HFA Welcomes New Faculty Members
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The College of Humanities and Fine Arts (HFA) welcomes new faculty members for the 2026–27 academic year. Across the college, these educators bring wide-ranging experience and approaches to teaching, research, creative practice, and community engagement.
Walid Akef
Assistant professor, History of Art and Architecture
Walid Akef’s research focuses on Islamic art, architecture, and archaeology, with particular interests in al-Andalus and the Mediterranean. He has taught Islamic art and architecture at Ain Shams University and world architectural history at Harvard University. His scholarship has appeared in Arabic, Spanish, and English, and he is currently working on articles about mural painting and Mediterranean court culture, as well as his first monograph on aristocratic agricultural estates in late medieval Granada.
Akef earned a BA from Ain Shams University, an MA in art history from the University of Granada, an MA in Muslim cultures from the Aga Khan University, and a PhD in art history from Harvard University.
“I am very excited to teach and mentor students at UMass, collaborate with my outstanding colleagues in the History of Art and Architecture program and beyond, and continue developing and publishing my research,” Akef says.
Photo credit: Omar El-Noamany
Alya Ansari
Assistant professor, Department of English
Ansari’s research interests include 20th- and 21st-century British, Anglophone, and world literature; postcolonial literature and theory; the history and theory of the novel; the critique of political economy; film theory and cinema studies; literary and philosophical aesthetics; and translation studies and practice.
Tracey Bullington
Assistant professor of art education, Department of Art
Tracey Bullington is an art education researcher, teacher, and visual artist from New Orleans. She uses qualitative and arts-based research methods to investigate how students and teachers use artmaking to work toward social change. A licensed art teacher, Bullington has six years of experience teaching in K–12 public schools. Her own artistic practice includes comics, woodcut prints, and artists’ books.
At the University of Wisconsin–Madison, Bullington taught comics courses inside a local men’s prison through the Wisconsin Prison Humanities Project and helped develop an arts-integrated professional learning program for K–8 teachers. Her recent scholarship includes research on children’s artmaking and on how fifth-grade students process and speak out about climate change and ecological disaster through the arts.
Bullington earned a BFA from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; an MAT in art education from Tufts University; and a PhD in curriculum and instruction from the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
“I’m so excited to be part of a community that values and celebrates scholarship across modalities and forms, from artwork to academic writing and community-based scholarship,” Bullington says. “I look forward to interdisciplinary dialogue and collaboration with students and colleagues across HFA.”
David Casali
Lecturer in music education, Department of Music and Dance
David Casali comes to UMass Amherst with nine years of experience teaching in public schools, primarily in Springfield, Massachusetts. His teaching has ranged from preschool and middle school music instruction to adult ukulele classes. He has also contributed to music and arts education projects with the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.
Casali’s research examines how elementary music educators use artificial intelligence tools to increase student access. At UMass Amherst, he plans to continue studying the role of artificial intelligence in music education, with an emphasis on mitigating its risks and making music education more inclusive and accessible. A bassist, he also performs with the Springfield Symphony Orchestra several times a year.
Casali earned a BM and PhD from UMass Amherst and an MM from Indiana University.
“I am most excited about creating new partnerships and fostering existing connections between UMass and the surrounding musical and educational community,” Casali says.
Atla DeChamplain
Lecturer in vocal jazz, Department of Music and Dance
Atla DeChamplain is a jazz vocalist, lyricist, and educator whose musical style draws from jazz, blues, gospel, and R&B. She specializes in vocalese, the art of setting lyrics to instrumental jazz solos, and is known for her original lyrics and interpretations of jazz standards. Alongside jazz pianist Matt DeChamplain, she co-leads a band that reimagines the Great American Songbook and presents original compositions.
DeChamplain previously served as associate professor in amplified voice at the University of Rhode Island and teaches with the Yale University Jazz Collective. She is also working on a book about learning, writing, and performing vocalese.
DeChamplain studied at the Jackie McLean Institute of Jazz at the Hartt School and earned a master’s degree from the University of Toledo, where she studied with vocalist Jon Hendricks.
Grace Holleran
Lecturer in Portuguese, Spanish and Portuguese Studies
Grace Holleran is a literary translator and scholar specializing in literary translation and queer and gender studies in the Portuguese-speaking world. Her current research traces networks of women’s activism through translation in Portugal, Brazil, and beyond.
A working literary translator and Portuguese–English community interpreter, Holleran is a member of the editorial collective of Barricade: A Journal of Antifascism & Translation. Her forthcoming projects include translations of collections by Angolan author João Melo and Brazilian poet Catarina Lins. Before joining UMass Amherst, she taught at Emory University and UMass Dartmouth.
Holleran earned a BS in music from Temple University and a PhD in Luso-Afro-Brazilian studies and theory from UMass Dartmouth. A classically trained trumpet player, she is also interested in the intersections of musicality and cultural production.
