Dr. Derritt Mason
Positions
Associate Professor
Contact information
Phone number
Office: 403.220.3395
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I'm looking for...
Research partners
At the moment, I am only accepting inquiries from prospective graduate students who are interested in video game studies and children's/young adult literature.
Background
Educational Background
Ph.D., English, University of Alberta, 2015
M.A., Cultural Studies and Critical Theory, McMaster University, 2006
B.A. (Hons), Information and Media Studies, University of Western Ontario, 2004
Biography
Primarily, I research and teach at the intersection of children's and young adult literature, queer theory, and media/cultural studies; I also have interest and expertise in video game studies and the scholarship of teaching and learning. I am the author of Queer Anxieties of Young Adult Literature and Culture (UP Mississippi, 2021), winner of the Children's Literature Association Honor Book Award. With Kenneth B. Kidd, I have co-edited both Alt Kid Lit: What Children's Literature Might Be (UP Mississippi, 2024) and Queer as Camp: Essays on Summer, Style, and Sexuality (Fordham UP, 2019), which won the Children's Literature Association Edited Book Award. I am also the host and executive producer of the podcast 3QTL: Three Questions about Teaching and Learning, and have served the Taylor Institute for Teaching and Learning as Acting Senior Director (2024-25) and Educational Leader in Residence, Online and Blended Learning (2022-24).
In addition to the above, my publications include essays on:
- The queer pedagogy of ungrading (Journal of Cinema & Media Studies: Teaching Media 10.2)
- Teaching close reading in the English classroom (Pedagogy 22.3)
- Queer representation in children's animation (Queer Studies in Media & Popular Culture 6.3)
- Children and virtuality (The Lion and the Unicorn 45.1; winner of the Children's Literature Association Article Award)
- Teaching and learning with "Let's Play" videos (Teaching & Learning Inquiry 9.1)
- The keyword "trans" in children's literature studies (Keywords for Children's Literature, 2nd Ed., 2021)
- The history of queer representation in picture books (Literary Cultures and Twenty-First Century Childhoods, 2020)
- Horror and slasher film tropes in queer young adult literature (Research on Diversity in Youth Literature 2.1)
- A queer adolescent trope I call the "Earnest Elfin Dream Gay" (Public Books, 2018)
- The history of childhood and perversity (Jeunesse: Young People, Texts, Cultures 3.1)
- Anti-gay violence in Wyoming (The Brock Review 11.2)
I also co-edited, with Ela Przybylo, a special issue of ESC (40.1) entitled Hysteria Manifest: Cultural Lives of a Great Disorder.
Research
Participation in university strategic initiatives
Courses
| Course number | Course title | Semester |
|---|---|---|
| ENGL 685/529 | Video Games and the Bildungsroman | Winter 2022 |
| ENGL 426 | Queer Theory and Video Games | Winter 2021 |
| ENGL 396 | Literature for Young People | Fall 2020 |
Awards
- Leadership and Mentorship Award in Justice, Equity, and Transformation, Faculty of Arts, University of Calgary. 2025
- Article Award (for "The Virtual Child"), Children's Literature Association. 2023
- Book Honor Award (for Queer Anxieties), Children's Literature Association. 2023
- Teaching Excellence Award, Students' Union, University of Calgary. 2021
- Edited Book Award (for Queer as Camp), Children's Literature Association. 2021
- Outstanding Early Career Teacher, Faculty of Arts, University of Calgary. 2020
- Insight Development Grant, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. 2019
- Wayne O. McCready Resident Fellowship for an Emerging Scholar, Calgary Institute for the Humanities. 2019
Publications
- Alt Kid Lit: What Children's Literature Might Be. Co-edited with Kenneth B. Kidd. University Press of Mississippi. 300. (2024)
- Queer Anxieties of Young Adult Literature and Culture. University Press of Mississippi. 246. (2021)
- Queer as Camp: Essays on Summer, Style, and Sexuality. Co-edited with Kenneth B. Kidd. Fordham University Press. 256. (2019)
- Three Questions About Teaching and Learning (3QTL). Podcast. (2023)
In the News
- Three Questions About Teaching and Learning (3QTL) podcast launches Sept. 27. UToday. (2023)
- Derritt Mason, "Queer Anxieties of Young Adult Literature and Culture". New Books Network (Podcast). (2021)
- Three Questions with Derritt Mason. Calgary Public Library. (2019)
- What’s the Price of Invisibility? Changing Perceptions of Gender Through Representation in Art. University of Calgary. (2019)
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