Bethany Hughes is an Assistant Professor of Native American Studies in the Department of American Culture at the University of Michigan. Her research interests (performance, race, Native plays/playwrights) are influenced by her background in which she trained as a musical theatre performer, worked as a Development Associate in not-for-profit theatre, and is an enrolled member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. She is interested in the business of theatre, the genre of musical theatre, and how aesthetic and legal performances of Native American identity shape the Native American experience. Her academic writing can be found in Theatre Survey, Theatre Research in Canada, the Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism, and forthcoming in Theatre Topics.