Kemp Jernigan
Assistant professor of oboe, Department of Music and Dance
Kemp Jernigan is an oboist who performs extensively in New York City. He is a frequent guest with ensembles including the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Orchestra of St. Luke’s, and Mark Morris Dance Group Ensemble. He also serves as co-artistic director of the Exponential Ensemble and has appeared as a guest artist at festivals and chamber music series across the country.
Jernigan has performed as a member of Bandwidth, UMass Amherst’s woodwind faculty ensemble, and looks forward to continuing and expanding that collaboration in his new teaching role.
Jernigan earned a Bachelor of Music from the Hartt School at the University of Hartford, a Performer’s Certificate from Purchase College, and a Master of Music from the Yale School of Music.
William Johnston-Rutledge
Lecturer, Department of Art
William Johnston-Rutledge is a multimedia artist whose work includes animation, documentary film, and autobiographical comics. His current work draws inspiration from the emergent behavior of birds, fish, and other collective species. He explores how simple sets of rules can simulate complex natural systems and how digital spaces can become sources of comfort and calm.
Johnston-Rutledge earned a BFA in film production and a BS in physics from Chapman University.
Emily Leue
Lecturer, Department of Theater
Emily Leue has worked across the performing arts industry, including in regional and commercial theater, presenting organizations, opera, and dance. Her experience includes work with the American Repertory Theater, ShowMotion Inc., the Performing Arts Center at Purchase College, and the Academy of Music in Northampton, Massachusetts.
Leue earned a BA in theater arts from Earlham College and an MFA in technical design and production from the David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University.
“I look forward to helping the next generation of theater professionals unlock the satisfaction of knowing how to turn an idea into a finished production,” Leue says.
Fredrick Walter Lorenz
Assistant professor of Middle Eastern history, Department of History
Fredrick Walter Lorenz studies the late Ottoman Empire through the interconnected histories of migration, displacement, settler colonialism, and imperial expansion across the eastern Mediterranean, North Africa, and the Balkans. Drawing on archival sources in multiple Middle Eastern and European languages, his work examines how refugees, settlers, Indigenous communities, and imperial officials transformed landscapes, agriculture, and political authority during the 19th and early 20th centuries.
Lorenz teaches courses on the Ottoman Empire, the modern Middle East, migration, colonialism, and North African history. He is completing his first book, Ottoman Settlerism: Empire, Migration, and Settler Colonialism in Late Ottoman Libya.
Lorenz earned a PhD from the University of California, Los Angeles.
Mix Mann
Assistant professor, W. E. B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies
Mix Mann’s scholarship examines Black intimate life at the intersection of race, gender, family, and sexuality in the 19th- and 20th-century United States. Their first book manuscript, tentatively titled She Feels Like Home: Black Women and Queer Domesticity, 1859–1970, explores how Black women’s domestic arrangements and desires can help illuminate their same-sex intimate relationships.
Mann teaches courses on Black women’s history, queer history, the history of the family, and Black feminist and queer theory. They earned a BA in Africana studies from the University of Notre Dame and an MA and PhD in history from the University of Michigan.
“I’m looking forward to taking advantage of exciting events and conversations happening across the College of Humanities and Fine Arts,” Mann says. “I enjoy being a part of a rich intellectual community.”
Mariah Smith
Lecturer, Department of Architecture
Mariah Smith’s practice explores the role of visual representation in the production and contemplation of tactile, domestically coded environments, with a particular focus on textiles. In 2023, she co-founded Rag Rug Study Group, a collaborative research project, platform, and community archive that places reworked textiles in dialogue with contemporary art, design, and architectural practice.
Before joining UMass Amherst, Smith taught introductory design studios at Barnard College and Syracuse University. She earned a BA in architecture from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MArch from Princeton University.
“I look forward to joining the vibrant community of thoughtful artists, designers, and scholars in the College of Humanities and Fine Arts,” Smith says.
Daoru Wang
Assistant professor, Department of Architecture
Daoru Wang’s teaching and research focus on computational design, structural design and analysis, and the integration of digital workflows into architectural education. He developed Bridge, an open-source plugin that connects Rhino and Grasshopper workflows with structural analysis software, allowing structural analysis to be incorporated into the early stages of design.
Before joining UMass Amherst, Wang worked at architecture and design firm LS3P and served as an assistant teaching professor at Ball State University. He also creates educational content about structural design, digital modeling, and construction through his YouTube channel.
Wang earned a BArch and PhD in design from North Carolina State University and an MArch from Yale University.
“I am excited to join HFA and collaborate with students and colleagues to explore new possibilities at the intersection of architecture, technology, and design,” Wang says. “I look forward to contributing to a creative and interdisciplinary learning environment.”