Melanie Springer Mock, PhD
Professor of English
Teaching and Writing Interests
- Journalism
- Creative nonfiction, including longform journalism
- First-year writing
- Cultural criticism
Melanie Springer Mock is professor of English at 性世界传媒, an evangelical Friends institution in Newberg, Oregon, where she primarily teaches first-year writing, memoir, and journalism courses. She is author or coauthor of six books, including Finding Our Way Forward: When The Children we Love Become Adults (Herald Press, 2022). Her essays and reviews have appeared in Ms. Magazine, The Nation, Christian Feminism Today, Chronicle of Higher Education, Current Magazine, Runner’s World, and Inside Higher Education, among other places, and she is a regular reviewer for Anabaptist World.
She and her husband live in Dundee, Oregon, and have two young adult sons. She is a stepmom to two adults, and “Nani” to three grandsons. In her free time, Melanie enjoys running, swimming, biking, knitting, and watching reality television.
Published Work
Melanie has published a number of books, including Worthy: Finding Yourself in a World Expecting Someone Else (Herald Press, 2018), and If Eve Only Knew: Freeing Yourself from Biblical Womanhood to Become Who God Expected You to Be (Chalice Press, 2015).
Melanie is also an accomplished essayist in both popular and academic presses. Her essays have appeared in Christian Feminism Today, Literary Mama, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Brain, Child, and The Oregonian, among other places. Much of her work focuses on her experiences parenting, feminism within Christian context, and writing theory.
Education
Melanie earned her PhD at Oklahoma State University in 1999 with a concentration in composition and rhetoric and modern American literature. Her dissertation: "Journeys of God and Country: The Narrative of American Mennonite Conscientious Objectors and the Great War." She earned a master's degree in English literature from the University of Missouri-St. Louis in 1994 with a concentration in writing theory. Her thesis was entitled: "Evenings at the Bird and Baby: The Inklings as a Model For Contemporary Collaborative Theory."
Personal Interests
Melanie's non-academic interests include her two sons, Samuel and Benjamin, running, and watching good shows on television.