Assistant Professor of English and the Humanities at Reed College in Portland, Oregon, Sarah specializes in19th and 20th-century American fiction but offers a wide range of courses. In addition to seminars such as “The American Con Artist,” “Transatlantic Bestsellers,” and “American Pastoral,” she teaches Irish drama and fiction. In spring 2012, English Literary History published sections of her dissertation. The article, “Virgilian Chesnutt” argues that allusions to classical pastoral in Charles Chesnutt’s stories of conjure debunk nostalgia for the Old South by exposing the brutality of slavery and the failure of reconstruction.

Sarah is a 2003 Mitchell Scholar. She received an MA in Anglo Irish Literature and Drama from University College Dublin. Her thesis research examined the influence of Yeats, Joyce and Faulkner on William Trevor's Felicia's Journey. During her Mitchell year, Sarah interned with Arts for Amnesty and she stayed an extra semester to work in North Dublin, running an afterschool program for seven and eight year olds and setting up a teen mentoring program with Trinity College students. She went on to pursue a PhD in English at Harvard University.

Sarah obtained her undergraduate degree from Columbia University.