About Me

I am currently Chair of the Department of Human Sciences and Director of Gerontology at Marylhurst University (outside of Portland, OR). I joined the faculty as an adjunct member of the Master of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies program in 1997 and since that time, I’ve been involved in designing many on-campus and web-based courses and programs for adult learners, including in Gerontology. As an undergraduate I attended Willamette University, graduating Cum Laude in Psychology and Music; my interdisciplinary graduate studies at University of Oregon and Oregon State University focused on the Human Sciences, with specialization areas in adult development and aging, women’s studies, and critical social theory and alternative research methodologies. My dissertation became part of a book published in 1996 and co-authored with Dr. Janet Lee–Blood Stories: Menarche and the Politics of the Female Body in Contemporary US Society. Over the past fifteen years I have been involved in inquiry in the areas of creativity in later life; older women’s embodiment; sexuality and aging; critical Gerontological theory; transformational adult learning practices; and cross-generational collaborative inquiry. In 2012 I co-authored, with Harry R. Moody, the text Aging: Concepts and controversies.

I live in Portland, Oregon with my daughter Isobel Coen and our dog Happenstance and in the same neighborhood as my mom, Susan Hotz.  I have been on the planet for 46 years.