She received her B.A. and B.M. from Wheaton College in Illinois (2006) and completed a Ph.D. in English at the University of Michigan (2014). Her book project, Fools' Play: Performing Cognitive Disability in Premodern English Literature, argues that the early English literary fool serves as an avatar for cultural concerns about the frailty of cognitive ability. Her second project examines the five senses in trans-Reformational English literature.