Alexandra graduated from Wilfrid Laurier University, in Ontario, Canada, with a combined Honours Bachelor of Music in Voice and Bachelor of Arts in Women’s Studies in 2007.  Her background as a vocalist led to an interest in how singing voices participate in the construction of social categories such as race and gender.  Her dissertation looks at social and musical relationships between white British girl singers and African American girl singers in Britain during the “swinging” 1960s. She considers the vocal performances of singers including Dusty Springfield, Lulu, Martha Reeves, and P.P. Arnold in the context of discourses of post-war renewal, focusing on issues of abjection and nostalgia.  Alexandra has presented papers at conferences including the Experience Music Project Pop Conference, Feminist Theory and Music, the annual meeting of the American Popular Culture Association, and at the UCLA Center for the Study of Women’s annual Thinking Gender conference.  Her recent paper topics include Beth Ditto and the vocalization of fatness, Lady Gaga’s visual and vocal representations of disability, punk rock spirituality in the music of the Slits, and feminist activism at girls’ rock and roll schools.

Alexandra is currently co-editor of Echo:  A music-centered journal (http://www.echo.ucla.edu), an online, peer-reviewed journal published by the graduate students in the UCLA Musicology department.  She also served as co-organizer of Echo’s annual conference in 2008 and 2009.

Alexandra’s non-school-related interests include vintage dresses, mid-century architecture, the cinematic oeuvre of Frankie Avalon and Annette Funicello, and drinking coffee.  She is quite possibly the leading authority on LA’s diners and donut shops, and has made it her personal mission to be photographed next to every giant donut-shaped building in the city.