Rick Branyon's great passion in life is teaching, and his greatest joy is to be in front of a class of energetic students engaged in a dynamic discussion of important issues in culture or literature. After receiving his MBA, he worked in the business world for eight years as a management consultant, then returned to graduate school to pursue his long-term interests in literature. His special areas of expertise are nineteenth- and early twentieth-century American and British literature, although he considers himself a generalist because he teaches everything from Homer to Donna Tartt. He has a special appreciation for all things from the 1950s and 1960s; his favorite course that he ever taught was "Sex, Drugs, and Rock 'n' Roll: Popular Culture of the 1950s and 1960s."
Degrees
B.A. Clemson
B.S. Clemson
M.B.A. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
M.A. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Ph.D. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Primary Areas of Research/Teaching
Nineteenth- and twentieth-century literature
American literature of the 1950s and 1960s
Utopian and dystopian literature
Courses Taught
3020: History of American Literature to 1900
3010: History of British Literature, 1700-1900
2200: Major American Authors
2000: Interpreting Literature
1200: Composition
1100: Composition
1000: Appreciating Literature
