Rate My Professor Anita Hardeman

Anita Hardeman, Ph.D., is Professor of Musicology and Director of the School of Music in the College of Fine Arts and Communication at Western Illinois University. She joined the institution in 2012, advancing to her current professorial rank, and has held key administrative roles including Graduate Coordinator from 2019 to 2024 and interim director prior to her appointment as Director effective July 1, 2025. Before arriving at WIU, Hardeman taught at her alma mater, the University of Western Ontario, and served as a Visiting Instructor of Music at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio. She earned her Ph.D. in 2010 from the University of Western Ontario, where her dissertation, "Re-presenting Vénus: Music, Drama, and Allegory in André Campra and Antoine Danchet's Hésione," explored themes central to her scholarly work.

Dr. Hardeman's research centers on the performative intersections of text, music, staging, and dance in French opera during the 17th and 18th centuries, with particular attention to the goddess Vénus in French theatrical works. She has an article forthcoming, "Travels with Hésione: the tragédie en musique outside Paris," derived from her dissertation research, as part of a collection published by Steglein Press. Currently, she is preparing a scholarly edition of André Campra's Hésione. Hardeman has presented her research at national and international conferences across the United States, Canada, England, France, and Poland, including the Annual Meeting of the American Musicological Society and the Biennial International Conference on Baroque Music. Her publications appear in prestigious journals such as Early Music and the Journal of the American Musicological Society. In teaching, she offers graduate and undergraduate music history courses, Women and Music, and What to Listen For in Music. Recognized for her pedagogical excellence, she received the Provost's Award for Academic Excellence in Teaching in 2019, the College of Fine Arts and Communication Dean's Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2018, and the Honors College Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2016. Hardeman also advises the Beta Omicron chapter of Mu Phi Epsilon and InVoxicated, WIU's A Cappella Association.