James Ashbrook Perkins is Professor Emeritus of English and Public Relations at Westminster College, New Wilmington, Pennsylvania, where he became a faculty member in 1973 and was department chair from 2000 to 2005.
Perkins earned his BA from Centre College, Danville, Kentucky, in 1963, an MA from Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, in 1965, and a PhD from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 1972.
After receiving his doctorate, he was appointed assistant professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, in 1971.
He was a Visiting Fulbright professor in Korea, 1998, and was a National Endowment for the Humanities fellow four times, in 1978, 1981, 1987, and 1989.
Perkins was appointed Special Program Chair for the Centenary of the birth of Robert Penn Warren and was instrumental in securing the release of a stamp honoring him by the United States Postal Service; the governor of Kentucky named him a Kentucky Colonel in recognition.