UW-Eau Claire
Assistant Professor
Feminist Theory, Medical Humanities, Nineteenth-Century Literature
Sarita Jayanty Mizin is humanities teacher and scholar working at the intersections of fin de siècle literature, women of color feminisms, and postcolonial theory. An assistant professor of English at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, she emphasizes student mentorship and career education in the humanities as the designer and inaugural faculty mentor for a first-generation and students of color support and retention program, the Magliocco Scholars. Her recent projects include investigations into early feminist solidarities between women of color in the United States and South Asia as well as research in medical humanities education.
Teaching and Learning Philosophy
As feminist philosopher Sara Ahmed writes in Living a Feminist Life, “To become a feminist is to stay a student.” My philosophy of teaching and learning is supported by this belief alongside Audre Lorde and bell hooks’ foundational thinking on humanities education as a process of “giving name to the nameless, first made into language, then into idea, then into more tangible action.” This tangible action in my feminist classroom operates not only at the level of content, but also at the level of method and approach. Teaching and learning is respected as a process involving both teachers and instructors, an exercise of freedom that goes beyond merely informing our students. I see myself as an active participant in the intellectual growth of my students even as they are active participants in my own growth as an instructor. Building on these contributions as a feminist teacher-learner, I strive to bring a willingness to be taught with my desire to teach when I enter a pedagogical space.
