On‑Camera
Karen Michelle
Television · Film · Theatre
Character-driven work across leads and guest stars, with a scholar's eye for how a role sits inside the larger story being told about who gets to be onscreen.
Reel
Aug 2026
Representation
Micaela Hicks
Eris Talent Agency
(310) 467-7064
micaela@eristalentagency.com
Simon Allen
Harter Allen Agency
020 3006 2470
info@tha.agency
Television / Webseries
Unlikely Romances
Co-Star
Dhar Mann
Fated to My Forbidden Guardian
Co-Star
Sereal
Group
Co-Star
YouTube
Negative Spaces
Guest Star
Lloyd & Lee Productions
Film
Shadowed
Lead
Dash Joseph
The Dinner Guest
Lead
Britt Williams
At 17 I Died
Lead
Schmitz Productions
Julia
Supporting
Razzaaq Boykin
Homecoming
Supporting
Kyle Sykes
Life in LA
Supporting
Bash Entertainment Group
Theatre (selected)
30/60 Showcase
Lead
Two Roads Theatre
Thai Love
Woman 1
Amy V Morse
Green Juice
Nurse
Amy V Morse
Tangled
Bren
Nichole Anderson-Cobb
Training
Meisner, Self-Tape, Cold Reading
Erin Elizabeth Burns
EEB Studios
Master Class / Comedy
Gunnar Rohrbacher
Actors Comedy Studio
Advanced Intensive
Jim Nieb
Margie Haber Acting Studio
Bookers Club / Self-Tapes
DaJuan Johnson
Think Bigger Coaching
Book More TV
Christine Horn
Chocolate Superstar Productions
On-Camera Scene Study
Steve Harris
Self Tape Service
Scene Study
Cress Williams
Mosaic Acting Class
Improv
Kristin Finger
ComedySportz
Special Skills
Voice Over
Karen Michelle
Animation · Anime · Video Games · Audiobooks
A soothing, sophisticated voice with range across animation and anime, video games, and audiobooks.
Demos
Commercial1:18
Industrial1:34
Character1:30
Dialect — British RP1:08
Alternate cuts of the dialect demo (no music, 1-minute edit) are in the media/ folder alongside this page — ask to have either swapped in as the featured version.
Representation
Micaela Hicks
Eris Talent Agency
(310) 467-7064
micaela@eristalentagency.com
Simon Allen
Harter Allen Agency
020 3006 2470
info@tha.agency
Voice Over Credits
Fairytale Confidential
Guest Star
Your Story Will Be Different Prod.
True Noir
Additional Voices
Imagination Connoisseur Media
Spam Risk
Co-Star
dir. Alessandra Carlino
Voice Training
Voice-Over
Kris Carr
Speak Friend Studios
Dialects
Logan Pietz
Speak Friend Studios
Dungeons & Dialects (dialect improv)
Kris Carr & Logan Pietz
Speak Friend Studios
Voice & Dialect Skills
Academic
Dr. Karen Bowdre
Media Studies — Race, Gender & Representation on Screen
Ph.D., USC School of Cinema-Television. Research and teaching on racial mythology in American film and television, from minstrelsy through the contemporary studio system.
Education
Ph.D.
University of Southern California
School of Cinema-Television, Critical Studies
Dissertation — Racial Mythologies: African American Female Images and Representation from Minstrelsy to the Studio Era. Committee: Tara McPherson (chair), George Sanchez, Sarah Banet-Weiser
M.S.
Cornell University
Communication
Thesis — Television Viewing and Race: Are Equivalent and Representative Populations Being Compared?
M.S.
Villanova University
Human Organization Science, Concentration: Public Administration
A.B.
