Tara M. Holman
Assistant Professor of Literature and Creative Writing
Tara M. Holman received her bachelor’s degree in English and International Studies from Bryn Mawr College, and Ph.D. in English from Brown University, where she was an Interdisciplinary Opportunities Fellow at the Pembroke Center for Teaching and Research on Women. Holman writes and teaches about 20th- and 21st-century African American and Black Atlantic literature and culture, with a particular focus on gender and sexuality. Her research interests include black feminisms, race and aesthetics, visual culture studies, and queer performance studies.
Recent Courses Taught
Black Women’s Literary Renaissance
Fiction and Autobiography
Intro to African American Lit and Theory
Passing Down
Reading Blackness
Research Interests
African American literature, Black and women of color feminisms, performance studies, poetry and poetics, queer theory, visual culture studies
Selected Publications
- “Presence to Possibility: Interview with Alexis Pauline Gumbs,” Mosaic, Special Issue: Black/Queer/Lit, Guest Edited by Mecca Jamillah Sullivan. Summer 2023.
Professional Affiliations
American Studies Association (ASA)
Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present (ASAP)
College Language Association (CLA)
Modern Language Association (MLA)
National Women’s Studies Association (NWSA)
The Society for the Study of the Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States (MELUS)
Appointed to the Faculty
2025Educational Background
Ph.D., Brown University
B.A., Bryn Mawr College
