Jan Whitt

Jan Whitt was born in poverty in Knoxville, Tennessee, and adopted five months later by fundamentalist Baptist missionaries who struggled with the demands of parenthood. Reliant upon books for escape, Whitt left home in her teens and earned a B.A. in English and journalism and an M.A. in English from Baylor University by working full time at a local newspaper. She received a Ph.D. in English from the University of Denver in 1985, and, today, she is a professor at the University of Colorado at...See more

Jan Whitt was born in poverty in Knoxville, Tennessee, and adopted five months later by fundamentalist Baptist missionaries who struggled with the demands of parenthood. Reliant upon books for escape, Whitt left home in her teens and earned a B.A. in English and journalism and an M.A. in English from Baylor University by working full time at a local newspaper. She received a Ph.D. in English from the University of Denver in 1985, and, today, she is a professor at the University of Colorado at Boulder. See less