About
Anthony is a first-year PhD student and Rackham Merit Fellow in the English Language and Literature program. His work attends to representations of disability in contemporary narratives of illness. Driven by lived experiences navigating a variety of exclusionary and ableist institutions as a disabled person, he engages disability studies, critiques of political economy, and biopolitical theory to examine how disability narratives both reflect and resist the management of disabled lives under neoliberal capitalism. He is particularly interested in how disabled characters articulate experiences of exhaustion, care, dependency, and bodily precarity, within systems that condition bodily autonomy and social value on economic productivity. He aims to challenge institutionally and culturally embedded frameworks that position disabled bodies as economically deficient and socially disposable, while exploring alternative understandings of care, dependency, and social belonging beyond neoliberal notions of value.
Anthony's commitment to disability advocacy extends far beyond the realm of academic inquiry and is rooted in long-standing community engagement. For more than fifteen years, he served as an ambassador for the Children's Diagnostic & Treatment Center in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, helping raise millions of dollars to cover comprehensive care for economically disadvantaged children with conditions including autism, ADHD, cerebral palsy, and HIV. At Michigan, he remains dedicated to advancing accessibility and inclusion while fostering solidarity across marginalized groups both within and beyond the university.
Before coming to Michigan, Anthony completed his undergraduate studies at Florida International University in Miami as a first-generation college student. While at FIU, he was selected as the tenth Butler Waugh Scholar, an honor awarded annually to the English Department’s most promising literary scholar, and received the Theodore and Vivian Johnson Scholarship, which recognizes high-achieving students with disabilities. He also received a CASE Outstanding Academic Achievement Award for excellence in literary study and was named a CASE Outstanding Graduate for the Class of 2025.
