Bio
Alexis Riley (she/hers) is an interdisciplinary artist-scholar whose research focuses on disability performance in the twentieth- and twenty-first centuries. She specializes in theatre, dance, and performance studies, disability studies, and mad studies, with particular interests in practice-based research methods and accessible pedagogy.
Her current book project, Mad Memory: Performance and Disability After Institutionalization, explores the legacy of medical incarceration—and its impact on disability communities—through the lens of performance. This research has earned numerous awards, including a generous grant from the American Theatre and Drama Society and year-long fellowships from the Charlotte W. Newcombe Foundation and the University of Michigan President’s Postdoctoral Fellowship Program.
In addition to presenting her work in conventional scholarly forums, she also draws on her archival sources to devise live performances and digital humanities projects aimed at making disability history, art, and culture available to a wider audience. These projects inform her approach to teaching, which centers accessibility as a strategy for fostering inclusion in and beyond the theatre classroom.
Education
Ph.D., Theatre, The University of Texas at Austin
M.A., Theatre, Bowling Green State University
B.A., Theatre, Rollins College