Dr. Andrea Kitta is a folklorist with a specialty in medicine, belief, and the supernatural. She is an assistant professor at East Carolina University. Her current research includes: vaccines, contagion and contamination, stigmatized diseases, disability, and health information on the Internet. Dr. Kitta is the recipient of ECU’s Teacher/Scholar Award (2015-2016), the Fearing Award for Excellence in Teaching (2010-2011), and her monograph, Vaccinations and Public Concern in History: Legend, Rumor, and Risk Perception, won the McConnell Book Award in 2012. She is co-editor for the journalContemporary Legend, the co-editor of Diagnosing Folklore and is currently working on The Kiss of Death: Contamination, Contagion, and Folklore (Utah State University Press).

Dr. Andrea Kitta, Ph.D., East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina