2023-2024 Staff Biography

Dr. TreaAndrea M. Russworm

Director, Radical Play Lab; Microsoft Endowed Chair; Professor, USC School of Cinematic Arts Interactive Media and Games Division

TreaAndrea M. Russworm, Ph.D (she/her) is the Microsoft Endowed Chair and a Professor in the Interactive Media & Games Division at the University of Southern California. She is also the founder of Radical Play (a games-based public humanities initiative, research lab, and afterschool program), and she has been a professor and Associate Dean at UMass Amherst. A prolific author and editor, Russworm is a Series Editor of Power Play: Games, Politics, Culture (Duke University Press). She is the author or editor of numerous articles, chapters, and three books: Blackness is Burning; Gaming Representation; and Theorizing Tyler Perry. With research expertise in digital culture, video games, and popular African American media, Professor Russworm’s scholarship and interviews have also been shared on CNN, The History Channel, Turner Classic Movies, in podcasts, and on streaming platforms like Twitch.