In her work as a professor, Windy Counsell Petrie works to reveal the connections between literary history and contemporary culture and to help students build resilience and virtue through reading and writing. As a specialist in autobiography, she is always focused on the lives beyond the literature. A former Fulbright Scholar, she has enjoyed spreading the word about the significant roles that women and minority authors have played in American literary history. She has published articles and reviews in a/b: Autobiography Studies, Literatura, American Writers, Christianity and Literature, and has contributed essays to several edited collections. When she is not working, you will find her outside, either under a tree or in the water.