Elyse Graham is a historian and professor at Stony Brook University, and the author of 3 academic books: YOU TALKIN’ TO ME?: The Unruly History Of New York English (Oxford University Press), A UNIFIED THEORY OF CATS ON THE INTERNET (Stanford University Press), and THE REPUBLIC OF GAMES (McGill-Queens University Press). She holds degrees from Princeton, Yale, and MIT, and has learned how scholars whisper, scheme, launder information, and guard secrets.