Bio
Miles Osgood is a Lecturer for Structured Liberal Education (SLE), with additional courses in Stanford English and Continuing Studies. After working at Oxford University Press in New York, Miles earned a PhD in English at Harvard, where he designed and taught courses on global modernism, women's literature, and James Joyce. He has published public essays in Slate, n+1, and the Washington Post, along with academic articles in Modernism/modernity and ARIEL: A Review of International English Literature.
Miles is at work on a book entitled "Culture Games," which documents the history of the 1968 Cultural Olympiad in Mexico City against the backdrop of Cold War espionage and global unrest. This work extends his dissertation research, which uncovers the little-known history of the Olympic Art Competitions of 1912-1948 and argues that twentieth-century world literature self-consciously adopted the qualities of international sport. Across studies of Olympic participants including Robert Graves, Jean Cocteau, David Alfaro Siqueiros, and Bunya Koh, and through analysis of sport in the work of H.D., Ralph Ellison, Marianne Moore, and Kamau Brathwaite, Miles's published work reveals the surprisingly pervasive genre of "athletic art" across major axes of twentieth-century culture.
Miles has been working in frosh education for many years, starting when he was a Resident Tutor as a Stanford senior and continuing with his time as a Teaching Fellow for Harvard's "Expos" writing program. From 2016 to 2018, Miles created and developed "J(oyce)-Term," a one-week winter-break bootcamp on Joyce's "Ulysses" for first-year students. He has extended his teaching to high-school students and lifelong learners online as designer and lead instructor for the "Masterpieces of World Literature" series on edX and with a course on the literature of the world wars ("Shell Shock") for the Master of Liberal Arts program. He's now building a "Storytelling and Mythmaking" class for undergrads studying literature and creative writing.
In his spare time, Miles designs board games, edits home movies, and hikes around San Francisco with his dog Pico.
Academic Appointments
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Lecturer, Stanford Introductory Studies
2023-24 Courses
- Storytelling and Mythmaking: Modern Odysseys
ENGLISH 133B (Win) - Structured Liberal Education
SLE 91 (Aut) - Structured Liberal Education
SLE 92 (Win) -
Independent Studies (2)
- Curricular Practical Training
ENGLISH 194C (Sum) - Directed Reading
SLE 99 (Win, Spr)
- Curricular Practical Training
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Prior Year Courses
2022-23 Courses
- Storytelling and Mythmaking: Modern Odysseys
ENGLISH 133B (Spr) - Structured Liberal Education
SLE 91 (Aut) - Structured Liberal Education
SLE 92 (Win) - Structured Liberal Education
SLE 93 (Spr)
2021-22 Courses
- Structured Liberal Education
SLE 91 (Aut) - Structured Liberal Education
SLE 92 (Win) - Structured Liberal Education
SLE 93 (Spr)
2020-21 Courses
- Structured Liberal Education
SLE 91 (Aut) - Structured Liberal Education
SLE 92 (Win) - Structured Liberal Education
SLE 93 (Spr)
- Storytelling and Mythmaking: Modern Odysseys
All Publications
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Going for the Bronze: Modernism vs. the Old Guard at the Olympic Art Competitions
MODERNISM-MODERNITY
2022; 28 (4): 761-789
View details for DOI 10.1353/mod.2021.0059
View details for Web of Science ID 000758777100001
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Umpire, Empire: Kamau Brathwaite, Athletic Education, and the Literature of Self-Rule
ARIEL-A REVIEW OF INTERNATIONAL ENGLISH LITERATURE
2021; 52 (1): 121–51
View details for Web of Science ID 000604393000005