Elaine Miller completed her BA in Spanish and French at Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois, and her MA in Spanish and Latin American Studies at Indiana University. She completed her PhD in Spanish Language and Literature at the University of California at Los Angeles. Her fieldwork resulted in the publication of Mexican Folk Narrative from the Los Angeles Area, a Memoir of the American Folklore Society (Univ. of Texas Press, 1973).

For the past 30 years she has taught at various colleges, most recently at the State University of New York, College at Brockport , where she was Dean of the Alternate College, Director of Women's Studies, Chair of the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures, and directed a Peace Corps/College Degree Program that trained math and science majors for service in Latin America and Francophone Africa.

Ms. Miller retired in 2004, and continues to do presentations and workshops and produce videos on editorial cartooning, through e k miller Productions (www.ekmillerproductions.com). Her first video, "Running Mate: Gender and Politics in the Editorial Cartoons" (1993) is based on portrayals of Geraldine Ferraro from the 1984 Vice Presidential campaign. Her second video is titled "Drawing Conclusions: Editorial Cartoonists Consider Hilary Rodham Clinton" (1998). Both are in distribution with First Run Icarus Films. Her most recent video production is "Trailblazer: The Editorial Cartoons of Etta Hulme" (2004), is on Ms. Hulme who is the editorial cartoonist for the Ft. Worth Star-Telegram, one of the very few women in the field.