The old truism insists that opposites attract, but according to DePaul International Studies professors Shiera Malik and Jacob Stump, parallel interests and intersecting work lives can be just as much of a binding force.

“We work in different areas, but we have a shared language,” Malik said of her relationship with Stump.

These scholarly spouses teach in the same college and the same department at DePaul. Their professional commonalities make for built-in common ground.

“We studied a lot of the same thinkers, and so we have ideas about how the world is socially constructed,” Malik said. “We kind of arrange our lives with the acknowledgement that we can build the marriage in any way that we want.”

Malik and Stump met at an international relations conference in 2013. At the time, Malik was a professor at DePaul while Stump was a professor at Shepherd University in West Virginia.

“I was very smitten,” Stump said, trying not to giggle. “I was very smitten, very fast.”

The pair wed in 2015, the same year Stump got a job at DePaul. But it was not necessarily easy finding two professor jobs in the same city.

“We had what’s called, in the industry, a two-body problem,” Malik said. “When two people are married in academia, it’s hard to get jobs in the same place.”

But lucky for the pair, Stump was able to join DePaul’s International Studies faculty.

Lexa Murphy, dean of the College of Communication, and Chris Solis-Green, distinguished writer in residence and the director of writing and publishing in DePaul’s English department, are another Blue Demon power couple.

The pair met at a bar in Salt Lake City while they were each in graduate courses at the University of Utah. They began their relationship before either of them had seriously considered entering the field of academia.

“Lexa was a flight attendant when she was getting her master’s in communication,” Solis-Green said. “And I became a high school English teacher for a while, so it wasn’t clear that we were heading into academia.”

Murphy said that she and Solis-Green have been lucky to evolve on parallel tracks since their relationship began over 30 years ago.

“We were able to grow together,” Murphy said. “We were able to kind of find ourselves, and it allowed us to find ourselves in a way that really kept us connected.”

Growing with each other is a key aspect of Malik and Stump’s successful partnership as well.

“In a long relationship, … there needs to be space for you to grow and change,” Malik said. “Life works in lots of different ways; you’re not the same person at 20 or 30 or 40 or 50.”

Though each couple shares similar lifestyles, it sounds like “growing together” must also involve diverse interests and complementary talents.

For instance, Stump said he recently started riding motorcycles. Sometimes he’ll ride his motorcycle to work while Malik walks to DePaul’s Lincoln Park Campus to enjoy some quiet contemplative moments.

“There’s a lot of things that enrich a relationship, and similarities are one of them, but having the kind of interests that allow people to expand out is also good for a couple,” Stump said.

While Malik and Stump teach in the same college and the same department, Murphy and Solis-Green are rarely on the same side of town, with the College of Communication based in the Loop and the English department based in Lincoln Park.

Despite their different academic concentrations, Solis-Green said he appreciates when Murphy reviews his poetry with her keen communication studies skills.

“I always trust her opinions about any of my poems or anything I’m up to,” Solis-Green said. “She’s a really good trustee reader, and I’d probably be a jealous husband if you were also a poet, because you’d probably be better than me.”

Clearly a jokester, Solis-Green added that though he may not have a PhD in English, he has a “PhD in love.”

Throughout our conversation, Murphy and Solid-Green’s new puppy Benny made a few adorable appearances. Solis-Green said having a puppy is a great way to keep a relationship exciting.

Before they got married, Malik and Stump asked an older couple of married DePaul professors (who have since retired) for advice.

Malik said these professors passed on wise words about maintaining a long term relationship.

“Both of them said you have to treat each other with grace,” Malik recalled.

As they grow together as academics and as life partners, Malik and Stump strive to meet each other where they are at and give each other grace.

“You have to be able to maneuver the relationship to accommodate the new needs,” Malik said. “It’s different from the kind of togetherness that you start with, or the kind of togetherness that we think of relationships when we’re much younger.”

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