Contact

Professor Emerita American Studies and Posse Mentor
Ph.D. University of Minnesota, 1973
malmshei@dickinson.edu

Three Mile Island Website

Employment
Director of Community Studies Center and Professor of American Studies, 2001-2007
Professor and Chair of American Studies, 1988-2001
Associate Professor and Chair American Studies, 1982-1987
Associate Professor and Chair of American Studies, 1975-1982

Education
1981 Post Doctoral Program, Visual Anthropology, Temple University
1973 Ph.D. American Studies, University of Minnesota
1966 M.A. English, Pennsylvania State University
1962 B.A. Science, Pennsylvania State University

Courses Taught
Methods in American Studies
Photography in America
American Lives (autobiography and memoir)
Gay in America
The Evening News
Documentary Films in the U.S.
U.S. Cultural Diversity
Workshop in Cultural Analysis
Sixties America
Crossing Borders: People in Conflict

Publications/Productions
“threemileisland.org” a website dedicated to the documentation of the accident at the Three Mil Island nuclear power plant in 1979. Includes over 200 interviews conducted at the time by a team of Dickinson researchers. The site has been recognized by the Smithsonian Museum of American History as the most comprehensive site on the 1979 accident.
“Outstanding,” with Susan Rose, video no minority students at Dickinson College”Just Like Anyone Else,” in production, video on lesbian parenting
“Mandala,” co-produced with Dan Cozort, Snow Lion Press, ©South Mountain Productions
“Clothesline,” video production with Susan Rose, ©South Mountain Productions
“In the White Man’s Image,” consultant, writer and interviewee for film for American Experience Series, producer Chris Lesiak, aired PBS, February 17, 1992. Awarded Organization of American Historians Prize for Best Historical Documentary of the year, 1993
“Photographic Analysis as Ethnohistory,” Visual Anthropology, I, i (Fall 1987), pp. 21-36
“Three Mile Island: Fact, Frame, and Fiction,” American Quarterly, Spring 1986, Vol. 38, No. 1, pp. 35-52
“’Imitation White Men’: Images of Transformation at the Carlisle Indian School,” Studies in Visual Communication, Vol. 11, No. 4 (Fall 1985), pp. 54-75
“Sylvia Plath,” American Writers Series, ed. Leonard Unger, Charles Scribner’s Sons: New York, 1979, pp. 526-549
“Sexual Metaphor and Social Criticism in Sherwood Anderson’s ‘The Man Who Became a Woman,’” Studies in American Fiction, Spring 1979, pp. 71-26
“Daughters of Zion: Some New England Roots of American Feminism,” New England Quarterly, September 1977, pp. 484-504

