AUM Faculty & Staff
Directory
Kent Quaney
Assistant Professor, Coordinator of Creative Writing | College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
Kent Quaney is the coordinator of AUM’s Creative Writing Program, the managing editor of Thirteen Bridges Review, AUM’s professional literary journal, and the faculty advisor for AUM’s Creative Writing Club. Dr. Quaney holds a PhD in Creative Writing from the Center for Writers at the University of Southern Mississippi, a Master of Letters in Creative Writing from the University of Sydney, and a BA in English from Weber State University. He teaches beginning and advanced fiction workshops as well as Introduction to Creative Writing and Creative Writing Appreciation. His novel, One Breath from Drowning (University of Wisconsin Press), won the Brodie Award for fiction in 2022. His short stories and essays have appeared in the Los Angeles Review, BULL, The McNeese Review, Literally Stories, RiversEdge, and other journals.
Seth Reno
Professor | College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
Seth T. Reno is Professor of English and Distinguished Teaching Professor, specializing in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century British literature, ecocriticism, affect theory, climate fiction, and the environmental humanities. He regularly teaches classes in these areas, as well as literature surveys and writing courses. Dr. Reno hails from Ohio, where he received his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. from The Ohio State University. Before joining AUM in 2013, he taught at Wittenberg University, Ohio State, and Columbus State Community College. He is author of Early Anthropocene Literature in Britain, 1750–1884 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2020) and Amorous Aesthetics: Intellectual Love in Romantic Poetry and Poetics, 1788–1853 (Liverpool University Press, 2019); editor of The Anthropocene: Approaches and Contexts for Literature and the Humanities (Routledge, 2021) and Romanticism and Affect Studies (Romantic Circles Praxis Series, 2018); co-editor (with Allison Hamilton) of William Delisle Hay’s The Doom of the Great City (COVE, 2022); and co-editor (with Lisa Ottum) of Wordsworth and the Green Romantics: Affect and Ecology in the Nineteenth Century (University of New Hampshire Press, 2016). He has also published dozens journal articles, book chapters, encyclopedia entries, and book reviews.
Dr. Reno is currently working on two book projects. The first is an anthology of lesser-known industrial writ, titled Popular British Industrial Writings: A Critical Anthology. It contains hundreds of relatively unknown (and often unpublished) poems, essays, and other forms of writing that chronicle the British Industrial Revolution.
The second project is a monograph, titled Alabama Banjo: A New History of America’s Instrument. As the title suggests, this book highlights the importance of the banjo and banjo music to the history and culture of Alabama—and, by extension, to the history and culture of America itself. Dr. Reno does this by tracing the history of the banjo—its songs, depictions in art and media, and notable musicians—from the nineteenth century to the present. From minstrel songs about “Alabama Joe” to Civil War-era banjo tunes traded between soldiers to poems about banjos to contemporary banjo players continuing the old-time music tradition, Alabama Banjo offers a new history of the banjo specific to the state of Alabama.
In addition to literature, Dr. Reno has a passion for music, food, and travel. He plays banjo, guitar, trumpet, and percussion; he has self-released two albums of original music; and he has a banjo YouTube channel. He also loves cooking and has taught courses on food and culture. Dr. Reno has also undertaken many domestic and international research trips, as well as study abroad courses, and he once came in fourth place at a burger-eating competition (he has since given up his professional food-eating aspirations).
Faith Roberts
Administrative Associate Theatre Operations | College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
Kashera Guy Robinson
Assistant Clinical Professor/Social Work Field Director
Kashera Guy Robinson
Assistant Clinical Professor/Social Work Field Director | College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
Kashera Guy Robinson, DSW, is a Licensed Clinical Social Work educator with more than 25 years of experience in the areas of juvenile justice, child welfare, mental health, and school social work.
Dr. Guy Robinson is an expert on the topic of urban school social work and has written a number of articles on this specialized area of practice. She has collaborated on a number of webinars and at professional conferences on school social work topics. Dr. Guy Robinson is actively involved in several professional social work organizations and has served in a number of leadership roles in these organizations including District President, District Vice President, District Parliamentarian, Chairperson of Membership, and Specialty Practice Section Committee Member.
Dr. Guy Robinson’s research interests include exploring the issue of chronic absenteeism among minority school-aged youth residing in urban communities, examining how the historical traumas of transgenerational poverty and racism continue to impact this demographic, and exploring ways that trauma-informed interventions can help these youth. Her teaching interests include introductory social work courses and school social work-related topics.
Neil Seibel
Professor | College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
Neil David Seibel (he/him) is a multifaceted artist with a career spanning acting, directing, playwriting and education. His directorial work has been showcased at venues such as the Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Mill Mountain Theatre, Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center, Teatro Prometeo in Miami and MiniTeatern in Stockholm, Sweden. A proud member of Actors Equity, he has appeared Off Broadway in New York City and nationwide on such stages as the Denver Center Theatre Company, the Alley Theatre in Houston, Actors Theatre of Louisville and six seasons in the Rocky Mountains as a company member of Theatre Aspen. Onscreen credits include the role of Lewis in the TV musical Passages: Lewis & Clark, the award-winning indie film Unspoken, and the dance-theatre film Clown at War. Seibel is a playwright whose works, including The Normal Giant, Paternity Leave and The Daughters of Abraham, have been staged across the country and abroad. His solo show, My Appalachia, was recorded at the LA Improv and featured on PBS. A Kentucky native who now resides in Alabama, he earned a bachelor’s degree from Northern Kentucky University and an MFA from the University of California, Irvine. He currently serves as a Distinguished Teaching Professor at Auburn University at Montgomery.
