Julie M. Burrell's research and teaching interests include African American literature, American drama, performance studies, critical race theory, black popular culture, and the literature of proletarian movements. Her manuscript, Staging Black Freedom, traces the radical, feminist roots of civil rights movement theatre in New York City in the mid-Twentieth Century. Her essay on Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun and Les Blancs appeared in Continuum: The Journal of Drama, Theatre and Performance from the African Diaspora. She is the faculty adviser for Cleveland State University's multicultural arts magazine, The Vindicator.