Bio:
Chris Harder is a scholar-practitioner with a background in playwriting, acting, and burlesque performance. His current research focuses on historiographies of queer male striptease, its reciprocal relationship to the formation of queer identities, and its proximity to dominant constructions of American masculinity–or masculinitease. Chris is now in his second year in the Phd Theatre and Performance Program at the CUNY Graduate Center and previously earned an MFA in Playwriting from Hunter College and a BFA in Performance from the University of North Dakota. He has presented scholarship at the International Federation of Theater Research and the American Society for Theatre Research and has had his plays read and performed at Dixon Place, Abrons Art Center, the Laurie Beechman Theatre, The Provincetown Theatre, and Buddies in Bedtimes (Toronto). As a burlesque performer, Chris has performed in New York City since 2009 and has been a featured performer at burlesque festivals across the US as well as in London, Berlin, Stockholm, Finland, and Christchurch, New Zealand, among others. Chris currently teaches in the English and Theatre Departments at Hunter College and has also taught at the New York Film Academy. When not researching or performing, he daydreams about owning a Pomeranian. Research interests include male striptease and erotic display, the dramaturgy of American masculinity, archive praxis, and queer theatre.
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