Dr. Jennifer Dawes, professor of English at Henderson State University, will present an essay entitled Attracted to Tragedy: Western Dark Tourism and Waco’s Mount Carmel at the Western Literature Association Conference in Minneapolis, Minnesota, Oct. 25-29.
Dawes collected information for the presentation during archival research in the Texas Collection at Baylor University earlier this year. She also visited the site of the Branch Davidian compound.
The work will be included in a collection of essays she plans to edit. Dawes is preparing a book proposal for that collection entitled Morbid Fascination: Dark Tourism in the American West.
Dawes has attended and presented at the conference for the past 20 years and has served on the association’s executive council twice.