s 2013 Iowa Playwrights Workshop award. In addition to teaching and writing, I have served as chair of the English department; director of Drake’s Center for the Humanities; co-coordinator of Drake’s accreditation reaffirmation; and president of the Midwest Modern Language Association. Currently, I direct Drake’s Center for Teaching Excellence. When I am not reading, writing, and teaching, I am running, walking my dog (a terrier-dachshund-mix named Augustus), mowing the lawn, or relaxing with family and friends—usually while eating. I am staunchly in favor of the Oxford comma and the rigorous use of the hyphen to indicate compound modifiers.