CarrieLynn D. Reinhard is Professor of Communication Arts and Sciences at Dominican University in River Forest, Illinois. She received her Ph.D. and M.A. in Communication from the Ohio State University. She served as a post-doctoral researcher in virtual worlds and reception studies at Roskilde University in Roskilde, Denmark. She has published numerous articles and book chapters on reception studies, primarily concerning digital communication technologies. She authored the book Fractured Fandoms: Contentious Communication in Fan Communities (Lexington, 2018). She serves as an Editor for the Professional Wrestling Studies Association. She is co-chair for the Wrestling Studies area for Midwest Popular Culture / American Culture.
Along with her partner, Christopher J. Olson of Dominican University, she is co-author of Possessed Women, Haunted States: Cultural Tensions in Exorcism Cinema (Lexington, 2016). Together, they are co-editor of Making Sense of Cinema: Empirical Studies into Film Spectators and Spectatorship (Bloomsbury Academic, 2016), Heroes, Heroines and Everything In Between: Challenging Gender and Sexuality Stereotypes in Children’s Entertainment Media (Lexington, 2017), and Convergent Wrestling: Participatory Culture, Transmedia Storytelling, and Intertextuality in the Squared Circle (Routledge, 2019). They also co-host The Pop Culture Lens podcast, which looks at pop cultural texts using different academic concepts and theories. She also runs her own website with her research at Playing, With Research.
Dr. Lowery A. Woodall III is an associate professor in the Communication & Theatre Department at Millersville University. He has been the Station Advisor to WIXQ 91.7-FM for six years. He was recently appointed to the position of Faculty Coordinator of General Education & High Impact Practices beginning in the Fall of 2019. His primary research interests center around the portrayal of race, gender and sexuality in popular culture. He is the co-editor of the book, Joss Whedon and Race: Critical Essays, published by McFarland.
Dr. Tunisha Singleton is a Multimedia Producer and Creative Strategist. Described as a 1-2 punch of art and science, Dr. Singleton practice is rooted in storytelling, innovation, community impact. With Ph.D. in Media Psychology, her expertise lies at the intersection of sports, new media, and fandom, enabling her to improve her clients’ position in marketing, communications, and business development. Dr. Singleton has presented at several conferences including the International Association for Communication and Sport, American Psychological Association, and the Midwest Popular Culture Association. She is also Adjunct Faculty at Fielding Graduate University, the producer and host of the I Have Questions Podcast and is the President on the Board of Directors for Black Girl Hockey Club, a non-profit organization dedicated to making hockey more inclusive for Black girls, women, and families. She is also a lifelong pro wrestling fan and spires to work with more brands and organizations on projects surrounding building fan experiences, flexing Black imagination, and advocating for mental health.
His research on popular culture and interactive audiencing rituals blends elements of rhetorical, cultural, and performance studies.
Jessica Fontaine is a Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canadian Graduate Fellow (2019-2022) and a PhD Candidate in Communication Studies, Graduate Option in Gender and Women's Studies at McGill University. Her dissertation argues that pro wrestling operates as an affective economy that is formed and fueled by the contingencies between work, affect, and kayfabe, and it takes an intersectional feminist approach to investigate how participants engage these contingencies to shape pro wrestling’s uneven material and social conditions.
She has published two articles on professional wrestling: "Illusion, Kayfabe, and Identity Performance in Box Brown and Brandon Easton's Andre the Giant Graphic Biographies" in The Comics Grid (2017) and "Headlocks in Lockdown: Working the At-Home Crowd" in Popular Communication (2021).
Christopher J. Olson is a Ph.D. candidate in the English Department at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee with a Media, Cinema, and Digital Studies concentration. He received his M.A. in Media and Cinema Studies from DePaul University.
He has taught classes on masculinity, interracial communication, ethics and superheroes, film as art, and game studies. He published the award-winning article "Shakespeare, Didgeridoos, and Samurai Cowboys: Remixing National and Cultural Identities in Sukiyaki Western Django" in the Popular Culture Studies Journal.
He is author, co-author, or co-editor of the books The Greatest Cult TV Shows of All Time (Rowman & Littlefield, 2020), Convergent Wrestling: Participatory Culture, Transmedia Storytelling, and Intertextuality in the Squared Circle (Routledge, 2019), 100 Greatest Cult Films (Rowman & Littlefield, 2018), Heroes, Heroines and Everything In Between: Challenging Gender and Sexuality Stereotypes in Children's Entertainment Media (Lexington, 2017), Possessed Women, Haunted States: Cultural Tensions in Exorcism Cinema (Lexington, 2016), and Making Sense of Cinema: Empirical Studies into Film Spectators and Spectatorship (Bloomsbury Academic, 2016). Since 2014, Christopher has served as co-host of The Pop Culture Lens podcast, which he co-created with his partner, Dr. CarrieLynn Reinhard of Dominican University.
Lee Benaka is a Fishery Management Specialist with NOAA Fisheries, and a life-long pro wrestling fan. As an undergraduate religion major at Columbia College (NYC), Lee wrote a senior thesis on Ritual and Religious Imagery in Professional Wrestling and subsequently received Columbia's Henry Evans Traveling Fellowship to interview people in the pro wrestling business. Lee is interested in pro wrestling criticism and overlap between pro wrestling content and music and comic book art.
Hussaini Garba Mohammed received his Master’s degree with honors in Production Management from the National Institute of Business Management in Chennai, India. As an author, writer, peace advocator, and African professional wrestling supporter, he aims to use his experience gained as an inspiring advocator to engage African students to be involved in studying wrestling. In his role as the Member-at-Large, Hussaini is an ambassador of the Professional Wrestling Studies Association in Nigeria, Africa and beyond. He believes that it is beneficial to have someone from Africa on the Executive, and is working to build PWSA membership in Africa, where watching professional wrestling has been popular since the 1980s.