Mariah is also and folklorist: someone who studies the ways people share knowledge through stories, practices, and traditions, whether it’s a tall tale by the fireside or a family heirloom passed down through generations. She received her PhD in English and Folklore Studies from The Ohio State University, and her research focused on storytelling and writing in the Missouri and Arkansas Ozarks. As a folklorist, she’s collected oral histories at horse racing events, taught classes on urban legends, explored archives, digitized farm books, and even written essays on the imagined geographies of tabletop gaming spaces.
RESEARCH INTERESTS: rural print culture, Ozark studies, place and space, agricultural rhetorics, family storytelling, oral history
As a 2022 Junior Fellow in the Library of Congress, Mariah curated an online exhibit for the American Archive of Public Broadcasting, titled, “Stories of the Land: Diverse Agricultural Histories in the U.S.,” which explored agricultural histories and traditions in public media.
Check out Mariah’s online exhibit on farming, her co-authored book chapter on Dungeons & Dragons tabletop role-playing media, and her work in Ozark regional studies.