She writes and teaches about Chaucer, the history of Chaucer studies, and the textual environments of medieval literature. Her recently published essays focus on the circulation of desire in the Canterbury Tales; the phallic jokes in the General Prologue and modern historicist criticism; and illustrations of the Canterbury pilgrims in manuscript and modern books. She has published The Post-Historical Middle Ages (Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), a collection of essays co-edited with Sylvia Federico. She is currently working on a book on Desire in the Canterbury Tales. Professor Scala co-edits Exemplaria, an academic journal dedicated to medieval and Renaissance studies, which won the 2011 Phoenix Award for Significant Editorial Achievement from the Council of Editors of Learned Journals.