Papers Delivered/Screenings
“Diversity Programs,” with Susan rose, Joyce Bylander, Coleen Heller and Lidya Aryia, American Association of Colleges and Universities, January, 2002
“Outstanding,” invited screening and discussion, College of New Jersey, March, 2001
“Sex, Lives and Videotape” joint session with Susan Rose, Oral History Association, Anchorage, Alaska, October, 1999
“Clothesline,” International Oral History Meetings, Göteborg, Sweden, June 1996; Fourth World Conference on Women, NGO Forum, Beijing/Huairou, China, August-September 1995; National Women’s Studies Conference, Oklahoma, June 1995; Oral History Mid-Atlantic Region (OHMAR), Baltimore, April 1995; National oral History Association, Albuquerque, NM, October 1994; Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education Conference, Millersville, PA, November 1995; CPC Women’s Studies Conference, Gettysburg College, Gettysburg, PA, March 1994
Invited Speaker, “American Studies theory and Politics,” Lebanon Valley College, October 15, 1991
“Race, Class, Gender and Patriarchy at the Carlisle Indian School,” National American Studies Association Meetings, October 30, 1988, Miami Beach
Invited Commentator, Visual Anthropology Session, American Anthropological Association Meeting, December, 1986
“’Imitation White Men’: Images of Transformation at the Carlisle Indian School,” invited paper Princeton Conference on Indians and Photography, September 21-24, 1985
“The Oral History of Disaster,” invited paper, National Oral History Association Meetings, Lexington, KY, September, 1984
“J. N. choate and the Carlisle Indian School, 1879-1900,” Pennsylvania Humanities Council Conference on Photography, March 31, 1984, State College, PA
“Before and After: The Carlisle Indian School and the Cultural Transformation of Tribal Peoples,” National American Studies Association Meetings, November 3, 1983, Philadelphia, PA
Invited Commentator, Elizabeth Blackman’s “Changing Images of Indians,” Lilly Conference on Photography, University of Pennsylvania, PA, April, 1983
Invited Presentation on Three Mile Island Research, Lafayette University, Spring, 1982
“And You Were Worried About the Bomb? Image, Fiction, and Frame During the Three Mile Island Emergency,” Biennial National American Studies Association Meetings, Memphis, TN, Fall 1981 and Middle States, ASA, Fall, 1981
“And You Were Worried About the Bomb?” Pennsylvania Sociology Meetings, 1980; Preliminary report on Three Mile Island Research
“Why Fieldwork? The Introductory Course,” Biennial National American Studies Association Meetings, Minneapolis, MN, Fall, 1979
“Daughters of Zion,” Modern Language Association Meetings, December, 1976
“Mather and His Daughters,” Berkshire Women’s History Conference, June, 1976
“Deviance and Death in America,” American Popular Culture Association Meetings, April, 1976
“Genre, Audience and Significance: Social Contextualism and the Literature-History Dilemma,” Bicentennial American Studies Association Meetings, April, 1976
“Getting Away From It All? Camping Lifestyles in California,” Western Popular Culture Association, Spring 1975

Other Professional Activities
Chair, Central Pennsylvania Consortium African-American Conference, Fall 2001, Fall 2002, Fall 2005
Program Committee, Oral History Association, 2001 Fall Program, St. Louis
Mary C. Turpie Teaching Award Committee, American Studies Association, Fall 2000
Digital Editing training, August, 1997
Summer Seminar on New Directions in American Studies, 1992
Ralph Henry Gabriel, Dissertation Prize Committee, American Studies Association, 1989-90
Reader and Evaluator, Visual Anthropology, 1987-90
Reader and Evaluator, American Quarterly, Journal of the American Studies Association, 1984-1988
Consultant on Curriculum, Episcopal Academy, Philadelphia, Spring 1987
Consultant and Interviewee, White Man’s Way, Nebraska Public television film produced by Chris Lesiak, 1986
Nominee, National American Studies Association Council, 1984
Member, Program Committee for National Biennial American Studies Association Meeting for 1983, Philadelphia
Secretary, Middle States American Studies Association, 1981-1983
Member, Search Committee for New national American Studies Association Executive Secretary, 1982-1983
Consultant, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution on Choate Collection of glass negatives, Carlisle Indian School, 1981-82
Member, Bibliographic Committee of the American Studies Association, 1976-1982. Editor of essays on structuralism for August 1978 edition; on Native American Studies for 1981 edition
Chair and organizer, Session on Structuralism at American Studies Association Meetings, Fall 1977
Chair, session on Rites of passage, Popular Culture Association, Spring 1977
Chair, Middle States Regional American Studies Association Meetings, April, 1977, Dickinson College

Community Service
Mentor to Dickinson Posse 3, New York
Dean’s Task Force on Diversity, 1997
Community Studies Center, founding Steering Committee member, 1996-present
Clarke Center, founding Board Member, 1994-1999; Chair, 1997-1998
Commission on the Status of Women, Chair, 1996-1999
Allies of Lesbians and Gays, 1992-1999
Budget & Planning Committee, 1989-1992; Subcommittee on Library Planning, 1990-92
Domestic Violence Services, Cumberland and Perry Counties, founding member of Board of Directors, Chair of Funding Committee, 1990-1992
Women’s Center Board, 1985-1987; 1988-1989
Academic Program Committee, 1986; APC Subcommittee on Academic Computing
Faculty Personnel Committee, 1982-1983
Personal Committee on Academic Professionals, 1982-1983
Commission on the Status of Women, 1981-1982; Chair, subcommittee on the Recruitment of Women, 1982-1983
Priorities and Long Range Planning Committee, 1977-1980; Chair, 1978-1979