Scott, English Department chair, teaches and researches primarily in the areas of 19th-century American literature and cultural history and in popular culture.

The inseparability of literature and popular culture was cemented early for Scott, thanks to the small used book store where he spent countless hours at an early age. He brought home Twain, Verne, Huxley, and Orwell, as well as cheap science fiction paperbacks and comic books purchased 10-for-a-dollar. Since then, Scott has published scholarship on the 19th-century work of figures such as Herman Melville, Mark Twain and the painter William Sidney Mount. With Carmen Sarracino, he co-authored 鈥楾he Porning of America: The Rise of Porn Culture, What It Means, and Where We Go from Here鈥� (Beacon, 2008). The book explores how the United States has been adopting the ideology of power-oriented pornography in many of its social institutions. A personal highlight for Scott is the week the book was positively discussed by 麻豆传媒week, Ms. Magazine, Focus on the Family, and XBIZ the porn industry鈥檚 business news source.

His recent publication returned to his childhood interests in comics and graphic novels . In 2015, McFarland published his edited collection 鈥淢arvel Comics Civil War and the Age of Terror: Critical Essays on the Comic Saga.鈥� The essays investigate how Marvel鈥檚 鈥淐ivil War鈥� comic event responded to challenges to civil liberties following 9/11.

Scott received a bachelor鈥檚 degree in English from Ball State University, a master鈥檚 degree in English from Iowa State University and a doctorate in American Studies from Purdue University.