Sam N. W. Blake, Ph.D. (all pronouns used with respect welcome) is a theatre director/devisor/scholar/educator and is currently the LGTBQ+ Coordinator at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater (UWW). In this role she directs the Pride Center, providing educational and community building programming, while overseeing the center's nine student employees. Sam develops, maintains, and advocates for LGBTQ+ resources across UWW's campus. They also teach in the Department of Women's and Gender Studies, offering courses including Introduction to Women's and Gender Studies, Introduction to LGBTQ+ Studies, and Drag Studies.

 

Sam earned their doctorate in performing and media arts from Cornell University. Their, dissertation project, Mincing and Screaming: Male and/or Masculine of Center Identified Femme Performance, examines the history, aesthetics, and politics of what might often be called effeminate performance practices in the 20th century United States. As part of the Ph.D., Sam received minor concentrations in both feminist, gender, and sexuality studies and directing. Their work as been published in the Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism. Other teaching and research interests include women's, gender and sexuality studies; queer performance and theory; fat performance and fat studies; feminist performance; applied and community based theatre; queer and embodied archives; performance ethnography; and theatre for social change.

 

While much of Sam’s theatre work has been as a director, Sam has also enjoyed working professionally as an actor, dramaturg, stage manager, and sound designer. Within PMA, Sam has directed Seven Homeless Mammoths Wander New England, An Evening at the Caffe Cino, and Two Truths and Allie, as well as produced the Ten-Minute Play Festival. Recent professional credits include: Heading Into Night: A Clown Ode to Remembrance and What Happens Next, Cherry Arts, Ithaca (dramaturg); Emma When You Need Her, a devised biodrama on Emma Goldman, Vortex Theatre, Austin (devisor/performer); and String Up the Moon, devised from Gogul and Pushkin for Fratellanza Theatre, Detroit (devisor/director). Sam is delighted to currently be part of the collaborative team for Heading Into Night: A Clown Ode to Remembrance, set to premier at Ithaca’s Cherry Arts in spring 2023.

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Before study at Cornell, Sam earned an M.A. in Performance as Public Practice from the University of Texas at Austin, and also completed the certificate program in LGBTQ/Sexuality Studies. Originally from the suburbs of Detroit, Sam began graduate school after living and working professionally as a theatre artist in both Chicago and Michigan. Sam earned a B.A. from the University of Michigan with majors in both drama and English, as well as a minor in British history.

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