Leslie W. Lewis is Dean of the School of Humanities and Sciences and Professor of English. Her current projects focus on integrative learning and liberal education, and on sustainable farming as a metaphor for higher education. A long-term project focuses on the science fiction of African American writer Octavia Butler.

Telling Narratives is her latest book (University of Illinois Press, 2007). William L, Andrews, editor of The Literature of the American South: A Norton Anthology, says: "A provocative unveiling of secrets in African American literature from the mid-nineteenth century through the 1920s. Uncovering what was and is at stake in the discourse of secrecy in African American literature and culture, Lewis helps readers see its grounding in 'master-female slave moments.' The analysis of interracial and sexual secrets is enlightening and instructive."