Public intellectual: pop culture journalist, interdisciplinary professor, tough broad.
MEGAN VOLPERT
  • about
  • books
    • Straight Into Darkness
    • Perfume
    • Closet Cases
    • RuPaul's Drag Race & Philosophy
    • Boss Broad
    • Tom Petty & Philosophy
    • 1976
    • Order Sutra
    • Only Ride
    • This assignment is so gay
    • Sonics in Warholia
    • Desense of Nonfense
    • Domestic Transmission
    • Face Blindness
  • articles
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    • Atlanta INtown
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Megan Volpert is author or editor of over a dozen books on popular culture, including two Lambda Literary Award finalists and an American Library Association honoree. Her newest work is Straight Into Darkness: Tom Petty as Rock Mystic (University of Georgia Press, 2022) and she won Georgia Author of the Year for Boss Broad (Sibling Rivalry Press, 2019). In addition to her work as Director of Insights for Halo Media, Volpert is a part-time Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Kennesaw State University and a Fellow at the American Institute for Philosophical and Cultural Thought. She writes for PopMatters and has edited anthologies of philosophical essays on the music of Tom Petty and the television series RuPaul’s Drag Race.

BIOGRAPHY

Megan Volpert grew up in Chicago and lives in Atlanta with her wife, Mindy.  Volpert holds an MFA in Creative Writing from Louisiana State University and taught high school English in public schools for sixteen years. She also teaches Gender Studies and American Studies part-time at Kennesaw State University.

She spent seven years as a nationally competitive debater in high school and college, then several more years competing in poetry slams. Her early publications focused on language play rooted in surrealism, before turning toward a variety of hybrid forms invested in confessionalism. Increasingly, Volpert's work can be characterized simply as opinion journalism or essays.

Throughout her writing career, Volpert has been influenced by second-generation New York School poetry
and has displayed a strong interest in performance studies. Volpert is a theory junky who cannot resist rock and roll. Her work is consistently argumentative. She used to drive a scooter.

Picture
Picture
photos by Rob Friedman

CURRICULUM VITAE

Publication
Why Alanis Morissette Matters
         
Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2025.
Straight Into Darkness: Tom Petty as Rock Mystic
         Athens, GA: University of Georgia Press, 2022.
Perfume (Object Lessons series)
         New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2022.
Editor, Closet Cases: Queers on What We Wear

         Little Rock: Et Alia Press, 2020.
Co-Editor, RuPaul's Drag Race and Philosophy
        
Chicago: Open Court, 2019.
Boss Broad
         Little Rock: Sibling Rivalry Press, 2019.
Co-Editor, Tom Petty and Philosophy
        
Chicago: Open Court, 2019.

1976
        
Little Rock: Sibling Rivalry Press, 2016.

Order Sutra
         Philadelphia: Lame House Press, 2015.
Only Ride
         Little Rock: Sibling Rivalry Press, 2014.
Editor, This assignment is so gay
         Little Rock: Sibling Rivalry Press, 2013.
Sonics in Warholia
         Little Rock: Sibling Rivalry Press, 2011.
The Desense of Nonfense
         Buffalo: BlazeVOX Books, 2009.
Face Blindness
         Buffalo: BlazeVOX Books, 2007. 
Domestic Transmission
         San Antonio: MetroMania Press, 2007. 


Education

Certificate, GAPSC, 2007,
English 6-12, Level T6.
MFA, Louisiana State University, 2006, Creative Writing.
BA, Illinois State University, 2003, English.          
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