Faculty: Carter Hanson

 

Professor Hanson's teaching specialties include nineteenth-century English literature and Canadian literature. Above, Prof. Hanson poses in front of Trinity College, Cambridge.

Carter Hanson joined the Valparaiso English Department in 1999, after previously teaching for one year at Luther College.  

Professor Hanson thinks Valparaiso is an invigorating and enjoyable university community due to its distinct Lutheran character, the close interaction between students and faculty, and because the Valparaiso ethos encourages cooperation and service instead of ego-driven individualism.        

Professor Hanson’s main areas of research expertise are Nineteenth-Century English literature and Canadian Literature.  He loves teaching courses in these fields, such as The Novel or Canadian Fiction, but he also counts Literature for Adolescents, Core and Intermediate Composition among his favorite courses.  In the classroom, Professor Hanson tries to help students fully explore individual texts through discussion, as well as to establish the important connections between texts, history and culture.  Some of his favorite books and authors are Lord Jim, by Joseph Conrad, The Englishman’s Boy, by Guy Vanderhaeghe, The Giver, by Lois Lowry, and Winnie-the-Pooh, by A.A. Milne.    

Professor Hanson hasn’t been seen recently on campus, not because of a truant disposition, but because he is currently serving as the director of Valpo’s international study program in Cambridge, England.  He will resume his erstwhile duties in the English Department at the start of the 2007-08 year.

Professor Hanson has published articles on the esoteric and rarefied topic of the literature of nineteenth-century English emigration to Canada in the journals Canadian Literature and The American Review of Canadian Studies, and has recently completed a book-length manuscript on said topic.   

Along with his wife Michelle, Carter spends much of his free time raising two young daughters, aged eight and five.  His extracurricular passions include electronic pop music and nearly anything related to Star Wars.   

Professor Hanson's undergraduate degree was from Luther, and he earned his M.A. and Ph.D. in English literature from the University of Iowa.