Max Rayneard
Honors College Faculty
Associate Director, Creative Work
Email: mjrayneard@uh.edu
Max Rayneard completed his bachelor’s degree in English and philosophy and his master’s degree in English literature at Rhodes University in South Africa. He lectured at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University in South Africa. Rayneard earned a doctorate degree in comparative literature at the University of Oregon. His dissertation was entitled "Performing Literariness: Literature in the Event in South Africa and the United States." While at the University of Oregon, he co-created the process and aesthetic for what would become The Telling Project, a national performing arts non-profit that stages stories told by veteran and war-adjacent populations. In 2011, Rayneard was appointed a visiting assistant professor in English at Colgate University, where he taught Anglophone African Literature. In 2014, he was appointed the senior writer/producer and director of Research and Outcomes for The Telling Project. Rayneard has written and/or directed productions across the United States, including such venues as The Library of Congress, The Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, and the Alley Theatre. He is the recipient of a number of awards and grants, including a Fulbright Scholarship (2004-2006), a University of Texas at Austin Humanities Institute Community Sabbatical Grant (2015-2016), a Pulsar award for “Best Original Script” for Telling, Lansing (2016), and a National Endowment for the Humanities Grant for "Planting the Oar," a literature-based discussion series between military veterans and civilians (2016-2018). Rayneard joined the Honors College in fall of 2018, teaching in the Human Situation course and the Medicine & Society minor.