Mary R. Harmon
Professor of English
Ph.D., Michigan State University, 1993
M.A., Western Michigan University, 1972
B.A., Western Michigan University, 1966
Dr. Harmon specializes in sociolinguistics, and has co-written a book on the subject entitled Beyond Grammar: Language, Power, and the Classroom (Erlbaum, 2006). She has delivered too many national and state presentations to count, primarily for NCTE, MCTE, and the Organization for the Study of Gender, Culture, and Language. A secondary area of specialization for Dr. Harmon is in English Education, and she has done many, many in-services for local and regional schools. In her pre-university, high school teaching days, Dr. Harmon received three "best teacher" awards, and has received research awards from the SVSU Faculty Association. Her most recent research is on hate language.
Dr. Harmon has interests in mountain hiking, cycling, reading, journal writing, her dog, her children and her good friend, Paul. And good food and drink!
Favorite undergraduate moment: Oh, come on! You don't really think I'd confess, do you?
Most interesting graduate moment: While researching, reading the actual articles of Eliot and Richards in copies of the actual publications in which they originally appeared and feeling a real writer/reader connection. Or finding a wonderful quotation by John Donne on the nature of rhetoric. Or falling in love with Henry David Thoreau while typing a paper all night on the nature of self-imposed stress. Or knowing I was heeding my most admired professor's (Dr. Clare Goldfarb) advice to get my doctorate-many years after she gave it.
Favorite teaching moment: When it's clear that students have gained a new insight; I see either the smile or the shock of recognition.
Five books that Dr. Harmon would like to have with her if marooned on a deserted island: a supply of journals and pens, the Collected Works of William Shakespeare, the Collected Works of John Donne, Byatt's Possession, Rushdie's Midnight's Children, Murakami's Kafka on the Shore