R.V.J. (Roel) van den Oever

Contact information

Roel van den Oever
Assistant Professor
English / American Studies

Office: 11A-17
Phone: 020 598 6439
Email: r.v.j.vanden.oever@vu.nl

Postal address:
VU University Amsterdam
Faculty of Arts
De Boelelaan 1105
1081 HV  Amsterdam
Netherlands

General

Roel van den Oever obtained a BA and MA, cum laude, in American Studies at Radboud University Nijmegen. He was a visiting student at the University of Iowa, where he took courses in film theory and queer studies. In 2005/2006, he was a research fellow at the Center for the Humanities at Wesleyan University. He has written his Ph.D. dissertation, titled Dominant Mothers, Queer Sons: (Un)doing Momism in Postwar American Culture, at the Center for Gender and Diversity, Maastricht University. Currently, he works as an Assistant Professor in English / American Studies at the VU University Amsterdam.

Research

Dissertation

Dominant Mothers, Queer Sons: (Un)doing Momism in Postwar American Culture

In postwar America, a pseudo-scientific discourse called Momism held that a domineering mother would hamper the psychosexual development of her son. This research project studies the cultural representation of Momism, in particular in the novels The Grotto (Grace Zaring Stone, 1951) and Portnoy’s Complaint (Philip Roth, 1969), the play Suddenly Last Summer (Tennessee Williams, 1958), and the film Psycho (Alfred Hitchcock, 1960). It shows that these four texts at once uphold and undermine the Momism discourse.

Supervisors: Professor Maaike Meijer (Maastricht University) and Professor renée hoogland (Wayne State University, Detroit)

Publications

2010
van den Oever, Roel. "A New Queer Companion for the Classroom." Rev. of A Companion to Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Studies. Ed. George E. Haggerty and Molly McGarry. GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 16.1/2 (2010): 330-32.

2008
van den Oever, Roel. "'A common ear / for our deep gossip': Selfhood and Friendship in the Poetry of Allen Ginsberg and Frank O'Hara." Amerikastudien 53.4 (2008): 521-33. (peer-reviewed)

2002
van den Oever, Roel. "De ultieme 'fag-hag'? De constructie van Madonna als homo-icoon." Raffia 14.3 (2002): 6-8.

Conference papers

1 April 2011
Conference: National American Studies Day: American Memory, American Forgetting, Leiden University
Paper: Angels in America and Momism

26 June 2010
Conference: 2010 Joint GLS Symposium, Reed College
Paper: "Room for Maneuver: The Jewish Mother Cliché in Portnoy's Complaint (Philip Roth, 1969)"

20 March 2009
Conference: Points of Exit: (Un)conventional Representations of Parenting, Age, and Sexuality, Maastricht University
Paper: "All the Queerness You Can Eat: From Martyr to Masochist in Tennessee Williams' Suddenly Last Summer (1958)"

5 May 2006
Conference: The New York School Poets and Their World, Wesleyan University
Paper: "'I was made in the image of a sissy truck-driver': Homosexuality in the Poetry of Frank O'Hara"

27 May 2005
Conference: ASCA Theory Seminar Mini-Conference, Commitment in the Humanities, University of Amsterdam
Paper: "Frank O'Hara's Good-Luck Charm: Complicity in a 'Personal Poem'"

18 March 2005
Conference: National American Studies Day, University of Amsterdam
Paper: "Larry Rivers' O' Hara: A Gay Icon in the Making"

20 May 2004
Conference: ASCA Theory Seminar Mini-Conference, World Memory, Affect and Trauma, and Sound, University of Amsterdam
Paper: "Traces of a Dead Man: Jasper Johns' Skin with O'Hara Poem (1963-65)"

Teaching

VU University Amsterdam, 2011-

Fiction and Film (MA)
Introduction to American Studies 
Gender Tutorial (RMA)
American Film
Screenwriting (MA)
Shakespeare Adaptations
Drama

Maastricht University, 2007-2009

Analysis of Paintings and Literary Texts
Research & Writing II
Pop Songs & Poetry: Theory & Analysis
Cultural Studies II: Reading Contemporary Culture
Rewriting European History: The Gender Perspective

Guest lectures (selection)

Frank O'Hara: New York City Poet
On Judith Butler's Gender Trouble
A Genealogy of the Homosexual as a Stereotype: Oscar Wilde and the Lavender Scare
Justify My Love: Madonna and the Embattlement of the Arts
Who Dies in Virginia Woolf's Mrs. Dalloway?

Curriculum Vitae

Academic training

August 2011 – present
Assistant professor, English / American Studies, VU University Amsterdam

December 2007 – May 2011
Ph.D. candidate, Center for Gender and Diversity, Maastricht University

September 2005 - August 2006
Research fellow, Center for the Humanities, Wesleyan University
(Made possible by an NWO travel grant)

September 2001 - August 2002
Thomas More scholar, Philosophy, Radboud University Nijmegen
(Made possible by a Thomas More Foundation scholarship)

September 1997 - August 2001
American Studies, BA & MA, cum laude, Radboud University Nijmegen
- MA thesis: What Are You Looking At? Madonna as a Gay Icon
  3rd prize Prof. Dr. C. Halkes thesis award, 1999-2001
  2nd prize Roosevelt Study Center thesis award, 2001
- Semester abroad (January 2001 - May 2001), University of Iowa
  (Made possible by a Quo Vadis stipend)

September 1996 - August 1997
Preliminary degree (propedeuse), Political Science, University of Amsterdam

Miscellaneous

May 2009 - December 2010
Ph.D. representative on Research Council of Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Maastricht University

March 19 & 20, 2009
Co-organizer conference Points of Exit: (Un)conventional Representations of Parenting, Age, and Sexuality, Castle Vaeshartelt, Maastricht

March 2008
Organizer of Een roze blik, five evenings of film and discussion with COC Limburg (LGBT group)

November 2002 - October 2004
Member editorial board Tijdschrift voor Genderstudies

August 2002 - December 2002
Assistant to interim manager, Financial Administration, Faculty of Science, Radboud University Nijmegen