Melissa Birkhofer, PhD

Melissa Birkhofer.webp
Achievements

Achievements

  • Her research won the Ehle Prize in 2023 from the North Carolina Literary Review for the article “She Said That Saint Augustine Is Worth Nothing Compared to her Homeland: Teresa Martín and the Méndez Cancio Account of La Tama (1600)” with co-writer Paul Worley. This award recognizes essays by forgotten or neglected writers of North Carolina.
  • Birkhofer is the recipient of the Inclusive Excellence Award for exceptional university service to inclusive excellence and the Program of Excellence Award for the Program in Latinx Studies from Western Carolina University.
  • She takes advanced undergraduate students to professional conferences to present their research at the annual Southeastern Association of Cultural Studies conference and works with students to help place their research in peer-reviewed publications.
Areas of Specialty

Areas of Specialty

  • Latinx literatures
  • Indigenous literatures
  • Environmental literatures
Publications

Publications

  • Birkhofer, Melissa and Paul M. Worley, eds. Return to La Tama: Indigenous Women’s Testimonies in the Méndez Cancio Inquiry on the Interior of La Florida. Appalachian Futures: Black, Queer, and Native Voices series, U Kentucky Press, November 2025.
  • Birkhofer, Melissa and Paul M. Worley. “Indias naturales de esta tierra: Teresa Martín, Luisa Méndez and the Multilingual Pasts, Presents, and Futures of Appalachia.” A New American Vein: Critical Essays on Contemporary Appalachian Literature, edited by Nicole Crockett and Zackary Vernon, Ohio U Press, accepted for publication.
  • Birkhofer, Melissa and Paul M. Worley. “How Teresa Martín Shaped the History of the Expedition Through Her Testimony at St. Augustine, 1600.” Special forum for Native South, U of Nebraska Press, accepted for publication.
  • Birkhofer, Melissa and Paul M. Worley. “She Said That Saint Augustine is Worth Nothing Compared to her Homeland: Teresa Martín and the Méndez Cancio Account of La Tama (1600).” North Carolina Literary Review, no. 32, Jan 2023, pp 122-42.
  • Birkhofer, Melissa. Toward a Feminist Latina Mode of Literary Analysis in Julia Alvarez’s How the García Girls Lost Their Accents. Convergences. 2.1 2022.
Courses Taught

Courses Taught

  • ENG 3715 - Literature and the Environment