Princeton University
Woodrow Wilson School of Public Policy and International Affairs
Academic Appointments
Adjunct Professor · University of Southern California, Interactive Media & Games Division
Fall 2026
Introduction to Interactive Entertainment
Adjunct Professor · California State University, Dominguez Hills — Interdisciplinary Studies / PACE
Fall 2016 – 2024
Promise of the West · Visions of Los Angeles · Black Popular Culture in the Americas · Harlem Renaissance · Ethnic Representations in the Media · Global Los Angeles · LA Stories: Literature & Film of LA
Adjunct Professor · University of California, Los Angeles — Cinema and Media Studies
Fall 2018 – Spring 2022
Race and Representation · American Film History · Examining the Auteur: Contemporary Directors · Love and Laughs — An Exploration of Romantic Comedies
Adjunct Professor · Arcadia University, Department of Media and Communication
Fall 2013
Introduction to Film
Assistant Professor · Indiana University, Department of Communication and Culture
2006 – 2013
African American Media · Authorship in Film: The Films of Spike Lee · Film and Television Genres · Gender, Sexuality, and the Media · Love and Laughs — An Exploration of Hollywood Romantic Comedies · Making the Visual Literal — An Examination of Film Adaptation · Popular Culture and Celebrity · Race and Media
Teaching Assistant · USC, Program in American Studies and Ethnicity
America, the Frontier, and the New West
Lecturer · USC, Provost's Office — Academic Salon
Taught and led discussion of A Beautiful Mind for the Academic Culture Initiative's book-to-film salon
Teaching Assistant · USC, Annenberg School for Communication
Gender, Media, and Communication · Interpreting Popular Culture
Research Assistant · USC, Annenberg School for Communication
Hired and supervised a team of students to code data for Sunday Morning Talk Shows; researched and analyzed the shows with Dean Geoffrey Cowan
Graduate Assistant · Cornell University, Leadership Alliance
Graduate Assistant to the Associate Dean of Minority Affairs; mentored undergraduates through their summer research projects
Publications
Books
From Madea to Media Mogul: Theorizing Tyler Perry — co-editor, with TreaAndrea M. Russworm & Samantha N. Sheppard; foreword by Eric Pierson (University Press of Mississippi, 2016)
Shades of Love: African Americans and Hollywood Romantic Comedies — book manuscript, in progress
Book Chapters
"Spectacles and Chorines: Black Women on Stage," Milestones in Black American Theatre and Performance, eds. Monica White Ndounou & Eve Graves (Taylor & Francis, Nov. 2026)
"Poitier's Cinematic Intervention in For Love of Ivy," African American Cinema Through Black Lives Consciousness, ed. Mark Reid (Wayne State University Press, 2019)
"Spike and Tyler's Beef — Blackness, Authenticity, and Discourses of Black Exceptionalism," From Madea to Media Mogul (University Press of Mississippi, 2016)
"The Derailed Romance in Nothing But a Man," The Politics and Poetics of Black Film: Nothing But a Man, eds. Michael Martin & David Wall (Indiana University Press, 2015)
"Romantic Comedies and the Raced Body," Falling in Love Again: The Contemporary Romantic Comedy, eds. Stacey Abbott & Deborah Jermyn (I.B. Tauris, 2009)
Journal Articles
"Ida Wells-Barnett and Chicago's Pekin Theatre," Journal of American Drama and Theatre, Vol. 26, No. 3 (Winter 2014)
"Passing Films and the Illusion of Racial Equality," Black Camera, An International Film Journal, New Series, Vol. 5, No. 2, pp. 21–43 (Spring 2014)
Invited Book Reviews (6)
Race and Contention in Twenty-First Century U.S. Media, eds. Jason A. Smith & Bhoomi K. Thakore — Howard Journal of Communications, 2017
Presenting Oprah Winfrey, Her Films, and African American Literature, ed. Tara Green — Cinema Journal 53, No. 4, Summer 2014
African American Actresses: The Struggle for Visibility, 1900–1960, by Charlene Regester — Black Camera, New Series, Vol. 5, No. 1, Winter 2013
Imaging in Advertising: Verbal and Visual Codes of Commerce, by Fern Johnson — Howard Journal of Communications 23, No. 3, 2012
Blaxploitation Films of the 1970s: Blackness and Genre, by Novotny Lawrence — Black Camera, New Series, Vol. 3, No. 1, Winter 2011
The Spike Lee Reader, ed. Paula Massood — Black Camera, Vol. 22, No. 2 / Vol. 23, No. 1, Spring 2008
Areas of Interest
Academic & Professional Service
Black Camera, An International Film Journal — Reviewer
Screening Noir — Editorial Board
African/African American Caucus, SCMS — Co-chair
Committee on Undergraduate Education, Indiana University — Member
Global Media Job Search, Critical Studies, USC — Graduate Student Representative
Zdc – Critical Studies Students, USC — GPSS Representative
AFAA – African American Film Association, USC — Vice President
ACGSA, USC — President
Graduate Students of Color Network, USC — Founding Member . Provided mentorship and resources to minority graduate students; organized the Fourth Annual Graduate Student Interdisciplinary Conference, "Beyond Black & White Reception," April 2001 (350+ attendees).
Publishing Workshop — Member of the five-person graduate committee that wrote the grant proposal and administered this three-part faculty-feedback workshop
Success in College — Developed and taught this seminar for minority high school students on strategies for academic success
Conferences & Invited Talks
Selected presentations at SCMS, NCA, ATHE, and international conferences, 1998–2016.
