Joy is Professor Emerita of American Studies at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and was chair of that department for ten years. Her research interests include American literature, American art, and American popular culture, and she won several teaching awards before retiring. She and her husband, John, have lived in Chapel Hill for more than 50 years. She has served on the Boards of Durham Academy, the University of North Carolina Press, the Center for Documentary Studies, and on advisory Boards for the Ackland Art Museum and Reynolda House. She has two grown children and three grandchildren. Her own Jewish education took place in Highland Park, Illinois, where she grew up.
This is Joy’s first year of her first two-year term.