Metropolitan School of Professional Studies

Richard D. Sharp, Ph.D.

INTRODUCTION:

Dr. Sharp works full-time at the Library of Congress (US Copyright Office) and teaches adult and continuing education part-time at various English departments such as UDC and The Catholic University of America. His dissertation analyzed the Civil War poetry of Walt Whitman and Herman Melville, their role as "witnesses" of the first, modern war (characterized by dehumanization, civilian targeting, new technology development and utilization such as: iron ships and machine guns), and the impact of their poetry in anti-war sentiment. Currently Dr. Sharp is researching Jean Toomer, often identified with the Harlem Renaissance, who transcended American notions of race and posited that America would outgrow racial categories

EDUCATION:

Ph.D., Literature, University of California, Santa Cruz, 1978

RESEARCH INTERESTS:

• Early American Literature & Poetry
• American History & Literature

MSPS COURSES:

• MHU 361: American Literature I
• MHU 362: American Literature II
• MHU 363: African American Literature
• MHU 151: Rhetoric and Composition

PUBLICATIONS:

• "Herman Melville and 'The Real War"
• "Walt Whitman and the Kiss of Reconciliation"