{"id":71063,"date":"2026-01-07T15:36:03","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T20:36:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cws.charlotte.edu\/backup-coaa\/?post_type=people&#038;p=71063"},"modified":"2026-01-07T15:36:04","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T20:36:04","slug":"mark-west","status":"publish","type":"people","link":"https:\/\/cws.charlotte.edu\/backup-coaa\/people\/mark-west\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark West"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Mark I. West is currently serving as the Interim Chair of the Department of Theatre at UNC Charlotte. He is also a professor in the English Department, where he has been teaching courses in children\u2019s and young adult literature since 1984.\u00a0 In addition to teaching, he has served in numerous administrative positions at UNC Charlotte, including the Chair of the English Department, the Associate Dean for General Education, the Interim Chair of the Department of Art and Art History, the Director of the M.A. Program in Liberal Studies, and the Director of the American Studies Program. He has written or edited more than 25 books, the most recent of which is &#8220;Once Upon a Toy: Essays on the Interplay Between Stories and Playthings&#8221; (2025), which he co-educated with Kathy Merlock Jackson. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Before entering academia, West worked as a professional puppeteer in Wisconsin. Among the highlights of his career as a puppeteer were performing at the Governor\u2019s Mansion, appearing on Wisconsin Public Television.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cws.charlotte.edu\/backup-coaa\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/807\/2026\/01\/Mark-West_CV.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">See West&#8217;s full CV here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Mark I. West is currently serving as the Interim Chair of the Department of Theatre at UNC Charlotte. He is also a professor in the English Department, where he has been teaching courses in children\u2019s and young adult literature since 1984.\u00a0 In addition to teaching, he has served in numerous administrative positions at UNC Charlotte, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":455,"featured_media":71067,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"template":"","people_types":[31,29,139],"class_list":["post-71063","people","type-people","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","people_types-administration","people_types-faculty","people_types-theatre"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Mark West - College of Arts + Architecture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Mark West - College of Arts + Architecture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Mark I. West is currently serving as the Interim Chair of the Department of Theatre at UNC Charlotte. 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