William Acree

William Acree received his BA from Berry College and his PhD from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Acree’s research spans the fields of Latin American literary and cultural studies and has a strong historical focus centering on the late colonial period and the nineteenth century. He is completing a book manuscript on the development of print culture and identity formation throughout the nineteenth century in Latin America’s most literate countries—Uruguay and Argentina. Other areas of interest include themes of war and writing, the sociology of reading, and popular literature throughout the 1800s. Recent publications include the co-edited volumes Jacinto Ventura de Molina y los caminos de la escritura negra en el Ro de la Plata (Ediciones Linardi y Risso, 2008) and Building Nineteenth-Century Latin America: Re-rooted Cultures, Identities, and Nations ( forthcoming with Vanderbilt University Press), as well as articles in Latin American Research Review, Latin American Theatre Review, and Studies in Latin American Popular Culture. His research has been supported by a Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Fellowship and grants from the Mellon and Tinker Foundations.

Previously Acree taught Latin American literature at San Diego State University. At Washington University in St. Louis his classes include Spanish American Literature I, seminars on nineteenth-century Latin America, and part of the “Argentina: Past and Present” FOCUS course. He is particularly interested in the writing process and working with students to cultivate strong reading and writing skills.