Deena Varner is an interdisciplinary Americanist specializing in carceral studies, cultural studies of the law, and law and literature. She is the author of From the Courtroom to the Boardroom: Privatizing Justice in the Neoliberal United States, which traces the partial transfer of quasi-judicial authority to employers, landlords, lenders, sharing economy platforms (such as Airbnb), and other private actors. Dr. Varner's other research has appeared in journals such as Ethnic Studies, Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies, and the Journal of Historical Geography. She currently serves as an advisory board member and book review editor for the Carceral Geography Working Group of the Royal Geographical Society in the United Kingdom. 
 
Dr. Varner is also the faculty advisor for Sigma Tau Delta, the international English honors society, at TTU.   
 
PhD Purdue University 

Book

From the Courtroom to the Boardroom: Privatizing Justice in the Neoliberal United States. University Press of Kansas, 2024. 

Articles

“On the (Bi)partisan Pleasures of Outrage in the Immigration ‘Debate.’” Ethnic Studies Review 46, no. 3 (2023). 

“Quasi: Adjudicating Guilt, Innocence, and Citizenship in the Neoliberal Prison.” Cultural Politics 15, no. 2 (2019): 139-161.  

“Nineteenth Century Criminal Geography: W.E.B. Du Bois and the Pennsylvania Prison Society.” Journal of Historical Geography 59 (2018): 15-26. 

“A Communitas of Hustle and the Queer Logic of Inmate Sex (Anti) Work.” Frontiers: A Journal of Women Studies 39, no. 3 (2018): 208-240.  

 “Reflections on Tawana Brawley: Publicity and Privacy Thirty Years On.” Women’s Studies 47, no. 5 (2018): 541-563. 

Education Research (Book Chapters)

Ashby, Iryna, Marisa Exter, and Deena Varner. “Developing Cross-Cutting Competencies for a Transdisciplinary World: An Extension of Bloom’s Taxonomy.” Educational Technology Beyond Content: A New Focus for Learning, edited by Brad Hokanson et al., Springer, 2020, 107-118. 

Varner, Deena, Colin Gray, and Marisa Exter. “A Content Agnostic Praxis for Transdisciplinary Education.” Educational Technology Beyond Content: A New Focus for Learning, edited by Brad Hokanson et al., Springer, 2020, 141-151.

Assistant Professor of Practice
American Literature and American Studies

Email: devarner@ttu.edu
Office: HUMA 478