Nicholas Helms
Nic Helms received their Ph.D. from the Hudson Strode Program in Renaissance Studies at The University of Alabama in 2015. They are the author of Cognition, Mindreading, and Shakespeare’s Characters (Springer 2019) and the co-editor of Water and Cognition in Early Modern English Literature (Amsterdam University Press 2024). Their research applies cognitive science and critical disability studies to early modern drama and poetry. They are currently the coordinator of PSU’s English Program, and they continue to advocate for the working conditions of their colleagues as a past president of PSU-AAUP and a faculty organizer for the Plymouth Union Caucus.
If they’re not teaching literature or researching premodern disability and neurodiversity, you’ll probably find Nic reading science fiction or playing board games. They act each summer with Sandwich’s Shakespearean troupe Advice to the Players. Before coming to Plymouth, Prof. Helms acted as artistic director of the Improbable Fictions staged reading series in Tuscaloosa, AL, for over a decade.
Scholarly Work
Water and Cognition in Early Modern English Literature, co-edited with Steve Mentz. Amsterdam University Press, 2024. Part of the series Environmental Humanities in Pre-modern Cultures. DOI: 10.1017/9789048557608.
"Seeing Brains: Shakespeare, Autism, and Self-Identification." Redefining Disability. Brill, 2022. 152-159. DOI: 10.1163/9789004512702.
“Designing for Fatigue.” Co-written with Cait Kirby and Asia Merrill. Hybrid Pedagogy. 27 Jan 2022. https://hybridpedagogy.org/designing-for-fatigue/.
Cognition, Mindreading, and Shakespeare’s Characters. Springer, 2019. Part of the Cognitive Studies in Literature and Performance Series (eds. Bruce McConachie and Blakey Vermeule). DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-03565-5.
“To Knit the Knot: Embodied Mind in John Donne’s ‘The Ecstasy.’” The Seventeenth Century, 23 Aug 2018. DOI: 10.1080/0268117X.2018.1485593.
“‘Upon Such Sacrifices’: An Ethic of Spectator Risk.” Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism 27.1 (2012): 91-107. DOI: 10.1353/dtc.2012.0031.
“Conceiving Ambiguity: Dynamic Mindreading in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night.” Philosophy and Literature 36.1 (2012): 122-35. DOI: 10.1353/phl.2012.0001.
“‘Where She Comes From’: Mindreading in Levring’s The King is Alive.” symplokē 19.1-2 (2011): 289-304. DOI: 10.5250/symploke.19.1-2.0289.
Courses Taught
EN 1320 Muder, Mayhem, and Madness
EN 1400 Composition: Writing about Disability
EN 1600 Studies in English
EN 2490 Rethinking Modern British Literature
EN 3430 Rethinking Medieval and Renaissance Literature
EN 3515 Currents in Global Literature
EN 3695 Critical Theory
IS 4220 Integrative Capstone: Protest and Performance
IS 4220 Integrative Capstone: Rethinking Disability