Recognition and Disavowal: Black Female Labor and Performance in Theatre, Film, and Television — Chair & panelist, Association for Theatre in Higher Education, Chicago
Spike and Tyler's Beef — Director Discourses, Blackness, and Exceptionalism — Society for Cinema and Media Studies, Atlanta
Remembering Archetypes in Shondaland — Panelist, Association for Theatre in Higher Education, Montreal
Show all 35 talks
Teaching Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks: Forty Years and Counting — SCMS, Montreal Mar. 2015
Collaboratively Dreaming B(l)ack: A Discussion Across the Disciplines — Chair, ATHE, Scottsdale Jul. 2014
What's Happening Now?: Black Film and Genre in the Age of Obama — SCMS, Seattle Mar. 2014
Blackness and British Telefantasy — Crossroads in Cultural Studies, Paris Jul. 2012
Chicago Film Series — Invited respondent to Miriam Petty on Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, Chicago Jan. 2012
No Longer on the Periphery: Guinevere as the Future Queen of Camelot in Merlin — Alien Nation Conference, University of Northumbria, England Jul. 2011
Cinematic Representations of Racial Conflict in Real Time — Discussant, Black Film Center/Archive, Indiana University Mar. 2010
Understanding the Past and Future of African American Media — Chair, panel with Charles Burnett, Julie Dash, Barbara McCullough, Cauleen Smith & Billy Woodberry, SCMS, Los Angeles Mar. 2010
Teaching Black Film and Media Today — SCMS, Los Angeles Mar. 2010
Adaptation, Remakes, and Rom-Coms — Dept. of Communication and Culture Colloquium, Indiana University Feb. 2009
Unseen, Uncertain, and Unconventional — Chair, National Communication Association, San Diego Nov. 2008
Politics and Presidents — Panelist for screening of The Man (1972), Black Film Center/Archive, Indiana University Oct. 2008
Television to Film Adaptation: A Theoretical Exploration — Midwest Popular Culture and American Culture Associations Oct. 2008
Anatomy of a Shrew — 13th annual Sercia conference, Jaca, Spain Sep. 2008
Black Romantic Comedies — Guest lecture, USC Annenberg Nov. 2007
"Evidence of Things Not Seen": Rhetoric, Vision, and the Problem of Identity — Chair, NCA, Chicago Nov. 2007
Filmmaker Julie Dash — Introduced The Rosa Parks Story screening, Buskirk-Chumley Theater, Bloomington Oct. 2007
Adapting Shakespeare: Black and White and in Color — American Studies Association, Philadelphia Oct. 2007
Associate Instructor Workshop on Campus Climate — Panelist, Indiana University Aug. 2007
Filmmaker Spike Lee — Introduced film screening, Buskirk-Chumley Theater, Bloomington Feb. 2007
What Does Interracial Romance Alter?: Black Female Representation in Something New — NCA, San Antonio Nov. 2006
Color on Display: The Black Female Body in Performance Spaces during the Late 19th and Early 20th Century — SCMS, London Apr. 2005
The Black Female Body in Performance Spaces — Guest lecture, University of San Diego Apr. 2005
Super Bowl Spectacle: Janet, Justin and the Wardrobe Malfunction — NCA, Chicago Nov. 2004
Romantic Comedies and the Raced Body — Love Maybe: A Romantic Comedy Study Day, University of Nottingham Aug. 2004
Black What?: Historical and Theatrical Precursors to African American Chorus Girls — ATHE, New York Aug. 2003
Black Theater and Racial Discourse — NCA, Atlanta Nov. 2001
The Importance of Historical Context in Racial Discourse — Black Public Intellectuals Revisited — NCA, Seattle Nov. 2000
The Role of Black Women in the Cultural Politics of Hip Hop — African American Cultural Center, Los Angeles Feb. 2000
Lil' Kim and Foxy Brown: Images of Strength or Weakness? — NCA, Chicago Nov. 1999
Aborted Revolution: How Sweetback and She's Gotta Have It Set Black Women Back — NCA, New York Nov. 1998
Television Viewing by Race — Poster session, NCA, New York Nov. 1998
Sponsored Research, Fellowships & Grants
CAHI Summer Research Fellowship — Indiana University
OVPIA Overseas Research Grant — Indiana University
Show all 13 fellowships & grants
OVPIA Overseas Conference Fund — Indiana University Summer 2011
Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship (Alternate) — The National Academies Apr. 2011
Purdue Conference for Pre-Tenure Women Fellowship — Purdue University Sep. 2010
OVPIA Overseas Conference Fund — Indiana University Summer 2009
CAHI Summer Research Fellowship — Indiana University Summer 2007
NCA Students of Color Travel Grant — National Communication Association Fall 2004
AAUW Educational Foundation Dissertation Fellow — American Association of University Women 2003–2004
Mary Pickford Foundation Scholarship — University of Southern California 2003–2004
Center for Feminist Research Travel Grant — University of Southern California Spring 2003
Irvine Summer Dissertation Workshop Fellow — University of Southern California Summer 2002
All University Predoctoral Diversity Fellowship — University of Southern California 2002–2003
SUNY Graduate Fellowship — Cornell University 1995–1997
Presidential Graduate Minority Fellow — Villanova University 1989–1990