Ben Severance
Professor | College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
A former lieutenant in the US Army, Ben Severance is a Professor of History at Auburn University Montgomery, a position he has held since joining the faculty there in 2005. He received his Ph.D. in 2002 from the University of Tennessee (Knoxville). His principal areas of research and teaching include the American Civil War, Nineteenth Century America, and U.S. Military History. Among his publications are three books: Tennessee’s Radical Army: The State Guard and Its Role in Reconstruction, 1867-1869 (University of Tennessee Press, 2005), Portraits of Conflict: A Photographic History of Alabama during the Civil War (University of Arkansas Press, 2012), and A War State All Over: Alabama Politics and the Confederate Cause (University of Alabama Press, 2020). Severance is also an avid reader of baseball history.
Jason Shifferd
Senior Lecturer | College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
Jason Shifferd is a senior lecturer of English who teaches composition and literature. He also tutors writing at the Learning Center. He earned his Bachelor of Arts in English in 2009 and his Master of Liberal Arts in 2014, both from AUM. His thesis, available online and at the AUM library, is entitled The Case for Humor in the Classroom: An Annotated Bibliography, which served as the basis for his 2025 HHMI seminar “Crayons in College? Using Play to Reinforce Learning Goals.” He has published literary essays for Critical Insights, including “Humor in the Autobiographical Writings of Maya Angelou: Maya Meets Mr. Julian” (2016) and “Maxine Peake’s Female Hamlet: A Survey of Responses” (2019). As a graduate research assistant in 2013, he contributed to the article “Who Lives Where: A Comprehensive Population Taxonomy of Cities, Suburbs, Exurbs, and Rural Areas in the United States” (2016) for The Geographical Bulletin. In 2019, he co-led a presentation at CCCC in Pittsburgh entitled “Performing TfT at the Composition Program Level,” and in 2023, he did a live reading of his creative writing at ACETA in Clanton. He writes fantasy and science fiction and intends to publish within the next few years.
Lacey Sloan
Professor | College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
Dr. Lacey Sloan is a wanderer who received her BSW from the University of Mississippi and her MSSW and Ph.D. in social work from The University of Texas at Austin. Her three intertwining areas of scholarship are sexual rights and gender-based violence; social work education and practice in Islamic contexts; and, environmental justice. Her early practice and scholarship focused on sexual rights, with a specific focus on sexual violence, sex work and sex workers, violence against LGBT people, sexual violence and oppression against people with disabilities, and sexual violence and oppression against other marginalized populations. Her decades working in the anti-sexual violence movement at the local, state and national level included work in rape crisis centers, serving on the Texas Association Against Sexual Assault and National Coalition Against Sexual Assault boards of directors, and serving as the scientific lead for the Department of Justice funded Violence Against Women Act Measuring Effectiveness Initiative. Since 2001, she facilitated the development and/or initial accreditation of three MSW programs (University of Southern Maine, College of Staten Island, Zayed University [United Arab Emirates]), three BSW programs (College of Staten Island; five universities Somalia; Qatar University), and, two diploma and certificate programs in social work (six universities in Somalia; Juba University in South Sudan).
Angie Smith
Assistant Professor of Social Work | College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
Dr. Angie Smith is a first-generation college graduate whose academic path reflects her dedication to social work and education. She earned an Associate degree in Pre-Social Work, a BSW from the University of Montevallo, and both an MSW and Ph.D. from The University of Alabama. Her doctoral dissertation explored the lived experiences of Black college students following encounters with police violence.
Dr. Smith’s current research focuses on social work education, particularly the importance of evidence-based practice in research for undergraduate students. Her broader interests include vulnerable populations, public and mental health, advocacy, policy, and the impact of police violence.
A passionate educator and mentor, Dr. Smith is committed to helping students reach their goals. She embraces the proverb, “Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day; teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime,” and believes mentorship is essential to student success.
Outside of academia, she enjoys science fiction and fantasy films such as Star Wars, Harry Potter, and The Lord of the Rings. She also loves to travel and is known for her dry sense of humor.
Eric Sterling
Distinguished Research Professor, MLA Program Director | College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences
Eric Sterling earned his PhD in English (Renaissance and Eighteenth-Century Literature), with a minor in Drama and Theatre, at Indiana University. He has taught at AUM for 32 years. Dr. Sterling was the AUM English student advisor for 28 years and is Director of the Master of Liberal Arts (MLA) graduate program.
Dr. Sterling has won the following awards:
- AUM Ida Belle Young Endowed Professorship Award
- AUM Distinguished Research Professor Award
- AUM Distinguished Teaching Professor Award
- AUM Distinguished Faculty Service Award
- AUM Alumni Association Professor Award
- AUM Alumni Association Service Award
- College English Association’s Robert E. Hacke Scholar-Teacher Award (national award)
- University of Wyoming’s Amy and Eric Burger Essays in Theatre Award (national)
- Association of College English Teachers of Alabama’s Eugene Current-Garcia Award
- Association of College English Teachers of Alabama’s Calvert Scholarship Award (twice)
- Association of College English Teachers of Alabama’s Woodall Pedagogy Award (five times)
Dr. Sterling has published four books and more than 100 refereed articles in academic journals. His four books are entitled:
- Life in the Ghettos during the Holocaust
- The Movement towards Subversion in Renaissance History
- Play Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman: Dialogue.
- The Seventeenth Century Handbook
Dr. Sterling lives in Alabama with his wife. They have two children and three grandchildren.
