Laurie Hovell McMillin

  • Professor of Writing and Communication
  • Director of Writing Program

Areas of Study

Education

  • BA, Lawrence University, 1984
  • MA, Syracuse University, 1989
  • PhD, Syracuse University, 1993

Biography

Laurie Hovell McMillin is professor of writing and communication and director of the Writing Program. Because her own writing and research cuts across genres and disciplines, Professor McMillin enjoys helping students to negotiate the demands of a liberal arts curriculum.

Her teaching interests include travel writing and writing pedagogy. Her research interests include travel writing, non-fiction prose, South Asian culture and religion, and Tibetan studies.

She also edits the online journal, AWAY: Experiments in Travel and Telling.

  • “To Claim Some Ground,” Journal for International Studies of Literature and the Environment, 2023. 
  • Spaces and Places in Western India: Formations and Delineations. Edited with Bina Sengar. Routledge, India, 2020.
  • “Karle/Ekvira: Many Places Over Time, and at Once,” Spaces and Places in Western India: Formations and Delineations. Ed. Sengar and McMillin. Routledge, India, 2020. 
  • "The Guide," The Lonely Planet Anthology of Travel Writing, 2016.
  • “Words, Time, and Worlds: Nine Days on the Grand Canyon.”  Journal for Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and the Environment. October 2013.
  • “Terror.” In Travel Writing: Theory and Practice, edited by Charles Forsdick, Corinne Fowler, and Ludmilla Kostova. London: Routledge, August 2013.
  • Buried Indians: Digging up the Past in a Midwestern Town. Madison: University of Wisconsin, 2006.
  • "New Age Namtar: Tibetan Autobiographies in English." In Proceedings of the Ninth Seminar of the International Association for Tibetan Studies. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill Academic Publishers, 2002.
  • English in Tibet, Tibet in English: Self-Presentation in Tibet and the Diaspora. New York: Palgrave, 2001

Fall 2025

Writing for College and Beyond — WRCM 102

Teaching and Tutoring Writing Across the Disciplines — ENGL 399

Teaching and Tutoring Writing Across the Disciplines — WRCM 401

News

Beyond the Writing Center: Abbie Patchen ’24

November 7, 2024

Abbie Patchen ’24 is a JD candidate at the UNC School of Law. At Oberlin Abbie minored in Writing & Communication. Here, she reflects on how her Oberlin courses and professors shaped her approach to learning and writing.

Survivor Mentality

May 16, 2023

Emma Hart traverses the globe to stem the tide of gender-based violence.

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