Roger N. Casey

BIOGRAPHY

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Roger N. Casey came to Rollins in 2000 and became the Dean of Faculty in addition to teaching English courses. In 2006, he was confirmed as Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs. He is also an accomplished writer, actor, director, and speaker.  

Casey was born on February 28, 1961 and grew up in the small town of Woodruff, South Carolina. The first member of his family to attend college, he earned his B.A. in English at Furman University before moving on to graduate school at Florida State University where he received his M.A. in English as well as his Ph.D. in American Literature. He also studied at the University of London and with the Royal Shakespeare Company. Before arriving at Rollins, Casey served in a number of administrative and teaching positions at Birmingham-Southern College in Alabama. In addition, he became a part of the Kellogg National Leadership Fellowship, which allowed him to travel to more than sixteen different countries over a four-year period.  

 Along with Lisa Tillmann, Casey contributed to the development of the Critical Media and Cultural Studies major, which was offered for the first time in 2007. He has spoken at numerous convocations at Rollins and was even called upon by the University of Florida. His unique pop culture welcome addresses have been popular with students, possibly because not every college administrator will rap Eminem lyrics at the podium. Casey was also involved in creating a Galapagos Seminar for faculty members, which serves as a model for faculty development in the College's internationalization initiative. Before his departure, he and his wife, Robyn C. Allers, also issued The Provost's Challenge in 2010 to help raise money for The Rollins Fund.

Casey's academic interests include: theater, literature, post-modernist theory, and the roles of automobiles and the media. His publications include such works as Textual Vehicles: The Automobile in American Literature (Garland, 1997), "Reality Shows in Florida" and "Driving Miss Flannery: Automobiles in O'Connor's Short Stories." He has also given many presentations and lectures including: "Dramatic Depictions of Teachers and Students" and "Baby-Boomer Culture." 

Casey Discusses his Convocation Speeches

• "...You have the text, which in the church is biblical, which in my case it’s from these pop culture references; a lot of rhyme - in the church experience, it’s built on rhyme, which the dominant rhyme theme in our culture is rap..."
  
  
  
  
  
  
   

• "...She got a set of Encyclopedia Britannica from the early 1950s - I think they’re 51s or 52s - and gave them to me when I was a kid; I read them cover to cover.  Between that and then television..."
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
   

• "...The book really got me even more interested in looking at popular culture and how popular culture could be a tool to really grab student’s attention and really teach them very deep, very complex critical theory..."
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

• "...We would meet the first hour and half of our seminar in a classroom, and the second hour and a half we met in the teachers’ lounge..."
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

• "...I was surprised how resistant parts of the community were to that kind of myth busting, because breaking up someone’s world view, particularly breaking it up with data, proves to create a lot of friction..."
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
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Casey Discusses the Roots for his Love of Learning

Casey Discusses his Dissertation and Interest in Pop Culture

Casey Discusses a Favorite Course he Taught While at Birmingham Southern College

Casey Discusses Myth Busting