Annie brings experience in qualitative and quantitative research, data analysis, communications, fundraising, and project management in the cultural, literary, and higher education sectors. Her experience includes strategic planning, feasibility studies, and sustainable funding analysis for clients including the Smithsonian American Art Museum (Washington DC, USA), the New York Transit Museum (New York, USA), the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden (Washington DC, USA), and the Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center (Portland, OR).

Prior to joining AEA, she led research projects on contemporary literature, culture, and philanthropy at the University of Texas at Austin. At UT, she taught courses in American, British, and African American literature and Film Studies and co-organized the Ethnic and Third World Literatures Symposium. She also led the humanities research agenda of a National Science Foundation-funded multidisciplinary team that embedded arts methodologies into climate science visualization and communication. While in graduate school, she also worked as a Communications Consultant at the Teagle Foundation, which supports and strengthens liberal arts education, and she was a Fellow at the Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Social Justice, where she coordinated the launch of a digital archive.

She previously worked in development at arts and cultural organizations in Memphis, Tennessee, including at the National Civil Rights Museum, the Soulsville Foundation, and ArtsMemphis. In those roles, she managed fundraising campaigns, donor communications, publications, and data analysis initiatives. 

She holds a Ph.D. in English Literature from the University of Texas at Austin and a B.A. in English Literature from Rhodes College (cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa). Her writing on contemporary literature and culture has been published or is forthcoming in MELUS: Multiethnic Literature of the United States, ASAP/Journal, JSTOR Daily, The Nation, Contemporaries at Post45, The Dirt, The E3W Review of Books, Public Books, The Journal of Cultural Economy, and Lux Magazine.