Bio

Helen J Burgess is Professor of English. She received her BA(Hons) and MA(Dist.) in English Language and Literature from Victoria University of Wellington, in New Zealand, and her Ph.D. in English from West Virginia University. She has previously taught at Washington State University-Vancouver and UMBC. Her research areas include digital rhetorics, electronic literature, critical making and text/textiles. She is currently working on a book about silkworms.

Office Hours

• Mon: 1:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. Rick’s Annex.
• Thu: 1:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. Alternate Rick’s Annex and Tompkins 237a.

Website

polyrhetor.io/cv.html

Research Publications

Dr. Burgess is author or co-author of numerous multimedia format titles, including Highways of the Mind (2014, with Jeanne Hamming, republished as Futurama, Autogeddon in 2022); Biofutures: Owning Body Parts and Information (2008, with Robert Mitchell and Phillip Thurtle); and Red Planet: Scientific and Cultural Encounters with Mars (2000, with Robert Markley, Harrison Higgs and Michelle Kendrick). Her installation works include Imaginal Pockets (2025), Intimate Fields (2018, with Maggie Simon), Loving-Together with Roland’s Bots (2016, with Craig Saper) and MashBOT (2015).

Dr. Burgess is co-editor of The Routledge Research Companion to Digital Medieval Literature (2018, with Jen Boyle). She is also editor of the online journal Hyperrhiz: New Media Cultures, technical editor for Rhizomes: Cultural Studies in Emerging Knowledge, and editorial board member for thresholds journal.

Area(s) of Expertise

Digital humanities, electronic literature, multimodal composition, critical code studies, multimedia and web development, feminist crafting.