Amy Kaplan

Amy Kaplan (September 10, 1953 – July 30, 2020) was an American academic working in the interdisciplinary field of American Studies, her work focused on the critical study of the culture of imperialism, prison writing, mourning, memory, and war.

Her 1982 thesis was titled "Realism against itself: the urban fictions of Twain, Howells, Dreiser, and Dos Passos".

Kaplan began her career teaching at Yale University.

In 1994, Kaplan co-edited Cultures of United States Imperialism with Donald E. Pease, a book which has been credited with marking "a paradigm shift for the field of American Studies, forcing scholars to contend with the United States' imperialist history".

Kaplan was Edward W. Kane Professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania, and president of the American Studies Association in 2003.

Kaplan was born in New York City and grew up in New Rochelle.

She graduated summa cum laude from Brandeis University with a BA. She completed her PhD at Johns Hopkins University, where she researched late-nineteenth-century American literature.

Kaplan was a professor of English and chair of the American Studies program at Mount Holyoke College before joining the department of English at the University of Pennsylvania in 2003.

In 2006, Kaplan became Edward Kane Professor of English.

For the 2011–12 academic year, Kaplan was a member of the school of social sciences at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey.

Kaplan died on July 30, 2020 of glioblastoma.