Dr. Lydia Kualapai
Assistant Professor of English

alma maters:
BA, University of Hawaii - Hilo
MA, University of Nebraska - Lincoln
Ph.D., University of Nebraska - Lincoln

favorite movies: My favorite movies range widely from Amelie to Apocalypse Now and 25th Hour to The Wizard of Oz.

favorite food: I love high calorie verboten pleasures! Top in the rankings are crusty French breads and decadent Italian pastries. Favorite food groups: chocolate and coffee.

favorite type of music: I’m a moody listener. Lately, not for any particular reason, I’ve been attracted to the darker sides of Michael Nyman and Philip Glass. For road trips (or cleaning the house), I have a passion for early Rod Stewart, Eric Clapton, and Buddy Guy. For quiet rainy nights, I enjoy the poignant Phoebe Snow and vintage Peggy Lee. Most recently, I’ve been revisiting the timely politics of Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young’s Four-Way Street. By far, though, the tallest stack in my CD collection is contemporary Hawaiian music.

what inspires you: I’m inspired by people who have the courage and the stamina to transform their visions into reality.

what's on your night stand?: My metaphorical night-stand is overflowing right now with recommendations from students, friends, and colleagues. At the top of the DVD stack is Hiroshi Teshigahara’s Woman in the Dunes. Nonfiction books include Jean Baudrillard’s America, Michel de Certeau’s The Practice of Everyday Life, and Terry Eagleton’s After Theory. My fiction stack is topped by Toni Morrison’s Love and Tom Wells’s Drop-Ins.

hobbies: One of my students gave me a cue stick for Christmas and, for better or worse, I’ve been learning to shoot pool. Thanks to The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Pool and Billiards and a lot of help from my pool-savvy friends, I have a new appreciation for geometry, spatial relationships, and the importance of chalk.

^ pictured above: Dr. Kualapai shooting pool in Boston, MA.

activities on campus: My most active associations are with Schreiner’s safe-space Ally program; Illuminations, our international literary e-journal; Monday Night Fiction, a community-based reading colloquium; and Food Talk, a healthy lifestyle support group.

favorite class to teach: I don’t necessarily have a “favorite” class to teach. All classes are potentially life enhancing for students and faculty alike. Ideally, at the end of each course, I want to be able to say honestly that it was my favorite class to teach.

why do you like Schreiner: I like the close working relationship between the administration, faculty, staff, and students. Because the University operates as a community, there’s no shortage of support and encouragement for innovative teaching and creative campus activities.

Visit Dr. Kualapai's website