The Joel Roache Papers document Roache’s research and activism during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. The collection dates from 1961 to 2008 and includes Roache’s academic work, his collected works of other academics, photographs, and other publications and documents pertaining to activism on both the local and national levels.

Joel Roache was born in 1941 and attended Eastern High School in Middletown, Kentucky. During his upperclassmen years in high school, he took classes at the University of Louisville, where he attended after graduation and received his bachelor's in English in 1962. Roache attended the University of Pennsylvania from 1962-1966, earning his PhD. After graduating, Roache served as an assistant professor in the English Department at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, from 1967-1968. Roache was also a visiting professor in the English Department at Clark University during this time. From 1968-1971, Roache worked as a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he took part in local activism pertaining to tenant rights, graduate Teaching Assistants' rights, and local county politics. Roache left the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1971 and started working at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore in 1972. While at UMES, Roache taught classes pertaining to civil rights in literature, and Afro-American literature. He also focused on literature surrounding feminism and Marxism.

This collection contains academic work, records, and notes from Joel Roache's time as a professor. It also contains flyers, pamphlets, newspapers, and other media relating to activism. Roache’s topics of interest include: civil rights, feminism, unions, tenant rights, and privacy rights. Materials in the collection date from 1961 to 2008 and are divided into two series: Series 1: Academic Papers and Series 2: Publications.

Within the academic papers, there exist items relating to Roache's activism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, which were in regard to Teaching Assistants' bargaining and demands. Found within the "TAA" folder, the content includes typed correspondence between students and the English Department, and reports from the department outlining actions being taken to dissolve the undergraduate English Department. The folder also contains publications from the Teaching Assistant Association (TAA), the TA union, in which they respond to the University reports and continue to list their grievances. For information related to local activism within the Madison, Wisconsin community, see the informational booklets 'Dane County Power Structure' and 'Our Tax', which detail struggles within the local government of Madison, Wisconsin, during Roache's time there between 1968-1971, and the local newspaper titled The Daily Cardinal (1970). Throughout the academic papers, there are also newspapers, correspondence, and publications detailing Roache's activism at the University of Maryland Eastern Shore. In particular, there exist booklets detailing the demands and recommendations from the student body to the University of Maryland in 1970. Informational pamphlets and newsletters within the collection also detail Roache's life within the local community in Maryland, relating to topics such as tax reform and tenants' rights. The rest of the newspapers, correspondence, and printed publications, relate to Roache's interest in national politics, beginning at his career start in the 1960s, up until the early 2000s.  

The collection is arranged into two series: Series 1: Academic Papers and Series 2: Publications. Series 1: Academic Papers was originally arranged in two sections: the first half did not have a discernible order, while the second half was organized alphabetically.  

Series 1: Academic Papers, contains the works, records, photographs, pamphlets, etc, that Roache kept, ranging from 1961 up to 2008. Documents from Roache’s time as a student at the University of Pennsylvania, and as a faculty member at the University of the Holy Cross, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and at University of Maryland Eastern Shore show Roache’s activity as an activist within his local community. Also included are correspondence pertaining to TA vs Faculty disputes at Wisconsin Madison in 1969 and student demands at UMES in 1970.

Series 2: Publications, contains various books and chapters written by Roache, as well as other literature he collected on American poets, sociology, and various academic journals.