Lee Caplan, is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of Pittsburgh. He completed his MA in Jazz History and Research at Rutgers University in 2017. He has presented at the University of Kansas, the Library of Congress, and California State University. His current research focuses on questions regarding musical semiotics, critical theory, phenomenology, historiography, and political economy. His work has appeared in the Jazz Research Journal and the Journal of the Society of American Music and has a forthcoming publication in the Journal of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music. Caplan currently instructs various interdisciplinary humanities courses at Ramapo University, Bloomfield College of Montclair State University, and the Returning & Incarcerated Student Education (RISE) with the Raritan Valley Community College. He has also taught numerous jazz history courses at Rutgers University and the University of Pittsburgh. Caplan also serves as a recruiter/liaison for local American Federation of Teachers (AFT) branches. He is currently working on a dissertation tentatively titled "Tell Them the Truth: Nathan Davis, The University Of Pittsburgh, and the Black Aesthetic Tradition."