From record collecting to radio, from art history to punk, pin-ups, and disciplinary-breaking work in the field of design, we bring you none other than Dr. Maria Elena Buszek. Interviewed by Punk Scholars Podcast (PSP) co-host team Jessica Schwartz and Russ Bustley, Dr. Buszek traces her love of and engagement with punk, as well as hip-hop, from a generative, albeit de-industrializing, Detroit, MI, to finding more punk community in Omaha, Nebraska. This episode helps trace the significance of a punk scholar's positional contributions to pushing disciplinary limits and grappling with the tensions between the "old guard" of and "new" critical approaches to disciplines, including the rethinking of canons and recontextualizing of work through feminist perspectives and Riot Grrrl logics.
Guest Bio.
Maria Elena Buszek, Ph.D. is a scholar, critic, curator, and Professor of Art History at the University of Colorado Denver, where she teaches courses on Modern and contemporary art and design. Her recent publications include the books Pin-Up Grrrls: Feminism, Sexuality, Popular Culture and Extra/ordinary: Craft and contemporary art; contributions to the anthologies Punkademics: The Basement Show in the Ivory Tower and Design History Beyond the Canon; catalogue essays for numerous international exhibitions; and articles and criticism in such journals as Art in America, Art Journal, Flash Art, and Punk & Post-Punk, where she also serves as an Associate Editor. With Hilary Robinson, she edited the 2019 anthology of new writing, A Companion to Feminist Art. Her current book project, Punk Feminisms: No Style But Strength, explores the feminist art and activism at punk’s roots. Dr. Buszek is also a prolific independent curator, who has previously worked at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Recent exhibitions include Danger Came Smiling: Feminist Art and Popular Music at the Franklin Street Works, Inner Ear Vision: Sound as Medium (with Raven Chacon and Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe) at the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts, and Sensitive Content (with Alayo Akinkugbe and Helen Beard) at Unit London. In 2022, Dr. Buszek was inducted into the fellowship of the University of Colorado’s President’s Teaching Scholars. The President’s Teaching Scholars Program honors faculty from the university’s four campuses who “embody teaching, scholarship, creative work and research with excellence in all.”
Links
Website: www.mariabuszek.com
IG: maria.elena.buszek
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We’d love to hear from you and are soliciting episode ideas and guests. Contact us at: punkscholarspodcast@gmail.com
The PSP theme music is excerpted from “Crows” by Watch You Drown. All rights reserved.
Season 2, Episode 3, was recorded on August 8, 2025, on Zoom with participants in the UK and the US. Russ Bestley and Jessica Schwartz co-hosted and co-produced this episode and edited the transcript, available here.
Jessica Schwartz edited the audio.
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