Professor Catanese is a distinguished scholar of African American Studies and Theater, Dance, and Performance Studies whose research focuses on race, performance, and representation. Her book Racial Transgressions: Colorblindness, Multiculturalism, and Black Performance reconceptualizes the cultural and political meanings of race in contemporary performance and media, and her editorial leadership as Editor of Theatre Survey helped expand the field's engagement with underrepresented histories and voices. Through this and other work, she has advanced new frameworks for understanding how performance shapes conversations about race, identity, and social change.
Catanese is also an exceptional teacher and mentor. In courses on African American life and culture and seminars on Black performance and theater history, she guides students in critically examining racialized representation as sites of critique, experimentation, and joy in contemporary culture while simultaneously cultivating imaginative approaches to social transformation. As faculty coordinator of Berkeley's Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program since 2009, she has helped design and steward one of the campus's most impactful mentoring pathways for underrepresented students pursuing doctoral study, integrating rigorous academic training with a deep pedagogy of care.
Since 2020, she has served as Associate Dean in the Graduate Division, overseeing roughly $100 million in annual graduate student funding, leading the restructuring of university fellowships including the Chancellor's Fellowship with a focus on equity and accessibility, and centering the needs of vulnerable students in every policy decision. Catanese has also served as Faculty Equity Advisor for over a decade across both her home departments, creating initiatives such as the TDPS Sounding Board and contributing to faculty searches, graduate admissions, and climate efforts. Across all of this work, she demonstrates deep integrity, calm and deliberative leadership, and a rare ability to navigate contentious moments with compassion, clarity and collective care.